We got up, had a wonderful breakfast at the B&B and felt like spending the day checking out the valley floor. We drove in, fought the traffic and road construction and parked at the Curry Village where we commenced our walk.
Originally our aim was to take the non paved trail that ran along the eastern side of Mirror Lake, be were quickly thwarted when halfway up the trail from the parking lot we discovered that, due to a serious rock avalanche in March 2009, the trail had been completely covered over and was no longer navigable. So we opted for the western route and to Mirror Lake.
It was far more crowded and noisy which, at this time of year, is to be expected. Once we passed the lower portion of the lake, we thought we had made it all the way there (which we never did) and saw another sign indicating that further up this trail was also blocked due to the same avalanche. Here are some pictures from our hike...
This, and the next two shots, are Half Dome as seen from the western trail.
This and the next several shots are of the lower portion of Mirror Lake.
Apparently it is okay to just jump into the water and swim...I kept wondering how much sunscreen and bug spray were washing off people and traveling down stream to be ingested my every living thing over which they passed. In a nutshell, I was rather surprised it was allowed!!
I don't remember which dome this was.
This is the valley heading northeast, Half Dome is up that mountain to the right.
After we passed the lower portion of the lake, we came upon what I can only described a rock shrine. I have seen these before and I have yet to learn the significance of them, but I did stack three up there - one for Katie, John and Me - I figured it was good Karma!
This enormous rock and ex-tree was the result of another, and apparently much smaller, rock slide...
The light colored area about 2/3 of the way up in the center is where the gigantic pile in the foreground came from when it just dropped off the wall.
Fortunately this path was manageable enough to clear.
John being hugged by a tree.
Ok, this was some sick uber fly thing that landed on John's hat. I have yet to figure out what it was, but we are lucky it didn't make off with the rental car!!
This gnarled wood looked pretty cool!
If I am remembering correctly this river was the run off from Nevada falls. Half Dome would be on the left.
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