Normally, a three day break from cycling would be a good indication of fresh legs and more or less full body recovery. Instead, Sammy and I are running fresh off 55km worth of hiking over the last two days in Yosemite National Park.
Let’s wind it back a few days.
We arrived in SF on Sunday night and stayed at Sammy’s old roommates place, Colin, near the financial distract. We got well acquainted with the city streets that evening, with several tech companies and start-ups squeezed between each block.
On Monday we took a legitimate rest day and explored the city by foot and by transit. We entered the Golden Gate Park and Japanese Gardens before taking the tram to Fisherman’s Wharf and passing by Pier 39.
We then treated Colin (and ourselves) to the Giants game just minutes away from the financial distract and Bay Bridge. The Giants lost but we had an awesome time at Oracle Park.
On Tuesday morning we walked our way over to National Rent a Car to start our journey towards Yosemite. Although we asked for a soccer mom mini van, we were given a monster Chevi Tahoe. We made our way to Yosemite by early afternoon where we were given advise on two 7+ hour hikes for our two day stay in the National Park.
The John Muir and Panorama Trail took us up a large ascent across from the famous Half Dome, where we hiked up sharp switchbacks and stumbled across a brown bear. With 14 days of cycling under our belts, the ascents felt much easier than typical, and we made pretty good time on our first day hike. Yosemite is truly spectacular, hard to describe through photos and words.
Our SUV rental acted as a two for one because we couldn’t grab accommodations in the park before they were all sold out, and rather vamped (camped in our van) just outside of the park.
The locals gave us some prettyvaluable advise with where to legally vamp, and we had a perfect spot to quickly make our way back into the park first thing in the morning.
We woke up with the sun just before 6am to drive back to the trailhead where we planned to tackle the Half Dome hike. The visitor centre rep mentioned it took him 16 hours to complete, and we planned to complete the round trip in a bit less than half that time to get back to SF by the evening. We made incredible time up the hike towards Sub Dome, with a total of 4000ft ascent. On our way up the climb, we passed the Mist Trail where we got drenched in Mist, not the most pleasant at the time, but definitely a fantastic feature of this hike.
How the Half Dome climb works is through a lottery system where only a limited number of hikers can enter to keep the traffic levels down. We unfortunately didn’t win the lottery, but still made our way up to Sub Dome in less than 3.5 hours. On our way back down, about 20 minutes below Sub Dome, we bumped into a group with extra permit spots! We quickly made friends and decided it was worth the extra few hours of hiking to complete the Half Dome bike. What we then proceeded to experience will be a lifelong memory. To hike Half Dome, you climb a ~60% grade with small wooden slots and wires on either end to keep your balance. The view at the top of the climb is indescribable. Just absolutely stunning and satisfying after a 4.5 hour hike and 5000ft elevation gain.
The way down was extremely tough on our legs, burning our calves and quads with all the hiking and biking we completed over the last 2+ weeks. We had just enough food and drink to last us the hike, and with a 9 hour hike on our final rest day (and 55km of hiking over two days) before cycling another six days straight, we were ready to collapse by the trailhead exit.
We made it back to SF very late last night with all the road work along the highway, and although our legs are hating us right now, we’re switching gears and getting set for a 140km day. Next stop, Santa Cruz!
(Count to be continued tonight)
Pacific Coast Trail 