We originally planned to hike 21+ miles today to get to the top of North Dome via Snow Creek Trail, but that trail was closed due to snow, so we re-grouped and decided to take a short jaunt to the top of Yosemite Falls instead. This would make it a relatively easy, short day. Therefore we decided to leisurely get up in the morning on Friday and start hiking by about 9am. Yosemite Falls Trail is amazing as you have the view of the Falls for much of the way up - a nice distraction from the constant switch backs the entire way up the trail. (We love switch backs, it's just that they can be grueling at times.) We really hit the jackpot with the weather this week. It has stayed around 68 degrees during the day - perfect hiking weather! After climbing 3.5 miles, we reached the top of the falls at about 11am and lazed around in the picturesque landscape for about 2 hours. We planned to go back to camp and be there for a relaxed evening, but someone in our group noticed some backpackers and asked where they had come from. They said they camped at North Dome and that the trail to there from where we were was fine - some snow here and there, but for the most part the trail is easy to find. We re-grouped and voted on if we all wanted to head for North Dome like we originally planned, which is about 4.5 miles from where we were at Yosemite Falls and we all said "yes!!!!" and took off for another adventure. It's now Friday afternoon around 1:00 or so and we know that it will be a challenge to make it to North Dome then back the entire 8+ miles from there to our campground.
Incidentally, we somehow got off track in our attempt to shorten our journey from the Falls to North Dome and ended up adding mileage as we made our own trails up and over a ridge to the actual trail on the other side of it instead of retracing our steps to find the trail where we veered off. Soon we were on our way on the path to North Dome. I remember hearing this sound that reminded me of a large bird flapping its wings and the wind rushing past them. It was like a droning "whoooo whoooo" sound. I heard it several times and asked those around me what that was. Nobody seemed to know and we marched on our way. Soon after, a few people in the front of our group shouted "bear cub!" One of our leaders, and Eagle scout, said "do you see the mama? - if not, then come back here!" We all regrouped and waited for the cub to run off to find his mama. Then we find out from our Eagle Scout that he knew that those sounds were bear sounds the whole time, but didn't want to say anything and freak us all out. Thanks. The bear sounds went away and we marched along the trail talking loudly to keep the bears away.
We had to forge through 2 icy cold streams - we took off our shoes and socks for this. There were several large patches of snow along the way and many fallen trees to climb over, but we eventually made it to North Dome. Yay!!!! No wait, we soon find out that we are, in fact, NOT at North Dome yet, and that the dome way over there is the one we want. Wow, I was perfectly content pretending this was North Dome so that we can all begin our hike back down to camp. It is 4:30 after all. So we begin our trek over to the next dome, but have to go down and through more forested terrain where we heard, guess what?, more bear sounds. This time the bear sounds were on both sides of the trail. I was freaking out (just a little - not too much, haha!) and I heard another girl shouting "Bear sounds! I hear bear sounds!!" The guys in the middle were shouting and motioning for all of us to stay together as we pass through this section of the trail and get out onto the dome. Finally (!) we reach the peak of North Dome, for real this time. It's the coolest thing to reach this enormous peak and look across the valley and see the peak that we reached yesterday. Half Dome is there perched as proud as can be across from us. We take our pictures to prove we were there and start our way back to Yosemite Falls and back down the mountain trail to our camp. The problem is that we don't have a lot of daylight left and none of us planned on night hiking so we didn't bring our headlamps. We were FLYING down that mountain. Thank goodness for trekking poles or many of us would have stumbled several times as we flew down there. The last 4 of us in our group reached the bottom of the trail at 9pm and just as the last bit of daylight left us. What a feat! We hiked back to our car, then drove back to camp where we ate one of the best meals of my life at 10pm. We all got showered and got to bed ASAP, about 11:30pm for some much needed rest from the day's work and to prepare for our next day....Glacier Point!
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