Miles: 5.3 + 9.6 JMT to Yosemite Valley

Total Trail Miles: 943.7 

Ascent/Descent: 1900/1430 ft 

Start Time: 05:00 

End Time: 16:05 

Temperature: 12°C (54°F)

We had a lie in until 4am today but after 2ish I woke regularly as I was a bit chilly. Despite being at lower elevation and on dry ground we still had frosty tents. As the 5ish miles to Tulomne Meadows was mostly snow free we decided we would go at our own pace and meet at the road junction there. It was a very beautiful stretch of trail, mostly flat, passing meadows and weaving in and out of trees. All of the big river crossings had bridges and the little streams and flooded trail were rock hopable. The only annoying thing were the frequent snow banks but it was mostly snow free nonetheless. I arrived third after Beer Slide and Buddy and was gutted that I missed seeing the two baby bear cubs they had just seen run up into a tree and the mumma bear nearby. There were lots of dear nearby though which weren't phased by us at all. We sunbathed in the closed road whilst we waited for the others. It's funny to think this are world normally be heaving with tourists and we had it to ourselves. moments after lying down by Beer Slide spots a bear plodding down the road towards us, it looked like a mumma bear but we couldn't see any cubs. She scarpered into the trees before getting too close. Yeehaw arrived 20 mins after me and Shortcut another 20 after that so we made a quick move once we had regrouped. We had a short road walk before reaching the JMT junction where we would turn off towards Yosemite Valley. We passed the closed post office, it has been wrecked by the snow with half of the beams collapsed, didn't look like it would be opening for a while. We had a pretty steep climb up the JMT to navigate around Cathedral Peak but it was really beautiful. The snow started back pretty much as soon as we stepped foot on the JMT so it was crampons back on. We had just under 9 miles of the JMT to cover before reaching the spot where we had decided to camp. Me and Beer Slide managed to squeeze our tents into a tree well so it was semi dry camping for us.