Yosemite Part 2

The cables were nothing like I had imagined. Sankari(my hyper-enthu roommate, who had been there before) had told me that there are cables to go up the last 900 feet and get this, she said something like,"Those cables are basically what you hold on to, and if you let go, it's a freefall to death". Haha...now I saw what she meant. The last 900 feet are up a steep rock face, which seemed to me like it was a 90 degree incline (it is actually around 45 degrees I believe). Two steel cables run parallel to each other and up the rock, with wooden planks every 10 feet or so. You can pick up a pair of gloves (for a better grip on the cables) from the measly looking glove-pile at the bottom (tip - get your own gloves!!!) and head up. We were rather late getting to that point, so there was a continuous stream of people coming down. The space between the 2 cables (which is the "path" you go on) is only about 4-5 feet across, and it's not very convenient when people are crossing you. The gloves are not really of much help and in fact, I kept feeling that they were slipping off. But I guess it is better than no gloves at all! It is scary climbing up Half-Dome on those cables. My hands were aching because I was basically pulling myself up while clinging onto the cables for dear life(literally!). And I dared not look down for fear of psyching out. Even then, I had all my worst thoughts running through my head, and for a while, I had no idea why I was doing that and was not sure if it would be worth it, if you think about all the dangers it poses. But I made it to the top, and Wow! It is not so much the view as the feeling that you made it that exhilarates. But the view is amazing, you see the green valley and some of the snow-capped mountains around. And oh, who do I meet up there but 3 Tamil girls from Madras! :D Amazing!! One of them was even from Santa Clara (very near San Jose). Really small world ...I was struck to hear Tamil on Half-Dome!

I had to climb back down soon 'coz there were folks waiting. The climb down is definitely easier, but one thing that strikes you is how sheer the drop is. And again, I didn't think about it too much, I was just concentrating on the cable and where to put my foot next! And yes, the cable-climb was where my dear sneakers were slipping on the rock-face and I realized somewhere during that fit of panic that I needed to buying hiking shoes if I was going to keep up at this sort of thing. The descent down the rock (the one without the cables) is not that easy either, although it is not as steep as the actual dome. There is nothing to hold on to and you don't always find the steps made out of the rock. Anyways, from then on, it was pretty much downhill (literally and figuratively in terms of our aches and pains). We left the top at about 5:30pm and began the descent. A lot easier, but it still stresses your knees out. Not advisable to be on the trail after sundown, so we basically slipped/slid/tumbled and ran down the trail without a stop. Reached the bottom at 8:30 and we were relieved to take the shuttle to the Parking Lot. The others had very cleverly left us notes on the van telling us that they were at the restaurant. Made it there, managed to eat something and left. I also bought some souvenirs at the store.

The facts: 17 miles (27.4km) round trip, ~4400 feet elevation change, conquered in 10 hours. Half-Dome is 8842 feet above sea level.

We stayed that night at this super-cool, totally comfortable mobile home. All of us were too tired to do a post-mortem of the day's events and just went to sleep, grateful for the comfort. We decided to take it easier on Sunday and went to Mirror Lake. It's a 1-mile hike to the really pretty lake. You can see a reflection of Half-Dome on the lake (hence the name). We also spotted a really graceful deer (or is it a stag, I don't know, it had antlers though) run by us. Got to cross the lake, freezing water about knee-deep. We also sat on some rocks and played a round of Pictionary before we accepted the fact that it was too uncomfortable a spot for that, considering that I was sliding down the rock every 2 minutes and might end up sliding down all the way to the lake taking the Pictionary board and who knows what else down with me!

We left Yosemite National Park, barely managing to avert a tank-empty fuel disaster! The drive back was fun too. We had some great music from Jaggi's real cool iPod! And I must say, Ashish and I were good DJs (do I hear applause?)! Soon, cell phones started working, and everyone went into the inevitable zone of returning phone calls. Made it back in decent time, had dinner at Rajjot, and reached home at around 10:30pm. Renuka and Kritika actually decided not to walk more then 20 steps a day to make up (or is it make down?) for the excessive walking that was done during the weekend! :-)

I don't think I can do justice to all the myriad encounters and all the Quotable Quotes that were a crucial part of the trip and drove us into hysterics at times. Each one of us has our own anecdotes (or different versions of the same anecdotes!) to narrate.Kudos to everyone for planning and executing the trip with so much enthu! Great company, great time!