I have planned this trip more than 6 months ago. I still wanted to see and shoot the Milky Way on top of north rim of Yosemite Valley. I found that Eagle Peak is a pretty good place to do it. Since very few people backpack this trail, I had no problem getting a permit for this trip.
As my trip date getting closer, Washburn wild fire happened. I kept a close eye on the progress of this unfortunate event. Using NASA satellite images I tracked how the smoke might obscure the valley. The day before the trip the whole valley was clear and the fire seemed to burn less and less.
As usual, I took long route of HWY 140 to Yosemite. After getting my permit, I headed to backpacker’s camp site to relax. It was a bit late to get to camp 4 to see if I could sweet talk to rangers to get a camp site. The ranger who issued my permit was not sure if I was allowed to camp there. It was about 100F in the valley (according to thermometer in my car), but did not feel that hot to me. As always I came prepare for hyperthermia with three ice cold bottles of brew. I stuff some old T shirts to keep it cold, and after 4 hour trip, the ice barely melted.
Nearby was a group of backpackers guided by REI. It seems a good way to to backpack without proper equipment and/or knowledge. REI staff would take care of everything, meals included. I chatted with the guide a bit. He later offered me some food, but I was too full for that night.
I also talked to a young guy from Montana. He just finished 3 week backpacking somewhere along JMT. Now he was ready to do 1.5 day worth of driving back to his place. He was worried about the battery state of his car since it was parked for more than three weeks. I assured him, it should be good to start, if not, some rangers would help him out.
Suddenly I noticed that the sky was getting darker. A new wild fire has started somewhere close by. It was the Oak Fire, which I did not know at that time. I knew it was very close and to the west of Yosemite. Less than two hours later white ashes start to fall around. It was too close for comfort.
I cooked my dinner of Campbell soup with instant rice. I wanted to get some extra calories for the trip tomorrow. Then as I sipped my hot tea, I realized I could use the tea bag as a sponge to wash my cooking pot (which I did). Dual function! I was pondering if I could use this to clean my behind, but quickly dismissed that idea.
I turned in about 9PM and did not have a good sleep. Nearby campers were making too much noise late into the night.
I woke up a bit early and got ready for the hard hike. I bade goodbye to the Montana guy and REI guide.
I parked near camp 4 and started my hike about 9AM. Right at the trailhead a young kid asked me about the hike to El Cap. I told him that I planned to hike to Eagle Peak, which is a few miles less than El Cap. I told him the water source in that area was very iffy. The only sure place would be Yosemite Creek. Eagle Peak creek was very questionable. The kid said he think he would have enough for trip to El Cap and back.
I knew this hike would be brutal since my pack now weighted 42 lbs. I knew I could hack it since I packed about the same weight doing Cathedral lake trip last year. The only difference this time was the elevation gain of 2700 feet (823 meters). And distance to Eagle Peak would be more than 6 miles. In addition to this the smoke from wildfire started to cover the valley as seen in picture below. At this point in time I did not smell any wood smoke, I was still “below” the smoke ceiling.
But that would soon change. The smoke came in so thick that I could no longer see anything in the valley.
I stopped along the trail a bit to eat two protein bars. The heat was more than enough to soften the bars, and I got melted chocolate all over my fingers.
Along the way I saw the kid who was asking me about El Cap hike at the trail head earlier. He ran out of water as he reached top of Yosemite Falls. He just hung out at the Falls for about an hour then headed down. Poor kid, lot of expectation, but not enough preparation, but he was happy.
I reached top of the Falls about 4PM. It took me about 7 hours. I consumed two protein bars, and drank almost all of my two litters of water. This was hardest trip I have done so far. Mostly due to heavy pack. I have abandoned the idea of camping at Eagle Peak. The prime reason was source of water. Either I had to haul in extra 3 litters of water or hike back out 3 miles to get more water tomorrow. With dim hope of see the Milky Way due to smoke, I chose to camp near Yosemite creek and would decide on Eagle Peak later. I explored the east side of the creek and did not see anything I like. The place I camped at several years back was maybe more than 0.5 mile in, but with low water level, I was not sure I could climb down to get water. Finally I chose to to camp about a mile north of the Falls toward Tioga road. I had survey this area on the internet, and it seemed doable. Beside the ranger told me this area has some very nice view. And what the hell, it was an opportunity to explore the unknown.
With destination picked. I decided to haul in 5 litters of water. With 2 litters of water my pack weighted in at 42 lbs. Now it weighted close to 49 lbs. due to extra 3 litters of water. One reason was to test my ability to carry this much weight if I were to hike to Eagle Peak. I dropped my pack on the side of the creek to filter water, and camel up (drink as much as my belly can hold, just like a camel) then to soak my sored, smelly, sweaty feet while enjoying the view. I saw only two backpackers heading down (?). Other than that I was pretty much alone. As I left a group of day hikers came by to play in the water.
I had a hard time lifting up my pack onto my back. It was too heavy. But once it was on, I could walk comfortably without too much extra effort. I planned to set camp at a saddle between two knolls along Yosemite creek, but then it did not look good, so I pressed on. I found a no name trail (not on the map), and decided to follow it. It led to a nice view on top of a small hill. It has nice flat ground to camp, water source is less than 0.2 mile away and not too expose to winds. It was about 6PM when I was done setting up camp. I did not feel hungry nor thirsty. I was tired but still had enough energy to set up a Gopro to capture some clips.
With so much smoke the sun looked orange. I explored my camp site a bit and found some fire rings.. This is quite a nice place, it could easily takes in at half a dozen tents.
I stocked up my ammunition for bears, if they decided to pay me a visit. I situated my bear can with direct line of sight and within my artillery range. It was time to rest up.
As expected with a belly full of water, I woke up about midnight to empty my bladder the second time. The smoke has cleared up and the sky was full of stars. I quickly set up my camera and started to shoot the milky way. The location was not perfect, but I got some decent shot.
There was light pollution to the south, but that was kind of expected. I played around with time lapse, but then decided to call it done. To capture a 20 seconds of time lapse I would be up all night. It was not worth it, given all the trees blocking the view.
I woke up early but stayed in warm sleeping bag for a while. It was a bit chilly last night. My feet were cold. I was testing out my new 30F sleeping bag I got on sale from REI. I fixed up my morning coffee while pondering what to do next. Should I pack up and leave for Eagle Peak. Sky was kind of clear. I could see clouds, but I could also see more wildfire smoke creeping in over the valley. White wood ash was still falling, not quite visibly, but it accumulated on top of my tent. I chose to stay here another night.
Previous campers had built a nice dinning seats around the camp fire. Below is a short clip of that
Instead of oat meal breakfast as planned, I cooked up my homemade turkey with instant rice and veggie. The link to making this concoction is here. It was a very early lunch. It was only 10:30 AM. It was quite tasty, a little bit bland, so I added a packet of soy sauce to it. The heat from the chili flakes was quite enjoyable.
After cleaning up I began to explore the camp site. The clip below was what I saw. Nice view, the smoke has cleared out a bit, only to come back later. The Yosemite creek was close by, but very steep to get to water.
I decided to relax and just enjoy the surrounding. I was still recovering from yesterday’s brutal hike. My back ached a little when I sat down, so I took one Advil and hoped it would ease the pain. Soon it was time to restock my water.
The water source was north of my camp site about 5 minutes walk. I filtered my water, did laundry and had a quick bath, while filming the whole thing on Gopro. But since I was in my undie, I decided not to post on Youtube. I was much cleaner and less smelly now. I had only one short, and the tripod now served as a place to dry it. I just wandered around on my undie. No one was around anyway, or I could wrap my shirt around like a skirt. Dual function was key on this trip.
Then it was time for second meal. Since I had only about 400 calories yesterday, it was time to make up for it. I carried what was supposed to be 3 servings of homemade turkey. I decided to have the last 2/3rd at a go for early dinner, with just a bit of instant rice and veggie. On this trip, I packed along fried garlic and shallot. This combo made the meal super delicious. I reasoned that with extra protein, it might help my muscle to recover quicker for the next brutal hike down into the valley. Anyway, this concoction will definitely on my things to bring on backpacking trip. Cheap, healthy, and easy to make.
Smoke was getting worse. I moved my camp to a cooler spot and here what it looked like with wildfire smoke.
I pulled out my backpack liner and put on the outside of my sleeping bag to keep my feet warm. It sure did the job that night. But what I could not foresee was that it made my the portion of sleeping bag around my legs wet. I did not know that my feet/legs sweat that much. One more lesson learned.
I tried to sleep as much as I could, since I would have plenty of time to get down. I forwent the morning coffee and oatmeal. I just drank as much water as I could and dumped the rest, while keeping only two litters for the trip down.
As I was decamping, a hiker showed up. This dude is from NY and it took him only two hours to hike from valley to my camp site. I felt his backpack, it felt like about 30 lbs. We exchanged stories. I gave him some pointers about the water source, and most importantly where I had pooped. He told me he got a spot at camp 4 using first come first served option, which I did not know about. I bade goodbye to him and hoped I could made to camp 4 before 3:00 PM.
I reached the fork of the trail and stopped to take picture of this flower. I met a young kid from Boston interning in Bay Area in the field of machine learning. He told me that this flower was an orchid. He gave me some Latin name but I could not remember. He asked about my pictures of Milky Way, and I gave him my website name. You know who you are, kid, the one with 600mm zoom lens on D-500 camera. And this kid also told me he saw Starlink satellites on previous evening. I did not know one can see them with naked eyes.
I like camp 4. If I were to camp at backpacker camp, I would have to park some where, haul my stuff in, hope to get a good spot far away from compost toilets, and if the wind blew wrong way, I would have to endure that awful smell. The plus side was that I could walk to Curry Village, get a pizza while downing couple cold brews. At camp 4 I would have to drive to get pizza or get on the usually packed free shuttle, but I could have all the hot showers I want. At this point in the hike, I wished I had started the trip down earlier, but then I would not know about the first come first severed deal anyway.
I tried to hike down as fast as I could. My knees did not complain much, but I almost fell couple times. I found out later that soles of my running shoes were all worn out. I almost rolled my left ankle twice.
About 800 feet above the valley floor, I gave up the idea of racing to camp 4. It was not safe to hike fast. I comforted myself of getting a pizza at Curry Village and forget about camp 4.
I reached the trail head about 3:40PM. Just out of curiosity, I swung by the kiosk at camp 4. The ranger was still there pecking at her keyboard. I asked her about the closing time of the kiosk. She said it depends on who works at the kiosk. Her shift ends at 4PM. Even though the first come first served was only from 1-3PM, she could still sign one up for me, but not later than 4 PM (some kind of regulation). I had only 10 minutes to spare, but then was able to got one camp site. I could not pay in cash, only credit/debit card but that was ok by me. Then I saw somebody’s broken sunglasses near the kiosk and picked them up. The ranger saw that and thanked me for it. I did not bother to tell her that I also picked up some jerk’s wet wipes buried in poop hole then were dug up and scatter near my camp site. But then I left the place in better shape than when I found it.
With camp site secured, now I could relax a bit. I retrieved my food from bear locker across street (I left them there on the day of the hike). I got to my car, only then did I notice that my nostrils were full of crusty snot and wildfire ashes. I hoped nobody I met on the trail noticed that. I did a quick drive to get a six pack at main store (not at Curry Village, they don’t stock many varieties of beers). I decided not to have pizza, but a warm chili would be better for more protein. I needed more protein, not carb. For the trip down, I had about 200 calories and almost two litters of water. Perhaps the two large meals the day before helped me with enough energy to get down.
The nice ranger gave me whole camp site to myself, no sharing. I set up camp, gulf down two beers while doing so. Slightly drunk, I took a long hot shower. It surely helped relaxing my sored muscles.
The sky has cleared out, I could see clouds on blue sky as I laid on the bench enjoying my beers.
Soon it was time for dinner. The can of chili has only 16 grams of protein. I needed more, so I broke up pieces of beef jerky and mixed it in. I dumped in the rest of fried garlic and shallot. I came up with an unique concoction that was quite tasty. The sweetness of the beef jerky contrasted with saltiness of the chili. I ate more than I should have. I ended wandering about camp 4 quite a while before I could lay down to sleep. With too much beans and rice, I spent the whole night fumigating my tent. Luckily there was no campmate to hear my bodily music. At least it might keep the nosy bears away from my tent.
I woke up early the next day. I had coffee and two packages of oatmeal. I forgot to pack some dried fruits to make it more palatable. The ginseng coffee help wash down the bland oatmeal. Perhaps I was not that hungry. I still had some time to kill, check out time was not until 12PM. But I decided to take off early to beat the 101 Hwy traffic.
But that was not to be. Hwy 140 was closed at Mid Pine, a bit north of Mariposa. Now I had to take 120, shorter drive, but with more traffic.
I finally captured Milky Way on north rim of Yosemite Valley on this trip, albeit it was not that pretty. I learned that I could hike up with 42 pound pack. Next time if I want to do Eagle Peak, I would start out earlier than July when more water was available. And I would have to somehow use my hiking poles as a tripod to save almost 3 pounds worth.
Note to self: cooked four dinners, two coffees, one breakfast. Used up 77g of fuel.
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