Dewey Point, Yosemite Nat'l Pk Trip Repo rt

“The destination was Dewey Point in Yosemite Nat’l Park, a popular overlook set well above El Cap at about 8,000 ft, for two nights, three days. The trailhead is located at the Badger Pass ski area, and we needed to get there from Sacramento. It was going to be a big group this year for the annual winter campout: 14 in total. Some I knew, some I didn’t, but there were several for-certains about the trip: plenty of snow and plenty of booze. We’d bee watching the weather report for weeks, and up until about two days before the trip, the forecast was for snow and 60 mph winds. However, some of us must have had some chits stored up because the weather broke into sunshine and 45 degree highs for the weekend. Nice!

Thursday eve: An hour before departure time and trip leader called to ask if everyone could meet at my place. Grrreat! So 10 guys loitered in front of my house (four were going to meet us at the trailhead the following day) while everyone made final gear adjustments, switched gear between vehicles and confirmed the driving route. Away we went to Groveland and the Yosemite Pines RV Campground where we stayed in two yurts for $10 a person for the night. The drive was about four hours with a stop at a Groveland greasy spoon for some burgers and some pitchers of Sierra Nevada. We then proceeded to the unheated yurts, complete with cable television, and partied like rock stars until about midnight when it became obvious we needed to turn in to meet the 6 a.m. wake-up call. Fortunately, there was no one else at the campground (except the host).

Friday: Ugh. Too many beers and the yurt smelled like a morning-after bar. Someone was gracious enough to go and pick up some crusty ham n cheese hot pockets from the quickie mart in town. It nearly made me yak, but I managed to force down about half of the concoction along with four ibuprofens and two liters of water. Ahh, much better. The crapper was even heated! We packed up, recycled the empties and hit the road for the trailhead. We were about 25 minutes from the northern entrance to the park and then another 20 minutes to Badger Pass. It was beautiful and Yosemite was in top form with snow capped peaks, Bridalveil Falls pounding, pines adorned with powdered sugar and intermittent snow flurries to keep us happy. Everyone met up at the trailhead as was planned! After registering in the ranger’s office and parking in the ski resort overflow lot, the group hit the trail. The hike in was particularly easy for the first mile as it’s a groomed service road for x-country skiers. However, once we turned off towards Dewey Point, we were breaking trail for the next 2.5 miles. It’s amazing, considering that the overlooks is a very popular winter attraction, getting HUNDREDS of people a day sometimes. Fortunately, we’d be up from the outlook with an outlook of our own, looking down on the Dewey Point minions and ignoring them entirely. The hike was easy, especially with 14 guys to tramp down the snow. I took lead on a couple of occasions, but mostly was in the back with the greenhorn I brought. He seemed to having no hard time of it, even with a six pack of bottled beer in his backpack. We arrived at our overlook within about two and a half hours from setting out from the trailhead. The weather was cloudy still, with a few flurries thrown in. The Yosemite Valley below us was completely socked in with clouds, nary a peak to be seen. All quite eerie knowing that just ten feet from your tent is a 4,000 foot drop off straight down to the valley floor and you can’t even tell it’s there. We spent the next couple of hours digging out our camp, complete with custom-made kitchen for the tall guys (yeah, chest-high countertops, uh huh!). As we dug out features, the beer and daquiris started flowing, and the corresponding conversation. Good times! My greenhorn tentmate had brought in a rotisserie chicken (at least he stripped the meat off of the bones prior) and proceed to make up a killer batch of chicken soup for dinner. Perfect for taking the chill out! Still cloudy when we hit the sack early, around 9ish. Everyone was apparently pooped out! Several negative incidents transpired during that night: my stove crapped out right before we went to bed; I woke up with a flat thermarest (luckily I had closed cell foam underneath); and I managed to dump an entire liter of water on the floor of the tent. I thought the lid was on, but ice was made a fake seal. It opened up in the night and formed a frozen lake on my side of the tent. I just threw out what big chunks I could during the night, made sure my bag and clothes weren’t in the water/ice and sacked back out.

More to come...”

“keep it comin!

I really hope to get to Yosemite next summer (2010)”

“Wasn't there a rookie on the trip? How'd that go?”

“Great TR! Any pictures? :-)”

“I missed it the first time but I see the rookie cooked up some soup while you had all the rookie something-went-wrong troubles, lol. Was it his own beer he was carrying or was he packing it without his knowledge?”

“Saturday:

We awoke at 8 a.m. to sunshine, clear skies and about eight degrees (F), not knowing that it would warm up to 40 later in the day. MY first order of business was to get the stove working. I didn’t have a cleaning wire for the jet though my persistent nagging of the other campers yielded one. While trying to pry out a part, my newer Leatherman Micra blade folded while in use and deftly cut through the top of my thumb and about halfway down my thumbnail. It was curving to the right in an effort to leave me with half a thumb, but didn’t make it. Whew! I dropped bouncing blood all over the ground and waited for our resident medic (actually, a nurse) to get outta bed so he could do a proper repair job. However, in the interim, crippled and bleeding, I did manage to fix the stove, so all was not lost. I ate some hot granola with dehydrated 2% (Milkman!), had a cup of good black tea and then proceeded to find the hole in the thermarest, bum (again) some instant repair goop and fix that sucker! By then it was about 10:30, things were warming up and everyone was just soaking in the views. They were mesmerizing, capturing all of Yosemite Valley from our outstanding vantage point -- Half Dome, the Gunsight, El Cap and all of the major peaks, draped in white, were popping against a bright blue sky. After receiving a nice bandage job from Dave, I strapped on the shoes and took a little stroll along the edge of the cliff. However, feeling slightly tired, I opted out of the group hike which was to go and check out a wooden bridge and falls a few miles down the trail (the group didn’t make it anyway) and instead, stuck around with the lush set for a cheese and sausage feed, along with the first cocktails of the day. Ahh, within an hour, the pain of my thumb and faulty equipment was behind me. A group of 30(!) college students, looking strung-out, came through with their trip leader and asked where the camping sites were. I think he took one look around at our motley crew, swigging away heartily and laughing, and decided it best to mosey on and camp at the next outcropping, a mile or so away. One of the cuter girls was impressed with our kitchen, and we offered to let her use it later but alas, she never returned. Several other backcountry couples filtered by for camping as well, not to mention the endless stream of dayhikers to Dewey Point, about a quarter mile away from us. We continued to sit in the sun on a snowfa we carved out next to the cliff edge. Someone cranked up a radio, we had a few snowball fights and then and we just took it easy as afternoon gave way to eve. I snacked and finally had one of my Mountain House meals – chili mac and chz. Mmm. After socializing for a while and continued consumption of libations, everyone went down to sleep, seemingly en mass at about 10 p.m. The night wasn’t nearly as cold as the previous eve, though was in the low teens.

Sunday
What a better night’s sleep I had with the addition of the thermarest! Plus, the earplugs I brought for the greenhorn’s snoring worked like a charm! I slept straight for nine hours! Got up, made some breakie and laughed at the constant coming and going of people from camp into the forested area with their snowshovels over their shoulders. Soon it was my turn! The stove crapped out again and fed up with its finicky nature, I just opted to borrow another group’s to melt the day’s water I’d need for the hike out. Again, blue skies and sunshine – we really couldn’t ask for more spectacular weather. I was in a t-shirt! We let things dry out and then packed it all up. Heading out was easier after a few hundred people had packed down the trail for us! I probably didn’t even need snowshoes but kept them on anyway for stepping into the powder. Throngs were headed to the lookout. We got back to the cars in about half the time to took to enter and cracked some cold ones that were waiting for us in the cars. We then headed out, stopping at a diner in Oakdale for a steak before completing the drive home.

Winter camping rocks.”