Our route to Yosemite Valley took us over Tioga Pass and our first stop was at Tuolumne Meadows. We parked the car and walked through the meadows to take in our first views of the National Park. This was a really beautiful spot and we encountered our first up close experience with wildlife - there was a coyote prowling the meadows looking for food (thankfully not us!) not too far from where we were walking. There were also a heap of ground squirrel everywhere (they kept popping there heads up out of their hiding spots and looked a bit like mini meerkats), which is what I'm guessing the coyote was looking for!
Our next stops were at Tenaya Lake and then further along at Olmsted Point, which had views back to Tenaya Lake and also into Tenaya Canyon where we got our first glimpse of Half Dome. From there it was about an hour drive to Yosemite Valley and our first stop at Tunnel View where you can see a great view looking through the valley. It was then onto Bridalveil Falls where we took a short hike out to see the falls - this late in summer there wasn't much falling but enough to get the idea! From here we stopped in briefly at the visitors centre and then parked our car at the start of the trail for our hike to Mirror Lake. The round trip on the trail was about 3kms and it was a pretty easy hike. Unfortunately when we reached the lake, there wasn't much lake to see! Again, given it is quite late in the summer, the lake had mostly dried up so we didn't get to see the full impact of the "mirror" part of the lake. It was still a really nice view and walk though. By the time we got back to the car, it was getting later in the afternoon, so we made our final stop to take some pictures of El Capitan on the way out and then hit the road for the drive back to San Francisco.
It was a pretty painful drive home, and after experiencing the peak hour traffic on our way into San Francisco the week before, we decided to try and avoid it as much as possible, So we stopped in at some outlets just outside of the city to take a break and have some dinner, before heading to our hotel near the airport.
Here are some photos from our time in Yosemite:
Tuolumne Meadows
Tenaya Lake
Olmstead Point
Tunnel View
Bridalveil Falls
Hike to Mirror Lake
Yep - that's a duck in the photo (first one I've seen all trip)!
El Capitan
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