Tioga Pass reopened

[John Kasaian]

....according to the LA Times.
A friend who was up there hiking Mt Dana last week said the trails were, well, uh, interesting.

[Drew Wiley]

There are still road issues below Olmstead Point, and potential delays due to ongoing road work. I'll wait till the heat wave subsides and the mosquitoes calm down, then go up there from the back side above Lee Vining for a bit of long lens work, and then move on elsewhere on the E side. The continuous snow is said to be at around 9,000 ft there at the moment, and Tuolumne Mdws more of a swamp, and none of the usual tourist "amenities" are open there yet, if at all this season.

Right now I'm plotting a relatively safe route to the upper Kern country for my friends which will give them a lot of elbow room to explore, but alleviate any potentially dangerous crossing of the Kern River itself. That's pretty high up in there, ringed by many peaks over thirteen and fourteen thousand feet, so there is simply no way most of that snow will melt off this season at all. If I were still young and strong enough for that trip, I'd definitely be toting an ice axe. But so far this summer, my adventures have only taken me as far as some lovely day hikes over at Pt Reyes. It's hard to leave our natural coastal air conditioning. I'm wearing a coat right now; but just 10 miles up the freeway it's 25 degrees warmer, and warmer still more further beyond.

[AnalogAngler]

We drove it on Sunday - just a trip over to the Lee Vining Mobil for lunch and then some exploration around Saddlbag and Tuolumne Meadows. The mosquitos were indeed bad, especially once the wind died down. Morning was clear blue sky, afternoon had some nice clouds.

The snow is receeding very rapidly - so trail conditions will likely be changing daily. There was not nearly as much traffic as we anticipated, and I think just one section near Olmstead with one-way traffic light set up.

The infrastructure took a beating over the winter, so there is no running water and quite a few structures were damaged. Parsons lodge thankfully survived unscathed. Looked like there was damage to the roof structure for the store/post office, and didn't look like anything was being done to repair it. The interp. rangers up there are currently dry camping and working from a tent in the parking lot.

If you're headed up from the West side, the Crane Flat gas station is fully open this year and so might want to stop there or at the Tuolumne Grove for a pit stop before heading on.

Happy Trails

[Drew Wiley]

When in Rome .... do what the bears do. There are plenty of trees around, if necessary.