Photo Tips USA – Yosemite NP – Tioga Road

Motifs along the Tioga Pass Road

If, after the exciting days in Yosemite Valley, you are in the mood for something a little quieter, you should head up to the high mountain landscape along the Tioga Road, which is still quite remote in many places. You can drive the entire length of 106 km (66 mi), snow-free, to Tioga Pass, the highest road pass in the continental U.S. at 3031 m (9,944 ft), in the far east between the end of May and the end of October. Whether you’re heading out for a day trip or making your way over to Mono Lake, if possible, set out early in the morning in the valley and exit to the west via Big Oak Flat Road.

From the Valley Portal Viewpoint, which is the first parking option after the second tunnel, you can then take in the lower valley in a dramatic backlit setting. This is also a good vantage point for late afternoon, when the sun is at your back around 16:00 to 17:00, illuminating the wide Merced River canyon to considerable length.

After another 13 km (8 mi) and another tunnel, you reach the intersection with Tioga Road. In this area, between May and July, you’ll find extensive wildflower meadows at Crane Flat and two sequoia groves, the Merced and Tuolumne Grove (note pronunciation: „t-wolo-me„). While the latter boasts only about 25 sequoias, it surprises with an abundance of photogenic Dogwood trees. These trees pair excellently with the dark red tree trunks during their blossoming period at the end of May or beginning of June, or with their golden foliage color in October.

Barely noticeable yet steady, Tioga Road now climbs east until it reaches Siesta Lake, 22 km (14 mi) past the junction. This small body of water resembles Mirror Lake in that the overabundance of sediment also causes it to silt up, and here, too, you can capture beautiful reflections in the morning and afternoon. Intimate scenes of grasses, shrubs, and trees emerge under an overcast sky, replacing the absent backdrop of peaks. A polarizing filter is helpful to darken the reflections a bit.

About 3,2 km (2 mi) east of the turnoff to White Wolf Campground, you will pass the Lukens Lake trailhead. The trail, not quite 1,6 km (1 mi) long, will take you to the lake, where handsome stands of wildflowers thrive during the summer.

Several trails begin at Yosemite Creek and Porcupine Flat campsites, located north and south of Tioga Road. Up here, the Sierra presents a high mountain landscape with a thin stand of mountain pines, spruce, fir, juniper brush, scattered birch, and low shrubs on the light, often almost white granite. It’s 10 km (6.2 mi) to the ridge of Yosemite Falls to the south, for example, and a 6.5 km (4 mi) walk brings you to North Dome with a really good view of Yosemite Valley deep below.

Tenaya Lake was named after a Yosemite Indian chief who referred to it in their language as „Py-wi-ack “ or „Lake of shining rocks„

The next well-developed viewpoint is Olmsted Point, 48 km (30 mi) east of Crane Flat Junction. Looking south from here, you can see the back of Half Dome, which is not visible from Yosemite Valley and is equally well lit in the early morning and late afternoon. At least 200 mm focal length is needed to get a reasonably full-frame image of the formation. From the eastern end of the parking lot, the view opens to the deep blue waters of Tenaya Lake (pronounced „ten-eye-a„) in the next valley and 3837 m (12,588 ft) high Mount Conness, towering over it. Beautiful grazing light puts both to advantage, especially at sunset. Everywhere, massive glacial erratic boulders and some photogenically overgrown pines provide an attractive foreground setting.

After passing Tenaya Lake and perhaps taking a short walk along its shore, the road climbs again for the next 8 km (5 mi), winding through the narrow cut between Fairview Dome on the right and Pothole Dome on the left, and entering the flatlands of Tuolumne Meadows, the largest subalpine meadow system in the Sierra Nevada. Here the Tuolumne River, with its abundance of water, produces the most spectacular wildflower meadows imaginable between June and August. Peak bloom usually occurs toward the end of July, and that’s when the campground and lodge usually overflow with visitors. – Rightly so, as the surrounding area holds some of the best scenery in the park.

Keep to the existing trails, the Tuolumne Meadows ecosystem is very fragile!

The colorful flowers of Tuolumne Meadows provide the best foreground for the surrounding mountains, which are further reflected in the many small and tiny ponds. The fine light often only reaches the peaks in the morning and evening, severely straining the contrast capacity of almost any image carrier. A graduated gray filter helps in such cases to push the exposure range to a tolerable level and thus to keep details everywhere. These accessories, along with rubber boots and, in May, insect spray, are essential for venturing into the damp meadows.

From mid-June to mid-September (exact dates vary and you can find them in the free park newspaper Yosemite Guide), you can escape the usually annoying search for parking at Tuolumne Meadows by using the free shuttle bus from Olmsted Point. It runs between 07:00 and 19:00 every half hour and serves the following stops:

Tuolumne Meadows Lodge – Dog Lake Parking Lot – Tuolumne Meadows Wilderness Center – Lembert Dome – Tuolumne Meadows Campground – Tuolumne Meadows Visitor Center – Cathedral Lakes Trailhead – Pothole Dome – Tenaya Lake east end – Sunrise Lakes Trailhead (west end of Tenaya Lake) – May Lake Trailhead – Olmsted Point

The same bus also serves Tioga Pass and Mono Pass at the following times:

from Tuolumne Meadows 	from Mono Pass 	from Tioga Pass
09:00 			09:10 		09:15
12:00 			12:10 		12:15
15:00 			15:10 		15:15
17:00 			17:10 		17:15

Following the Tuolumne River around Pothole Dome to the west for about 0.5 km (0.3 mi) will take you to a 600 m (650 yd) section where it flows downhill over a series of rapids. In the late afternoon, the cascades and rocky peaks to the south, especially the prominent Unicorn Peak, bathe in the warm light of the low sun. An exposure time in the > 1/8 sec range transforms the water into a smooth, flowing stream. Also in the late afternoon, the easy walk up to Pothole Dome is worthwhile, as its peak is high enough to allow a very good panoramic view. On the east side of Tuolumne Meadows rises Lembert Dome, 2880 m (9,450 ft) high. The trail up to Lembert Dome is only 2,4 km (1,5 mi) long, and due to its greater elevation, it offers an even better view of the surrounding peaks at sunset than Pothole Dome across the street does. If you’re an early riser, the walk to Soda Springs from the end of Dust Road to the Lembert Dome Parking Area will be worth your while. A short 800 m (0.5 mi) hike brings you to an overlook with very good views of Tuolumne Meadows as well as Unicorn Peak to the south and the Cathedral Range rising behind.

Just off Tioga Pass, which marks the eastern park boundary and the transition into the Inyo National Forest, you’ll find a handful of small ponds that beautifully reflect the peaks to the east, especially 3979 m (13,054 ft) Mount Dana. Park right at the entrance station and follow the unmarked but well-worn trail to the east, where you can already see the water surfaces. The low sun in the early morning and late afternoon creates the best lighting conditions on the high mountain peaks and the best conditions for beautiful reflections. A graduated gray filter is again useful here to bridge the large contrast difference between foreground and background. Without it, you can limit the image detail to the reflection. From the same parking lot, take the 1,6 – 2,4 km (1 mi – 1.5 mi) Gaylor Lakes Trail (150 m / 490 ft elevation gain) west to the two lakes of the same name. The lakes, slightly larger than the ponds on the east side of the road, reflect the vast mountain panorama all around them.

Just after the exit from the National Park, there is a nice viewpoint on the right side of the road. From a high position, you can see the long Tioga Lake and the 3513 m (11,525 ft) high Tioga Peak in the north. The stop here is worthwhile at any time of day. If you’re lucky, you’ll get a site at the wonderful little campground down by the lake and can shoot the smooth water with the reflection of Mount Dana just after sunrise right from your tent. A Forest Service sign („Parking Area“) for the Nunatak Nature Trail, which passes three small reflecting lakes, is located just a short distance from the campsite on the opposite side of Rt-120, towards Mono Lake. Nunatak refers to the high peaks in the Sierra range (e.g., Mt Dana) that were not glaciated during the last ice age. These small ponds usually offer the better reflections in the morning than the lakes, as they are more sheltered and not so rippled by the wind.

Of course, the area surrounding Yosemite also has evidence worth seeing of California’s past, which was shaped by gold and silver mining. Columbia State Historical Park, near the intersection of Rt-49 and Rt-108 to the west, while not a true ghost town, features a large number of original buildings from the town’s boom period between 1850 and 1860. As many as 6,000 people lived here during these years, extracting gold from the easily accessible upper layers of the earth using the hydraulic power of the Stanislaus River. More than once during this period, the town was almost completely destroyed by fire and even partially sacrificed to the mining of the gold-bearing ore, but never entirely abandoned. So if you are traveling to Yosemite from the west or crossing the Sierra from the other side via Rt-108 or Rt-4, Columbia is worth a detour, as are the nearby towns of Sonora or Jamestown.

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