Yosemite: Mariposa Grove, Glacier Point, and the Valley

So last weekend we drove over to Yosemite National Park, 4 hours away, and spent three nights in a tent cabin at the Yosemite Bug, by day reacquainting ourselves with the great park, which we think we had visited  previously in 1970, definitely in 1972 and 1990, and possibly in 1992. Pretty much all the same sights were there, of course, generating pretty much the same awe and affection as in previous visits. It's an incredible place, the Valley itself, the big walls, the big trees, the high country, the granite everywhere.... Our visit began with a special occasion, a milestone, as it were, obtaining my Interagency Senior Pass ($10), which gets us into national parks and forests and other public lands free of charge, for life. Our visits to these places have spanned five decades now, and we hope they will continue a few more too.

At the Mariposa Grove of redwoods, this little fellow was dragging the pine 
cone across the trail, munching as he went

But then he was driven off by this big fellow, who took over the munching; survival 
of the fattest

The Bachelor and Three Graces

Vicki poses for scale under the lower drive-through tree (forgot 
its name)(the upper one, now fallen, was the Wawona Tree)

From Washburn Point, en route to Glacier Point, Nevada and Vernal Falls

Half Dome, profile, from Washburn Point

Us at Washburn, wearing our New Zealand steady shirts ("not all who wander 
are lost")

Mt. Starr King and some of the high country

Looking up the great valley

To distant peaks; exposed rock everywhere...

Across the Valley, Yosemite Peak and Yosemite Falls; our 
first backpacking trip ever, in 1972, took us on a trail down

Yosemite Creek, to the Falls, and then via the switch-backs 
(click to enlarge) down to theValley, where we stayed at Camp 4