Yosemite Trails

YOSEIilTE TRAILS J ' SMEATONrCHASE Class cui Book Z^Ei Copyiightl^". COPYRIGHT DEPOSITS ^p 3r« ^meaton Cl)afiie YOSEMITE TRAILS. Illustrated. CONE-BEARING TREES OF THE CALIFORNIA MOUNTAINS. YOSEMITE TRAILS (Pase oi HALF-DOME FROM THK KAM YOSEMITE TRAILS CAMP AND PACK-TRAIN IN THE YOSEMITE REGION OF THE SIERRA NEVADA BY J. SMEATON CHASE WITH ILLUSTRATIONS FROM PHOTOGRAPHS AND A MAP BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY MDCCCCXI 'i COPYRIGHT, 191 1, BY J, SMEATON CHASE ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Published March jqii < ^-^ \V G(.A28.3415 TO FREDERICK OLIVER POPENOE OF ALTADENA, CALIFORNIA AT WHOSE SUGGESTION THE EXPEDITIONS OF WHICH THIS VOLUME IS THE RESULT WERE UNDER- TAKEN, THIS ADVENTURE OF A FIRST BOOK IS BY THE AUTHOR COR- DIALLY INSCRIBED PREFACE THE following pages are the outcome of three journeys, two of them of considerable length, through the Yosemite region of the Sierra Nevada, and of a resulting desire to acquaint the nature-lov- ing public with the attractions more particularly of the less known areas of the locality. The writer has preferred not to limit his work to the specific uses of a guide-book, but has allowed a natural propensity for a loose rein and discursive observation to dictate its range; with the result, he hopes, of a gain in variety and interest both to the general reader and to the prospective and retrospective wayfarer in the region. The volume will be found, however, to have also much of the value of a guide-book for the travel- ler on the ground, and with this point in view it is furnished with a map. Especially it has been the design of the writer to direct the attention of mountaineers and lake-lovers to the fact, almost unknown even among devotees of the out-of-doors, that there exists in the Sierra Nevada a lake-land of incomparable richness and peculiar di- versity of charm : where lakes are sprinkled like stars, exceeding the possibility of distinguishing them by name. The time is coming when the highlands of this via PREFACE great Californian range, which it is not too grandiose to call the Alps of our country, with its superb features of mountain, forest, river, glacier, lake, and meadow, and lying under a climate of unequalled regularity and perfection, will be the playground of America. It is largely the purpose of this volume to expedite the day. Los AxGELEs, California. CONTENTS PART I : YOSEMITE AND THE SEQUOIAS I. A General Survey of the Yosemite Val- ley 3 II. The Principal Rock-Features of the Val- ley 15 III. Some Observations on the Nomenclature OF THE Valley 27 IV. A Circuit of Yosemite Rim : Fort Monroe TO the Little Yosemite 37 V. A Circuit of Yosemite Rim : The Little Yosemite to the Tuolumne Meadows . 55 VI. A Circuit of Yosemite Rim : The Tuolumne Meadows to Yosemite Falls .... 72 VII. A Circuit of Yosemite Rim : Yosemite Falls to the Big Oak Flat Road . 91 VIII. Th£ Forests of the Yosemite Region . .103 IX. The Great Sequoias 126 X. The Wawona Country 144 XI. Rafaelito : An Interlude 169 X CONTENTS PART II : THE HIGH SIERRA XII. The High Sierra :,The Yosemite Valley TO the Hetch-Hetchy 187 XIII. The High Sierra : The Hetch-Hetchy to THE TiLL-TILL 211 XIV. The High Sierra : The Till-till to Lake Benson 229 XV. The High Sierra : Lake Benson to Lake Tenaya 246 XVI. Bodie: ''Well, Sir — " 264 XVII. The High Sierra : Lake Tenaya to Mono 282 XVIII. The High Sierra : Mono to Gem Lake . 306 XIX. The High Sierra: Gem Lake to the Little Yosemite 326 Index 347 ILLUSTRATIONS Half-Dome from the East (page 339) Froiitispiece^^ The Yosemite Falls 8«^ The Yosemite Valley 12^ The Sentinel 20*^ The Half-Dome 26 t^ Cathedral Peak 68 U- A Mountain Meadow in the Forest Belt . 94^/ The Great Seqtljoias 128*^ A Trail in the Wawona Forest 152 iX El Capitan from the Big Oak Flat Road . iSS*^ The Hetch-Hetchy 202 "^ Our Lake in Jack Main Canon 234 ^ Mount Dana and Jessie Lake 288 1^ Looking Eastward from Mount Dana, Mono Lake in the Distance 292/^ Rush Creek and the Crest of the Sierra. 314 Mount Lyell with its Glacier 320 -^ Map 346' The illustrations are from photographs (most of which were made especially for this book) by the Pillsbury Picture Company, of San Francisco, California, with the exception of a few by the author. PART I YOSEMITE AND THE SEQUOIAS ''Mother of marvels, mysterious and tender Nature, " why do we not live more in thee ? Amiel. YOSEMITE TRAILS CHAPTER I A GENERAL SURVEY OF THE YOSEMITE VALLEY THE YOSEMITE VALLEY is not, properly speak- ing, a valley. That word conveys the image of a gentle depression with sloping sides, which the patient fingers of Time have smoothed and rounded into quiet, compliant lines. The Yosemite is not in the least of that character. It is a great cleft, or chasm, which one might imagine to have been the work of some exasperated Titan who, standing with feet planted fifty miles apart lengthwise of the Sierra Ne- vada summit and facing westward, raised his hands palm to palm over his head, and struck upon the earth with such fury as to cleave a gap nearly a mile in depth ; then separating his hands he thrust back the sides of the fracture, leaving between them a nar- row, precipice-walled plain. The Act of Congress of 1864 by which the tract was granted to the State of California defined it as "the * cleft ^ or * gorge' in the granite peak of the " Sierra Nevada mountain ; and it would have been better if in the early descriptions of the spot it had been referred to as the Yosemite Gorge, which would 4 YOSEMITE TRAILS have more properly described it and also would have been more stimulating to the imagination than the tamer designation which is now, no doubt, securely fixed upon it. In what may be called its aesthetic sense, however, " the word valley" answers well enough ; for the level enclosed between the walls is a sheltered tract of the richest verdure, mixed of forest and meadow, watered by a wandering and placid river, starred with flowers, and the paradise of birds and friendly, harmless crea- tures. It is greatly in this contrast between the grandeur and severity of the encircling walls and the sylvan charm of the protected enclosure that the unique character of Yosemite consists. It is as if Nature had here put herself to show a parable of contrasted excel- lences, setting the stern heights and solemn silences of the cliffs against the soft demeanor and gentle voices of trees and flowers, streams and heavenly meadows ; and to marry them together she pours the great waterfalls, in whose cloudy graces majesty and loveliness are so mingled that one cannot tell which of the two delights him the more. The valley — I shall use the term which custom has fixed — may be said to begin, on the west, where the Bridal Veil Fall pours down over the southern cliff, and to end at the conspicuous pillar or buttress of the northern wall that is called the Washington Column ; at which point the cafions of the main Mer- ced River and the Tenaya Creek converge. Within SURVEY OF THE YOSEMITE VALLEY 5 these limits the valley is about six miles long and has an average width of about half a mile. Its general di- rection is east and west, crosswise to the axis of the mountain chain which it cleaves. The ** floor" is re- markably level, and lies at an elevation of almost exactly four thousand feet. At the point where, in following upwards the course of the Merced River, this altitude is reached, the caiion opens, while at the same time the walls, which along the whole course of the river since leaving the plain of the San Joaquin have been first hilly and then mountainous, become high and precipitous cliffs, des- titute of trees or brush except as regards the talus at their feet, the huge blocks and cubes of which give footing to a chaparral of flowering brush interspersed with oaks, maples, and platoons of indomitable pines. The level plain lies between, a long glade through which the quiet river makes its way, winding leisurely from side to side, more like some thoughtful lowland stream than what it is, — the nervous, quick-breathing child of glacier and mountain-chasm. A growth of willows and poplars marks its course, contrasting their summer green or winter lavender against the sombre richness of the evergreens. Every observant person will be struck at first sight by what he will later find to be the salient geological feature of the whole Yosemite region, — the curved, rind-like forms of the layers of rock of which these mountains are built. A rough image of this can be made by placing the open hands one upon the other, 6 YOSEMITE TRAILS the palms downward and considerably concaved ; or, if the reader will excuse the violence of the illustra- tion, a granite onion of mountain size would well represent the formation. This peculiar structure is clearly seen in the domes of the upper plateau, while on the faces of the cliffs it is exhibited in arch-shaped recesses where masses of the lower strata have become detached and fallen away. The most noticeable instance of this occurs on the northern face of the wall at a point just to the west of the Washington Column. Immense fractures and displacements of rock have there produced natural arches that are very remarkable in their vast span and deep recession.

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