Shoeless in Yosemite

A couple months ago we made a plan to hike Half Dome in Yosemite with one of Tara's Rice friends and a friend of hers. We had everything ready to go on Thursday and just needed to pack things up before heading out on the road Friday. I can't remember how many times I went over the checklist in my head ...

Lots of water ... check
Food ... check
Extra socks, moleskin, first aid, pocket knife, mosquito repellent, etc., etc. ... check

We got in late Friday and since we were waking up at five to go to the trail head we just dropped our stuff and crashed. Five rolled around and we started getting ready. After I was all dressed and had the backpack ready, I looked around and didn't see my shoes (both of us had driven up in flip flops). I asked Tara if they were still in the car and she said, "I thought they were in the bag." But I didn't panick just yet. It was only after I went out to the car and saw nothing did my heart drop to my stomach. We forgot our shoes. We drove 3+ hours to hike Half Dome and didn't have any shoes.

Ughhh.

Since the hike is 17 miles including a portion at the top where you use a line to climb up slick granite we knew it was impossible in flip flops. We also knew that not only would there be no shoe stores open at 5am, or ones that carry size 15 boots, they would also wreak havoc on our feet due to not being broken-in. So we resigned ourselves to missing the hike and saw our travelling companions (who did remember their shoes) off.

After gettting a couple hours more sleep we decided to hit the park and do what sightseeing we could with flip flops. We started on the valley floor and quickly our depression grew. We were surrounded by people who couldn't handle hiking 3 miles, let alone 17. Tons of little rugrats scampered around us in addition to the morbidly obese and infirm ... and us, the shoeless ones. A stop at the bottom of Yosemite Falls was the capper - it looked more like a water park than anything natural. The beauty of nature was eclipsed by the sight of hundreds of people who have no business wearing a bathing suit in public making the falls a bacteria cocktail.

We then decided to get out of the valley and try some less travelled trails in the mountains. There the day improved immensely. We went to the trailhead for Sentinel Dome and Taft Point and started off for the former. There were far fewer people there and we were often the only ones we could see on the trail. Sentinel Dome offered amazing 360 views of the Valley like this one ...

Then we decided to hike down to Glacier Point before catching a loop around to Taft Point. Glacier Point is also very accessible by car, which meant that the trail was completely empty. The same went for the trail to Taft Point, which we hiked on for a good 2-3 miles without seeing another living soul. Both points offered additional amazing views of the park. When we finished up at Taft Point it was about 6:00, so we decided to call it a day. In all, we had hiked over 10 miles in flip flops - meaning our calves were a little sore and our feet were filthy.

About two hours after we got back to the hotel our friends arrived, wiped out from their hike. It sounded great, but also crowded, and we realized that maybe doing the less well-known stuff wasn't such a bad plan after all. We definitely still want to hike Half Dome (we even bought a season pass to the park) but what could have been a disaterous trip turned out great.

If you want to see more pics, check out the album I posted on Flickr.