Dateline: November 9, 2016, Trumpocalypse 2016
Today is 11/9. It feels like 9/11. Gray skies, chill breeze, a country brought to its knees by its own actions. We have elected a man so stunningly unprepared to lead us, so small, so small-minded, so mean, so stunted. I fear for our nation. I fear for the Earth. I can’t speak, can barely write, can’t imagine the future in a positive light. We must stand up and fight, oppose, make our voices heard, love each other, refuse to descend into the caves of misogyny, xenophobia, and narcissism. But that will have to wait until tomorrow.
Time to do the blog. Ok, that means I need a framing device. I’m glad that I got to visit so many National Parks this summer during the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service. Why? Because I am sure that Donald J. Trump is going to allow corporations to start naming the parks and using them for cross-marketing. Google Yosemite Park, Yahoo! the Grandest of Canyons. And mining will be allowed along the banks of the Colorado River as it traverses Yahoo Canyon.
Stand up! Fight! Oh wait, write. Someday soon you might not remember where you’ve been and what you’ve done, so write this blog for you. No one else will read it.
State 21:California
Dateline: July 1-4, Yosemite National Park, 34 miles total, Clouds Rest Summit, 14 miles
My brother, Matt, and his family live in Oakland, California. Aware of my quest and that I was fully recovered from my first breast surgery, Matt and Colleen invited me to join them as Yosemite for Fourth of July weekend. Fourth of July, you know, when we celebrate the Declaration of Independence, we hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal. And when I meet Thomas Jefferson, I’m gonna compel him to include women in the sequel. ( Hamilton strikes again, in parentheses..) Evidently, he should have mentioned it right from the beginning..
After a few days in Sacramento exploring the Statehouse and Old Town, I drove to Yosemite and hiked about five miles at Hetch Hetchy, the seldom- visited twin valley to Yosemite which was flooded in the early twentieth century to provide water to San Francisco, over the vehement objections of John Muir. Despite the damn dam, the valley is still beautiful and well worth a visit. One can hike in near solitude there even in high season, right up under Wapama Falls.
I saw a couple of backpackers in the Hetch parking lot at 9 am, but that was about it. I crossed the dam and entered the dark tunnel leading to the Wapama Falls hike. Every step I took altered the view. Every blink of the eye was a new vista. wildflowers thrived in tiny crevices between the rocks, and the only sound was the gradually building roar as I approached the falls.
The hike of 5 or so miles was not difficult, but it was hot, and the mist roiling over the bridge at the base of the falls was a welcome relief. At times, the water runs so high here with snowmelt that people are swept away. Not so this day, but I could feel the power, a wind generated by the cascade.
Something tells me we will be lucky to have the next intrusion into our national parks end as benignly as the damming of Hetch Hetchy, but eventually all the people who remember how the parks used to look will be dead. Surely that will mute the negative effect on future generations. They won’t know what they’re missing, so who cares? Pave paradise, put up a parking lot.
Hike one done and dusted, me fried and dusty, I decided to head into Yosemite Valley at noon on July 1. I got past the entrance gate with my annual pass with no delay, but the Valley was a mob scene. I felt like Elmer Fudd chasing that wascally wabbit: which way should I go? Which way should I go? I ended up walking over to Bridalveil Falls and then had a brainstorm. Why not make it a waterfall day? Oh look, there’s a trail called Yosemite Falls. It’s ok that I haven’t eaten, it’s ok that I have just arrived at 5,500 feet, it’s ok that it’s 95 degrees and I’ve already done 5 miles. This will be fun. Especially since Yosemite Falls is the tallest waterfall in the contiguous United States.
I was about as prepared as Donald J. Trump is for his next job. I was woefully inadequate. But unlike him, I realized that if I proceeded on my chosen course, I was likely to run into disaster in the ensuing days. I stopped. I reconsidered. I backed away from the figurative and the real precipice. Unfortunately, people with his mental illness never do.
A lovely drink at the world famous Ahwahnee Hotel (renamed The Majestic due to some ridiculous corporate thing (See warnings in paragraph 3, above.)), and then I met my bro at the brandy new Rush Creek Resort just outside the park gates and had a terrific buffet meal poolside and chatted up my nieces.
Day Two featured a hike with the girls to May Lake and beyond, onto the slopes of 12,000 foot Mt. Hoffman. Our group split up at that point and Matt and I headed for the summit ridge, which was a bit too much for the girls. The two of us have summit fever to a certain degree. I also have a fear of heights, and I was, like, ok, you go ahead, I don’t really have to climb those boulders and get to the tippy top and see the 7,000 foot drop off the other side. But two women who were about to make the attempt said, oh no, come on, you got this far. And don’t let anyone tell you women can’t do anything they set their minds to, (yup, even win the popular vote for President of the dis- United States despite being too competent to be popular) because we did it, and shared the summit space with this marmot. He kept us occupied taking pictures while his partner in crime was chewing up Matt’s brand new pack and my hiking poles. Marmots need salt, and they get it from eating sweaty gear. Opportunistic little rodents. Like some politicians.
July 3 was the day of the requisite dawn assault. Matt and I left before dawn to drive to the trailhead for Cloud’s Rest, a 14 mile out and back hike to the top of, well, Cloud’s Rest, which looks down on Half Dome. It’s not as high as Mount Hoffman, but it is a major hike in and out. We started the climb about 6:30 am, as I remember.The sun was barely up in the valley. It was cool and dry, and the trail was nearly deserted. Wildflowers, boulder fields, steeps, switchbacks, skinned knees, bathroom breaks off trail, and the sound of our breathing underscoring the birdsong. Matt is tall and strong, and the pace was a challenge for me. So fun.
Every mountain seems to end in a rock scramble. Matt captured this shot of me striding confidently toward the summit…
and this one of me suddenly feeling exposed and crouching feebly toward my feet.
The view from Cloud’s Rest down into the valley was worth the momentary terror. Half Dome is left of center, people ascending the cables like ants.
The final day, July 4, we hiked out to a waterfall and swim along the Evergreen road called Carlon Falls. I hadn’t hiked with young children for quite a few years, and doing so reminded me that a slower pace is not a lesser pace; it is just different. It reveals details best savored slowly. After we said our goodbyes, I headed back to Hetch and did one final 2 mile hike on the ridge before driving back to Sacramento to catch my flight home.
Yosemite is vast and varied, and surely one of the crown jewels of our public lands. May they be forever public. I honestly don’t know what will become of them.
Sorry to be so negative but this is a terrible horrible no good very bad day. My memories of Yosemite are fading with time and more travel and final goodbyes, and they are tainted by my fears for its future.
