Yosemite Falls Trail

This past weekend marked my 32nd (gasp!) birthday. To "celebrate" I decided that unlike last year when I spent the weekend in Las Vegas sitting by a pool, I wanted to try something a little more technically challenging. So I set my sights on Yosemite National Park, and the most difficult hike you could do from Yosemite Valley (besides hiking Half Dome which now requires a permit). That hike is the one to Upper Yosemite Falls. It's a 7.3 mile hike round trip. The first half of the hike is a 3.25 mi 3,000 foot elevation gain up to the top of the falls, and so while the route is not as direct, essentially it is equivalent to scaling one of those sheer valley walls that Yosemite is so famous for. Since it is impossible to go straight up, the trail is comprised of a million (probably closer to thirty or forty in real life) switchbacks, that just keep going and going. It's taxing on the body and on the mind, especially when you feel like you should be getting close to the top and then you look up and see people on the trail who are so far above you they look like ants, and realize you aren't even close. It was somewhere in the middle of those torturous zig-zags, when my right butt muscle was seizing up, my nose was running, and I had sweat dripping in my eyes that my BF wished me "happy birthday" for the tenth time. I just started laughing.
But I made it to the top. I decided I was going to get there, or die trying. It's one of those weird challenges you place upon yourself when you get older, to confirm that you aren't really that old I guess. It took me longer than it should have, and my BF had to wait for me to take a break every few switchbacks (which I appreciated!), so maybe I wasn't totally successful in not feeling aged, but the bottom line is I made it, and I didn't die. And sometimes that's all you can ask for.
The best part of the hike is half way up when you've already conquered the first grueling set of switchbacks, and are hot and exhausted, and you turn the corner and get blasted with a brisk wind, and a roar that sounds like a mix between ocean waves during a storm, semi-trucks rummbling on the freeway and thunder. They you get sprayed with a fine mist of water that is so welcoming it makes you want to cry with joy, and then the falls come into view (for the first time on the whole hike I might add!). At that point you are at the base of the upper falls, or at the top of the lower one depending on how you want to look at it. It's just incredible, so beautiful and powerful.
Then the rest of the hike to the top is switchback after miserable switchback. When we got to the top, we took a break on a granite boulder and watched the water rush down the final feet of the upper river bed. To get a view of the water actually falling over the cliff is difficult, since the opening is shaped like a V and so you have to almost be down in it to get a view. There was one "lookout" area where there was about 8" of rock, a metal bar, then a 3,000' drop, but I got vertigo just looking at it, so I opted to climb out as far as I could (before my knees began to buckle and my head spin) on a solid looking boulder farther back, reach by arm out as far as I could, and snap a picture. Then we booked it out of there.
The hike down was a breeze for me, and I actually really enjoyed it. I wasn't as hot and tired, so I was able to take in the view a little more, and felt a little more inspired by the outdoors at that point. I even wondered why I don't do more hiking!
It took a total of 7 hours, (one hour was walking to and from where we had to park to the trail head) but we finally made it down to the truck. We took off our shoes, cracked a victory beer and looked up at the falls and basked in the accomplishment. Even after we'd done it, it still looked impossible to hike all the way up there. It was hard to believe we'd actually done it.
Anyway, here is my very brief summary of the Upper Yosemite Falls Trail:
Q.Would I do the hike again?
A.Probably not.
Q.Was it worth it?
A.Totally.
Q.Was it a great birthday?
A.Absolutely.
(Video is the view half way up at the bottom of the upper falls.)