The HIKE

Sisters Deborah (left) and Mary (right)

"Let me make this really clear," she said with eyes that pierced mine, an angry and concerned look on her face. "This is not a video game! There is no reset button! There is no second life! You stay on the marked trail. Do not leave the trail. Do not climb over the fences. If you do you are dead!"

This epic warning from my oldest sister would serve as my introduction to Yosemite National Park, one of the crown jewels of the National Park System. It was my first visit. I was just a boy. My sister had begged me for years to come and visit her there. But I had resisted up until this point. I had this mental image that sister Deborah (Debbie), as a fledgling Yosemite Park Ranger, would attempt to have me hang off a sheer cliff face like El Capitan. Wouldn't that be fun??? NOT! Even at my young and foolish age, I wanted no part of that.

The Yosemite that I am about to describe to you in words and pictures no longer exists. In my youth this park was, in the words of my sister, "underutilized." Reservations? Not needed. Who ever heard of such a thing? Entry fee? To get into Yosemite? GET BENT! To visit Yosemite during this period in time, one only needed to load up the car with camping gear and family. You had your pick of camping spots in Upper or Lower Pines campgrounds, and that choice was usually smack dab on the banks of the Merced River. Cost? Anywhere from $1 to $5 per night. A trip to Yosemite was a "trip on a budget."

Half Dome

No phone calls were needed. No warnings required. The World Wide Web was a World Wide Fantasy. The price of gasoline to fill up the car was getting exhorbitantly expensive at the time, approaching 59-cents a gallon as I recall. But nothing else would stop families from driving directly into Yosemite Valley and parking at the campground of choice. It was that easy. That simple. Traffic jams? In Yosemite? Are you kidding? Far too remote. Not that many people were willing to make that kind of a trip.

You didn't even need an ice chest to keep the cans of beer, soda or bottles of wine cold. That is what the ice-cold Merced River was for. It was nature's ice chest and campers took full advantage of it. There was nothing more refreshing than a can of Olympia or Hamm's beer or Shasta soda at the end of the day that had been "water iced" by the fresh snow-melt waters of the Merced River that coursed through Yosemite Valley and ran straight by our camping spot. No can of cheap grape soda ever tasted any better.

These memories, and a lot more, have been flooding back to me in waves recently. I am recalling events and conversations that I haven't thought about for decades. The recent death of a young lady, Grace Rohloff, is most likely the reason. The 20-year old Arizona State University student slipped and fell from the cables that hikers use to ascend Yosemite Valley's Half Dome in July. She tumbled off a rain-slickened rock face and fell some 300-feet. By the time a rescue team managed to reach her, she was gone.

Yosemite Valley

The story of what happened to Grace has appeared in multiple newspapers and magazines. The tragic event was told to these outlets in detail by her father, Jonathan Rohloff. They were more than just father and daughter. They were hiking partners. The trip up the Half Dome trail is just one of many adventures that the two had undertaken. I feel horribly for Mr. Rohloff. I will never understand this father's pain. But his experience has resulted in a flood of memories.

In the summer of 1977 my two older sisters announced they were going to treat me to the experience of a lifetime. That trip would be a hike into the backcountry of Yosemite National Park where no car could reach. It would result in an overnight camping experience in a remote place called Little Yosemite Valley. It would also mean a trip up the vaunted Half Dome cables. Debbie talked about these cables and this hike often. She was about to introduce me to the experience. That earlier fear I mentioned about scaling the vertical face that is El Capitan was about to come true.

Sister Mary and I. Half Dome Trail

Although I could still describe this ascent up from Yosemite Valley and this hiking trip in detail, I'm going to skip that. Needless to say, this is a trip that took place nearly 50-years ago. Yet, I remember it to this day. I remember it like it took place last week. I don't think anyone forgets an adventure like this. I certainly did not, for many reasons not necessarily connected to this one excursion. It's just an experience that you do not allow yourself to forget.

I can and will tell you the first thought that came to my mind after I had huffed and puffed my way up to the lip of the little dome, also known at the time as "Little Half Dome." This is where the cables that ascend the big round rock called Half Dome came into view for the very first time. The first reaction from my 14-year old brain when I looked at those cables went like this: "OH. HELL. NO." I was already about to drop dead from the trip up just to reach those cables. Now, I would be forced to ascend this monster in front of me? Nope! Not me! I'm not having any part of that!

This is where the term of "sister power" came into play. Both Deborah and Mary announced they were going up those cables. If that wasn't a good enough argument to convince a recalitrant (chicken-hearted) brother, Mary announced she would need a strong man behind her. Just in case she slipped on the cables, you understand. Needless to say, they "convinced me" to make that assault on the cables. They overcame all of the inner voices that screamed "ARE YOU INSANE?" However, to this day I still do have a feeling that if I had refused to hike up that big hill, they would have tied a rope around me and hauled me up.

Half Dome Cables: 1977

A photo snapped by sister Deborah attests to this lineup. Debbie, the strongest in the family, led the way. Behind her came the youngest sister, Mary. Behind Mary came the baby of the family. The spoiled one: me. Do you notice anything else about this photo? Like the complete lack of any other people nearby or below? This was no accident. This was the Half Dome experience in the mid 1970's. If you were brave enough to make the trip up those Half Dome cables, you owned the mountain for that afternoon. Debbie was right. The park was underutilized. This photo is proof of that.

This isn't to say that there were no other people on the Half Dome trail leading to the cables, or other people who accessed the cables at the same time my sisters and I were there. I do remember a handful. But, it was just that: a handful of people. Maybe 10 to 15? Maybe less. I wasn't really looking for them at the time. Nope! My eyes were firmly on the cables and the steep and treacherous side of Half Dome that I found myself on. The only time that I looked up from those cables and that mountain, and I can guarantee you this much, is when Deb told me to look up so she could take the now famous cable photo above.

I can also guarantee you that my eyes and attention went straight back to that mountain I was perched on when that "photo moment" came and went. Another guarantee I can offer is that this section of Half Dome looked nothing like the photo I've placed below. This photo represents the Half Dome experience today. This is today's hiking reality on that Half Dome trail. This is the kind of crowd you can expect to find on this mountain, even with a lottery system in place. My sister's efforts, and the efforts of other park rangers at this time in history, to transform the park from "underutilized" to "utilized" paid off big time.

Today's Half Dome Cables Reality

There's another thing that I like about this photo. There are many such photos of the traffic jam that hikers can expect to find on the Half Dome trail in this day and age. But the one I've chosen to include shows something very special. I saw it for the first time in 1977. I see it in this photo today. You will see a line of people vanish from sight at the very top of this photo. When I first noticed this section from the bottom of the cables I was about to nervously ascend, I reached the conclusion that this point must represent the top of the mountain.

Nope.

I still have a clear memory of what I encountered when I reached this point on that ridge. It's been darn near 50-years since I saw what was over that ridge. I have never forgotten it. As I went over it, I did not find the top of the mountain. No sir. What I did see made my heart sink just a tad further. I was nowhere near the top. In fact, those cables continued up for as far as the eye could see. The hike up to the top wasn't even close to being over. As a matter of fact, it represented the section where the hike to the top of Half Dome got even tougher. To this day I'm still not sure how I made it all the way up, but at some point I did. I was at the top. My sisters and I had conquered the iconic rock called Half Dome.

There are some hikers who celebrate this accomplishment by sitting on the very edge of Half Dome, allowing legs to dangle over the side. Other people will lie down, on their stomachs, on a section of flat rock and inch forward until their head is at a point where you can look straight down. These people are insane. I am not. I wasn't getting anywhere close to any ledge. In fact, as I wandered around the top of Half Dome my mind was occupied on one thought and one thought only. How in HADES am I going to get down?

Debbie Center. Mary Seated

Again, my sister turned park ranger came to the rescue. When a downward facing descent turned into a terrifying assault on the senses (I may have started crying), she suggested that I turn around and go down the way I came up. This turned out to be a fine idea. I turned around, stuck my big butt out for leverage, and assed my way off that Half Dome ledge. I did feel a bit sorry for the handful of people who encountered my big keester as they ascended Half Dome. Although I could move it a tad, that was and still is a mighty big butt to overcome.

As far as safety equipment is concerned, there wasn't any. It was 1977. It either did not exist yet, or these things were not widely available. There were no gloves. Nobody wore a harness. Hiking boots also weren't really a "thing" just yet, although I did have a cheap pair of knockoffs that came from the Montgomery Wards store in Modesto. Those boots, however, did not stop the inevitable slipping and sliding that can take place on those Half Dome cables. This happens, even when the weather is dry. The smooth granite face of Half Dome, polished clean by centuries of ice and snow from previous ice ages, can be that slick. There were points where I lost my footing and my knees met solid granite. There may have been points in that hike to the top where, for short periods, I crawled on my hands and knees. This is not an easy trip. I cannot imagine how people do this type of climb today with so many hundreds of people on these cables. I really can't.

I didn't know it then, but this would be the lone highlight of hiking trips with both sisters. Five years later our family would lose Mary to a car accident. The news, oddly enough, would be broken to me by my sister, Debbie. Mary, who had set a professional goal of becoming the next Barbara Walters, was killed while covering a story for KHSL-TV in Northern California. The job of General Assignment Reporter with KHSL represented the first step in achieving the professional goal she had set for herself since her graduation from the University of Southern California. But her time at KHSL would be short. It lasted only six months. In an instant she was gone.

Debbie with President Bush

A much better fate awaited my older sister, Debbie. 25-years after our hike up the Half Dome cables, this park ranger unknown (at the time) had risen to a rank where she found herself sitting next to the President of the United States. George W. Bush didn't just like my sister. No, love would be a much better term. He found every opportunity to be photographed next to Debbie, as he apparently dragged her from stop to stop during his one-day tour of Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks in 2001. Not many people get that kind of access to the President of the USA. I have two of these photos. There are others. I treasure them all.

I feel horribly for Jonathan Rohloff. He watched in abject horror as the pride of his life, 20-year old daughter Grace, slipped off the Half Dome cables and fell to her death. He saw every moment of it. In an instant she was gone. Many computer comment jockeys think he is to blame. "He should have done this," they say. Or, "he should have had safety equipment." It is our reality in today's world. People can be terribly insensitive and this is one big example of it.

Debbie
& The President

There is nothing he could have done. Not one thing, other than choose to stay off the mountain on this particular day. Safety equipment is a fine idea, but those devices can sometimes fail. I do know that he will be haunted by his daughter's death for the rest of his life. She will come to visit him in his dreams, just as my sister Mary has visited me through the decades. Mary never ages in my dreams. She never got the chance. She will always be the young lady that she was. The young lady pictured above on the Half Dome trail is the lady that sometimes comes to visit when I dream. The death of a child can bring families together or blow them apart. Rock solid marriages can disintegrate because of it. Or, they can sometimes grow stronger. Each situation and each family experience is unique.

This would not be my last experience in a National Park like Yosemite. Having a sister as a Park Ranger or Park Administrator has its advantages and perks. Like access, for one. Or knowing where to go and when to go there. I would go on to hike or travel to places in Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks and Yellowstone National Park. My brother and I would hike the trail to Paradise Valley in Kings Canyon. I would also work for part of one summer at a restaurant washing dishes in Sequoia National Park. Traveling through Yellowstone on a snowmobile in the dead of an ice-cold winter is another experience. I will never forget any of these memories. They are stories for another day.

Mary-KHSL TV

EDIT: My thanks to Cris Hazzard, aka "Hiking Guy." His guide on what hikers can expect in today's Yosemite National Park Half Dome reality is very good. It's a far cry from what I experienced in the 1970's. He was kind enough to allow the usage of some photos from his excursions on the big hike, and is a very good resource for what kind of reality hikers can expect to see and experience in the here and now.

PHOTO CREDITS: My thanks to both Jota Lau and Johannes Andersson for depositing digital images of Yosemite Valley and the valley view of Half Dome on the Unsplash website. My thanks also to the Visalia Times-Delta photographer who snapped the iconic image of my sister with President George W. Bush. I will never remember his name, but I did call to thank him (plus order additional copies of this iconic shot).

REGRETS: I have a few. A big one was failing to save any pictures of Debbie during that 1977 Half Dome trip. She was in a few of them. However, at the time I collected these photos, Mary had just passed. My intent was to find, locate and save each photo of Mary that I could gather. Pictures of Mary and Debbie together were saved, as were photos of Mary with other family members. But I passed on others, which is something I have come to regret.