1st Disappointing Yosemite Hike

[BlackMagicPanther]

I'd like to start off saying that I am an avid hiker, as I am out on one of the many trails in California at least once a month. The main focus of my training is to be able to hike longer and farther, since I love it so much.

I also love Yosemite more than anywhere in the world. It is truly spectacular, and I fell in love with the place when the waterfalls weren't flowing much at all. The geology of it is a sight to see in and of itself. This year alone I have been 10 times, with the highlight being making it to Clouds Rest, which looks down on Half Dome (it's my avatar).

However, I just went this past Monday as the last day of my vacation and I was looking forward to not being around people too much. So, I took one of the lesser traveled hikes. With Tioga Road being closed due to snow (I couldn't see any from on top of Sentinel Dome or Glacier Point, so I don't know why), my choices were limited. I did the Sentinel Dome hike, which I have done before, and it was it's usual good hike. Lots of fun and very beatiful. However, my second hike was to a place called Inspiration Point. Whoever called the place Inspiration Point must have been high.

It is actually the hardest hike that I have done in Yosemite. It has 37 switchbacks for only a 1.3 mile hike, which is pretty bad. I believe there is only one other trail in the park that is worse, which is to the top of Yosemite Falls, and I intend to do that one next year. The hike was totally uphill, there was about a total of 9 feet that was flat terrain. The trail also has several places that used to be trails that go off of it that are no longer maintained, but not clearly marked, so there were several points where I missed the turn to continue up to Inspiration Point and had to backtrack.

Along the trail there are four breaks in the tree line, so you can get a higher view of the four points (El Cap, Clouds Rest, Half Dome, and Bridalveil Falls) that everyone stops at the Wawona Tunnel Parking Lot to take pictures of. It really is quite a view, but it's very accessible from the parking lot. So, as I keep going up and up, I am thinking that Inspiration Point is going to offer a picture that I want (I have over 3600 pics from Yosemite) of both Bridalveil and Ribbon Falls together. I know that somewhere up there, it is definitely possible. However, as I continue along, the switchbacks are going further and further away from that possibility as the trail progresses west more than east. There are a few shots of Silver Streak Falls, which a waterfall almost no one ever sees cuz they never both to look in south east from the parking lot below, but the fact is that's not why I was on the trail. So, after about an hour of uphill hiking, I finally come through the trees to a wide open space that should be a nice meadow with a sign post that faces towards the parking lot with the same miles on it. I had reached Inspiration Point. What should have been a nice meadow turns out to be a paved road (no idea where it goes or where it came from since it isn't on any maps) that circles around a couple small groupings of trees. As I walked around I found a fire pit and obviously laid out sand for a campground, though it's not listed on any map as a campground.

By this time I am very disappointed, cuz I don't think anything like this should be done to a beautiful place like Yosemite. There are tons of places in the park that used to be campgrounds, but they weren't paved over. So, I figure after a few minutes, it's called Inspiration Point, cuz there is going to be a spectacular view of something up here. So, I walk around the campground for about ten minutes checking all possible sightlines for a picture. Not a one. Everything is blocked by the treeline. There was only one sign post for another trail out of this place, but the two locations on it that weren't Glacier Point aren't listed on any maps either. I figured, what the hell, I'm up here and the picture I want is still up here somehwere. I went about half a mile before I hit a couple more switchbacks heading west instead of east, so I decided to call it a day. On the way down I got to see massive squirrels and of course the same pics that I already could have taken from the parking lot.

It was still Yosemite, and it was still a trail that I had never done before, so it was good. I liked it, but I was disappointed. I guess there is a first for everything.

[ghost_wolf]

I usually have the same bad experience just walking around my city or hiking in the countryside. They're make changes on beautiful places and screw up in almost every case. The people who sitting in the rooms of the top like wouldn't have any sense of these things and sometimes acting like a bull in a china-shop.

Thats why we read the sad stories like this.

(sorry for my poor English)

[FitnessStrengthTraining]

This is akin to the people building houses that they don't live in - they put thermostats in places that are not the prime spot, and intake vents where they won't utilize the optimum air flow. Just like that - Inspiration Point was not inspirational.. Too bad, yosemite is one my favorite places too.