Tentless

I went back to the Glacier Point Road area of the park, and did a second survey of several of the sites I visited last time. All sites need to be visited twice. My partner was Sage, who is an amazing outdoorswoman. I have a lot of respect for her. She is one of the handful of people on the crew who sleep without a tent; she just throws down a ground sheet, her sleeping pad and sleeping bag and – voila! – there’s home. I decided I would try that this time as some kind of interesting, crazy experiment. So, first night out we find a nice granite outcrop in the middle of some dense forest and set up camp on some pine needles. It’s interesting how, especially when I’m not in a tent, I like to sleep high up or in areas where I have a clear view – I want to be able to see what’s coming. At first, we both thought we were going to be sleeping in the dense forest (filled with a lot of bear scat, mind you) and that made neither of us comfortable. The granite outcrop was found with a bit of relief. We got there in time to set up camp, eat and then read for a bit while chasing away the mosquitoes. The main problem with not having a tent is that if the mosquitoes are bad, you have to either deal with it or wear a head net. They weren’t too bad. All told, it was about a half hour of swatting them away before it got cold enough and they went away on their own. I have to say that I certainly didn’t feel like I slept any worse than usual that night. When you sleep out in the open like that, you tend to sleep right next to each other also (when I’m in a tent I’ve noticed that people will often spread out more). As a result, I think I felt safe, huddled in our group of two. Plus, I’m convinced Sage could kick any bear’s ass. The worst thing was the moon – it was so bright! I kept having to pull my bag down over my eyes because I felt like I was being blinded.

The next day we went our separate ways. We were given three sites to do over two days, but we decided to do them all in one day. Sage took the one bigger site (which was beautiful – I wanted her to see it), and I took the two small ones that were less inspiring and involved a hike in between them which I had done before. All were off trail navigating with a compass and map – something which I am now comfortable with. Nothing exciting happened that morning for me. Now, when I hear a large branch snap in the woods, I start talking loudly because I know it’s a bear. That usually sends them off, often without seeing them. I did see a lot of nice birds. I got back to camp about 9:30 a.m. and waited for Sage. We figured she would be longer than me. She showed up about 11:00 a.m. with a great story. She was walking out of her site and heard a HUGE racket ahead of her. Much to her delight, she spotted a black bear up a tree ripping the crap out of it. She stood there for a bit and got several pictures. I will post these once I get them from her. She also noticed that there was a cub in an adjacent tree, hanging out. Very cool.

Sage and I hiked back out to Bridalveil Creek Campground, where another four members of our team were staying, hoping maybe maybe we would be able to loaf a day since we got done early. No such luck. Bob recruited us to go down to Wawona the next day and resurvey two sites down there. It was really hot (still is), so we all piled in two cars and went to a creek/waterfall outside the park and then to a movie and dinner. It was a big night out for the survey team. Unfortunately, this meant that we actually didn’t get to sleep until 11 p.m., which is really late when you get up at 4:00. We guerrilla camped in a National Forest campground just outside the park. I have a huge tarp in my leaky car trunk that was going to be used to cover it in case in rained. It has not been used for that purpose, but serves as an excellent ground tarp for group camping. I threw it out and three of us slept on it, including me keeping up my tentless policy for the third night in a row. I was starting to enjoy it. The next afternoon we all compared notes and it turns out we all heard the very loud bear that was sneaking around at who knows what time, but no one said anything in the middle of the night. He made lots of noise snapping wood.

Bob gave me a choice of which site I wanted to do the next day, and I chose Wawona because I had done South Entrance several times, and it had exhausted me. That’s the one with the major bushwhacking along a creek. Bob assigned me a portion of Wawona Meadow that I hadn’t been in before that involved finding my way through willow thickets. This meadow also has the incredibly tall dew-laden grass, which I discovered was even taller (as in, over my head) in the section I was assigned.

I couldn’t see where I was putting my feet, and the ground is very hummocky and riddled with stream and holes of water. I lost count of the amount of times I fell over. I put my left leg in a water hole up to mid-thigh, I put my right leg in over my knee. My waterproof boots eventually surrendered to the onslaught. I emerged wet, hot (I forgot my sun hat and it goes from being freezing out there to being a sauna) and exhausted. When I returned to my car everyone was waiting for me and had been for at least an hour. I’m not so sure it was any easier than South Entrance. Also, winding my way through the thicket was a little unnerving. I had a map of Bob’s plotted points, so followed those – and his footsteps from his previous visits. I scared a deer when I was back there.

Insects at Wawona - these were all over the meadow:

Sage and I told each other we were both exhausted when we returned to Bridalveil Creek Campground. We decided we would rest and then do an easier site the next morning and then go back country again the last night. This plan changed when one of three people who was supposed to hike out to Dewey Point wasn’t feeling well, so she couldn’t go. Bob needed either Sage or I to go. Sage is the kind of person who would suck it up and just go even though 1) she was exhausted and 2) she had a toe injury that was bothering her. I knew that I should be the one to volunteer to go. I mean, I was exhausted too, but I didn’t have any injuries. I left with two guys at about 5:00 p.m. We got there before sunset. Dewey Point hangs over the valley, and it is an incredible view – you can see the valley and the high country. White-Throated Swifts were flying above where we laid out our sleeping bags. We had a 180 degree view of the sky and the stars (and then that bright moon came out again). It was pretty amazing.

Up and survey the next morning, and then back out (it’s about 6 miles). We spent the rest of the day resting at Bridalveil Creek Campground. We slept out under the stars again on the blue tarp (dubbed the “swimming pool” by Bob). The next morning I had a site that had a huge burn through it.

I was excited to do this as Bob saw Black-Backed Woodpeckers there. These are a relatively rare find; they frequent burn areas. It was fascinating to see the burn, and to see how the forest regenerated itself. Unfortunately, neither I nor my partner saw the woodpeckers. Grrrrrr ... Bob couldn’t believe it and even asked (jokingly) if we had surveyed the right creek. It was a big bear day that day. I stopped to survey a point and saw a bear hauling out of the creek into the woods behind me, about 30 meters away. My partner also saw a bear at the beginning of her survey, and we both saw one in the forest across a meadow on the hike out. His ears looked so cute and fluffy, you just wanted to pet him.

We have one more survey period and then that’s it. I can’t believe it. The next one will be a very long hike up in Hetch Hetchy.