Half Dome

Like I said in my previous blog, Ben and I visited Yosemite National Park while we were in California for his sisters graduations. The whole purpose of our trip to Yosemite was to hike to the top of Half Dome. Ben's dad went with us and we stayed at the Housekeeping Camp tents behind Merced River. It was beautiful. If you've never been to Yosemite I recommend that you go sometime.

Anyway, we checked in on a Wednesday evening. We set up camp, cooked dinner over the campfire, roasted marshmallows, and explored the Merced River that night. When it got dark we went looking for bears, but didn't find any. However, a bear actually visited our campsite while we were sleeping that night. We woke to the sound of our camp neighbors yelling at the bear to "get." And it did. By the time we got out of the tent the bear was gone. We did see wet bear paw prints in the dirt in front of our bear-proof food locker, though. At least we know those lockers work!

The next morning we woke up bright and early. We wanted to get an early start on our hike up the mountain. We started up the trail at 7:25 am.

The whole 13 and a half hour/15+ mile hike was unbelievable...from the Mist Trail and Waterfalls to the Cables and the Summit. It was definitely an experience of a lifetime.

We didn't finish the hike until about 9 pm! We all slept like babies that night (and woke up nice and soar too.) We checked out the next day and it was off to graduations and the party. That's what I call cramming a lot of adventure into a short amount of time.