Rocks and Trees, Gaylor Lake
Rocks and Trees, Gaylor Lake. Yosemite National Park. July 2, 2007. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell.
Changes Continue
A few weeks ago I began the transition from managing and hosting this site on my own Manila server at home to using wordpress on a commercial hosting service. (I already miss the ease of use of Manila, but that’s another story.)
The main transition took place quickly over a 24 hour period, and brought essentially all of the content of the previous site over to this newer version. However, much work remains. Today I moved my equipment list pages over to this site and made them visible in the sidebar. Soon I need to rethink the organization of the photography pages. And so forth…
Which is all my way of saying that a) if you can’t find something that was here before, stick around and it will likely reappear soon, and b) things will continue to be in a general state of flux for the next month or so.
– Dan
Tuolumne, Here I Come
It looks like it will probably be Monday (rather than Sunday, as originally planned) but I’m going to head up to the Tuolumne/Tioga region for a few days this week to do some early summer hiking and photography. I understand that the campground is still working in first-come-first-served mode, so I’ll try to get up there early and get myself on the list. Failing that, I’ve had good luck with any of a number of Forest Service campgrounds just outside the park.
I don’t have any particular agenda – beyond doing a lot of photography – though I’m thinking about a particular hike I’ve done that provided a great panoramic view of the Cathedral range. A late afternoon and sunset photography session there, followed by a quick hike back as darkness falls might be nice.
I'm about to be a happy camper again…
… since I just finished grading the last bunch of final exams. Tomorrow I spend the morning at the college turning in grades and taking care of some other end-of-year business. Then I have the whole summer ahead of me – yay!
(I like to think of my income-free summer months not as unemployment, but as a period during which I am well-compensated a very valuable currency, time.)
Reinventing the… two-heel drive?
Tom at Two-Heel Drive is preparing to switch from many daily posts to one major weekly post. Here’s a bit of what he has to say for himself:
Reinvention time. OK, so all my hard work of the last 20 months (OK, goofing off, but still…) has earned me an audience of about 200 people a day who actually visit my site and wonder when I’m going to get to the point.
OK, I’m getting there.
… from here on in I’m going to focus on places to go in the Bay Area and stuff I think might interest folks who hike around here. …
I probably won’t have as many daily updates, but the weekly hike write-ups will continue.
[Two-Heel Drive]
Hike on over (sorry, couldn’t resist) to Tom’s blog for the details and to subscribe to his feed.
By the way…
Happy first day of summer!
Ex-Marine Kills Bear With Log
According to an article in SFGate…
A camping trip to Low Gap Camp Grounds turned into a harrowing experience for Chris Everhart and his three sons when they tangled with a 300-pound black bear. But the encounter last weekend proved fatal for the bear.
Sounds like a story about a pretty tough guy taking on a bear and winning, right? Not quite so fast.
The bear had taken the Everharts’ cooler and was heading back to the woods when 6-year-old Logan hurled a shovel at it.
He left their cooler out and unsecured in bear country, and the six year old was close enough to throw a shovel at the bear!
Fearing what might happen next, the Norcross father and ex-Marine grabbed the closest thing he could find — a log. “(I) threw it at it and it happened to hit the bear in the head,” Chris Everhart said. “I thought it just knocked it out but it actually ended up killing the bear.”
A better strategy might have been to grab the six-year-old and back off. Bears will rarely attack a person unless provoked.
Because a camper left food lying around and a child unsupervised and then attacked the bear when a retreat would be the right thing to do… another bear dies.
The man was given a ticket for failing to secure his camp site, said Ken Riddleberger, a region supervisor for game management with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources.
That’s good news, at least.
Some bear country protocol:
- Keep food secured in bear country – in the food locker in car campgrounds and in bear canisters (in most circumstances) in the backcountry.
- Keep a close eye on children in country where bears and large predators such as mountain lions live.
- If a bear comes into camp, adults may try to harass the animal if they know what they are doing – yell, bang pots, throw small pebbles – but give up if the bear is not responding to this. (All bets are off if the bear is a grizzly…)
- Be sure to leave an escape route for the bear – don’t trap or surround it.
- If a bear gets your food, give up. The food belongs to the bear now. Fighting a bear for your cooler is a really, really bad idea.
More About the Half Dome Death
Earlier I posted a short piece referencing the SFGate article about the unfortunate death on the Half Dome cable route. I now see that SFGate outdoor writer Tom Stienstra has posted an entry in his blog on the subject, and that many have commented on it.
I’m prepared to revise my initial thinking on this a bit, though only a bit. I continue to believe that trying to make the outdoors risk-free is both unwise and doomed to failure. However, it seems that the situation on the cable route has perhaps gotten out of control. While I do not agree with those who would require people to climb the route in a particular way (example: one person suggested requiring an overnight stay in Little Yosemite Valley) I do think that it is time to make the nature of this climb clearer to those who might be tempted to try it.
Of course, the news stories about this death will serve that goal to some extent. This may be one of the situations where the Park Service should amp up the “fear factor” a bit, in the way they have with the bear situation. A 16+ mile round trip with an elevation gain of nearly 5000 feet that ascends an exposed rock face that, while not tremendously difficult, presents a real risk of fatal consequences should not be undertaken lightly by inexperienced hikers. While knowledgable hikers and climbers may scoff at Park service warnings (I certainly do from time to time regarding the bear situation), a greater good may be served by encouraging additional respect for the difficulties this route presents to those who are not experienced or not in shape.
Deadly Trek Up Half Dome
From an SFGate article: Rangers re-examining safety of popular hike after a fatal fall from cables during final ascent
Nohara didn’t have time to speak or even shout before he slid off the side of Half Dome to his death, becoming the third fatality within a year off the 4,800-foot granite dome.
The death of Nohara on Saturday is forcing Yosemite rangers to re-examine safety on the long trek to Half Dome, a grueling 17.2-mile round trip that culminates with a dizzying 400-foot climb up a ladder-like contraption made of cables and wooden steps leading to the top.
“We need to be concerned about visitor safety and look at it seriously, but the fact that it is wilderness makes it a unique situation,” said Ranger Adrienne Freeman, the park spokeswoman.
This accident is tragic but the fact is that it isn’t possible to eliminate all danger from outdoor activities, particularly those in the mountains. There is always some element of risk, even in situations where risk is not the main goal of those participating. Thousands and thousands of people have ascended the exposed Half Dome “cable route” – and they have been rewarded with an astonishing view and a powerful sense of accomplishment and connection with the natural world. There have been very, very few serious accidents or fatalities.
While the park service should look at safety issues (and has probably done so all along) it would be tragic if an accident like this one led to overly restrictive changes in trail management.
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Dan's Outside 
Thanks, Tom… and Welcome to Two-Heel Drive Visitors
Just saw this over at Tom Mangan’s Two-Heel Drive:
Thanks, Tom. For those who may not know, Tom’s site has become a virtual gathering place for many San Francisco Bay Area hikers and for those interested in all things hiking related.
Trees and Grass, Morning. (monochrome) Calero Hills, California. June 23, 2007. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell.
For those looking for the local (SF Bay Area and especially South Bay) photography, let me also point you to G Dan Mitchell | Photography, my main photography web site.
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July 1, 2007 Posted by gdanmitchell | Commentary | Comments Off on Thanks, Tom… and Welcome to Two-Heel Drive Visitors