The photo is Far Lower Piute Creek Falls, where I camped on night 3 and saw the bear.
I was worried about the Morrison Creek crossing. I should not have been. I had already estimated that even if the creek flow was double I should still be able to cross it with no issue. But would I? What if I made a mistake? The Tuolumne River was substantially higher and overflowing onto the trail. I found out later it went up from 2000 cfs to 2900 cfs from Sunday to Thursday. (that is a 45% increase). I prayed to God to take my worries away and let me sleep. It was all in His hands now. But it is hard. I kept thinking to myself, it’s in God’s hands, it’s in God’s hands. I did end up getting a decent amount of sleep (but not great).
I woke up early and was on the road by 6:30AM. All the creeks leading up to Morrison were only “slightly” higher. But Morrison is a different beast. I knew from looking at the satellite beforehand that there was still a lot of snow in the Morrison Creek drainage. When I finally got up there I saw that it was actually no higher than before! Maybe just “slightly” higher. I did not even need to use the log to shimmy across the creek, I easily waded it. God’s word to me: “I told you so”. I do not understand why the creek was not much higher. It should have been 45% higher. With the temperatures rising and the snow melting at a high rate, it just does not make sense. Or maybe it does. And God had something to do with it.
All good things … must come to an end …
It is a 3300 ft. climb to Harden Lake where I initially had planned to stay the night. It was only noon when I arrived and I still felt really good after the big climb. Surprisingly. At most it is a 7 hour hike from here back to the trailhead (if I am hiking slowly). I could easily make it back and get home a day early. The deciding factor: pizza. I could not stand another night of ramen noodles. I had it 3 nights in a row and a 4th seemed revolting to me. I will not make this mistake again, bringing so many noodles. It took 5 hours to get back to the car and I arrived at 5:30PM. It was 19.3 miles in total this day. I drove straight to Pizza Factory. Day 7 of Yosemite backpacking trip complete. It was an absolutely amazing trip in the Yosemite Wilderness.
