Part Five: Hiking My Feelings in the Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne - Yosemite National Park
PART FIVE // Sunshine and Pain
Imagine the most difficult thing you've ever done in your life, physically.
If you aren't a hiker, maybe it's childbirth. Or that marathon you didn't train for properly. Back-to-back-to-back shifts, on your feet all day.
Take a deep breath, close your eyes, and relive the physical and mental torture of pushing your body to its absolute limit.
To that, add blazing sunshine, wafts of smoke, little to no breeze, and 33+ pounds to your back.
Oops, AllTrails lied again. Add a couple miles.
And you're desperately thirsty, walking next to a river you can see, hear, and smell, but cannot access during the hottest part of the journey.
That was our trek from Pate Valley to Waterwheel Falls.
Looking back, it was one of my favorite days on the trail. In the moment, I gave actual mental space to the notion that it would be easier to be mauled by a bear and left for dead than it would be to get to our campsite.
We climbed and climbed for 11.53 miles and 3,005 feet of elevation gain. The parts through the forest almost balanced out the hot climbs on granite stairs and slabs. Almost. My legs were gassed three miles in. We passed campsite after campsite, keeping our eye on the prize: Waterwheel Falls.
We got to the first set of falls in the area and there wasn't room to camp. AllTrails said we had 0.5 to go to get to Waterwheel. Similar to our hike to a glacier off High Line Trail in Glacier NP, this was an aggressive uphill push, the distance was not accurate, and as we chugged along, breathless, sweating in all the places, Barry said:
"There better be bears on unicycles juggling chainsaws when we get there."
I died laughing, found a second wind, and we equated the distance remaining to one of our favorite walks at home: walking from Newport Ave to Sunset Cliffs in Ocean Beach.
We distracted ourselves by reciting our favorite tacos on the route, made up a fake concert at Winston's, joked about eating everything in our bear canisters, and occasionally, KBong would raise his walking stick triumphantly and shout:
"THIS IS WHAT WE TRAINED FOR! WE ARE WARRIORS!"
Will we make it? Find out tomorrow!
Part 6 hint: 🐻🐻