Cali 2011 part 2- Escape from Yosemite

A wise man once said "Sometimes success is just making it back home.  Perceived failures are often the greatest adventures."

The morning of July 2nd started out with great promise, as we woke up in Camp 4 with the plan of extending our stay another night, and spending another day in the Valley before heading back to Santa Barbara.

Strike one.  We got up too late, and soon found ourselves displaced by the family of roughly 50 people who were now moving into our site.

No matter.  We had heard of a campground outside the park boundary that would have some sites available.  Even better, by staying there we would be able to use the pool and hot tub at the neighboring hotel.  Suddenly the day didn't seem so bad!  Throwing our things in the car, we left the Valley in search of our temporary residence.

Strike two.  Arriving at the campground only to be greeted by a "no vacancy" sign.  Okay then, new plan.  We decided to grab some lunch at the nearby grill, then head back and climb for the day before making a late drive back to Santa Barbara.

Four lackluster patty melts later, we were on our way back into the Valley, planning to head over to Serenity Crack so Luke could get some good photos of Dan leading the 3rd pitch.  Then we hit the traffic jam...

Cali 2011 part 1- A week in the Valley

Back in January, long before Maryland was experiencing its current heat wave, my friend Luke Anderson asked me if I wanted to fly out to California this summer and climb this...

Photo borrowed from Wikipedia

Five months of training later, the snow on Mount Whitney was showing little sign of breaking, and we began to reevaluate our plan.  While the routes themselves would have been clear, the approaches and descents were far snowier than we felt like dealing with, and we regretfully decided to go with our backup plan instead.  Ok, not so regretfully, since that meant we were now going here...