Yosemite in Memory and Reality

For Peggy's birthday, we drove up to Yosemite for the weekend.

We last visited the National Park in March 1976 and had stayed in the Curry tent cabins with the outdoor toilets and showers. We were in our late 20s then.

This time we stayed in a Curry cabin with indoor plumbing, an amenity you care about a lot more when you are in your 60s.

The park is changed some since President Gerald Ford was overseeing the National Park Service.

There are more amenities -- pizza parlors, taco shops, Starbucks knock-offs -- for tourists.

And there are a lot more tourists.

Even in October when the water falls are running dry and Mirror Lake looks like a sand pit.

There are tons of tourists who have flown into Fresno and been bused into the park.

In March 1976, it was too early for the tourist season and you could still have the valley pretty much to yourself.

Ansel Adams, who still lived and walked among us in 1976, used to say he could hike 100 yards off the beaten paths in Yosemite Valley and have perfect solitude for his photography.

Now, Ansel would have to trek a lot further to get away from the Yuppies pushing their baby strollers and their cranky children, screaming and crying so the hike to Mirror Lake now resembles recess at kindergarten.

One guidebook said irritability is a symptom of altitude sickness and there seemed to be a lot of it going around.

Ansel's iconic photographs of Half Dome still inspire amateur photographers to try imitating the master craftsman. (See photo by me above.)

They have digital cameras and equipment Ansel never dreamed of.

But it's not very creative to tread in another artist's footsteps and it is grandiose to believe, as so many still do, that they can equal or surpass Ansel Adams.

And now meadows and lakes that Ansel knew are dying.

Hard driving Yuppies in SUVs ran over 16 bears last year and appeared to be ignoring the Park Service signs warning that "Speed Kills Bears."

The good hearted forest rangers have their hands full trying to keep the hordes of tourists from trampling fragile ecosystems while busily chatting and texting on their iPhones.

"I'm here in Yosemite. It looks just like the pictures."

Oh, Ansel, you were too good.

You made Yosemite a world famous icon.

Now, come the iconoclasts.