Yosemite 2012

Georgia went on a work assignment that took her near Yosemite the week before Memorial Day. She wangled permission to fly from Yuma to Fresno, then detour through Yosemite. Georgia has gone to Yosemite from Yuma before (during 2011).

Georgia has visited Yosemite in October, February, March, April, May, and once in the first week of June. Not surprisingly, the weather has varied a lot between visits, even during the same time of year.


In late autumn, the park has few visitors, and the vegetation is putting itself to bed for the winter. In early Spring there may not be many visitors who brave the cooler temperatures. These visits have had interesting weather for photos.

Depending on the weather, late Spring has provides interest because of the snow runoff. At this time the waterfalls are amazing, and water can be found in all sorts of places in the park.

This year, 2012, the winter had been very mild, and the runoff happened well before Georgia arrived. Besides that, the weather was clear and sunny. It seemed that summer had completely arrived at Yosemite. That seemed especially the case since it was the weekend before Memorial Day. The Hordes of Summer had made it to Yosemite already this year, congesting the roads.

So what do you take photos of when you have been to Yosemite a number of times? The weather this year didn't provide any extra drama with clouds and shadow. As for the water, the Merced River provided interest as usual, but there was nothing special there this year either.

Well, this year Georgia worked on finding other subject matter. The meadows had benefited from the previous snow runoff, and were brightly green. The dogwood and meadow plants seemed worthy subjects.

Georgia tried taking photos of the granite rocks. While they have interesting patterns in the rocks, they just didn't make good photos.

So Georgia concentrated on enjoying the park, visitors and all. Perhaps next time she will be able to find the time to visit Hetch Hetchy like she wanted to this year.