[pct-l] Northern Yosemite trail report

[carlito at gmail.com (Carl Siechert)]

We (the 1977 Kelty Kids plus my wife, an honorary Kelty Kid) just
returned from nine days of trekking around northern Yosemite. We were
mostly on trails other than the PCT (our actual PCT mileage was under
5 miles), but for anyone headed to the area between Tuolumne Meadows
and Dorothy Lake Pass, here are some recent conditions:

There's practically no snow around Tuolumne Meadows. However, in the
forested areas (and even many exposed areas) of the northern Yosemite
washboard, there are still considerable snow patches at 8500 feet and
up. Not enough to be dangerous in any way, and rarely enough to make
routefinding difficult. Just enough to slow you down a bit. It has
been really hot up there this past week, so that snow line is
undoubtedly rising rapidly.

Which leads to the bigger problem: stream crossings. We ran into
Hobbles (he began May 12), who said that Rancheria Creek in Kerrick
Canyon wasn't *too* bad; he went several hundred yards upstream to
find a relatively safe crossing. Lest you think that it's going to be
easy, however, consider the source: he told us that he was the only
one in his group who did not end up swimming Evolution Creek. We
didn't ask exactly what that meant. The PCT crossing of Falls Creek in
Jack Main Canyon is wide and fairly slow, but waist to chest deep,
depending on your height. We crossed Falls Creek a couple miles
upstream (at the Tilden Lake Trail junction), where we were able to
find a place that was only thigh deep and only moderately swift.
Stream crossings in this area are still risky and much trickier than
usual for this time of year; be careful!

Mosquitos were also particularly nasty between 7000-8500 feet last
week. There's still lots of standing water from late snowmelt.

And yes, it's beautiful out there. Wildflowers are spectacular at all
elevations up to 9000 feet. I've been home only a couple of hours and
I can't wait to go back!

Cheers,
Carl
1977 Kelty Kid
ADZPCTKO Co-conspirator