Laura R.
Yelp
I was here in November, during Thanksgiving week. So that meant less people, but VERY dry conditions. I think California had a really dry season in general around that time. I only went up the Lower Falls, pretty much because I knew the conditions were dry and I wanted to see a few other trails that day. Maybe if I come back, I'll check out Upper Falls. It seems worth it, so who knows. I seem to be making a habit of viewing large waterfalls in the winter and THEN the summer (I did the same for Niagara Falls).
The trek wasn't very difficult for the Lower Falls, and pretty soon, you see a bridge with the falls to your left. When I say dry conditions, I truly mean DRY conditions. As in, people were climbing in the bed of the falls. This was one of my favorite Yosemite experiences, and really made this part of the trip memorable for me because it was such a unique experience. It's not every day you can say you climbed the bed of a usually burbling waterfall. I only went about three quarters of the way, if not a little less, but there were some people who had climbed all the way to the actual falls. It took me a good 30-45 minutes of climbing to even get as far as I did.
The tourists were doing what you'd probably expect with so much dry surface space and the waterfall so far from the bridge: they climbed into the bed because they could. And I don't mean this was reserved for adults or teens. Oh no, no. There were children younger than 10 scampering along rocks and climbing up and down without any kind of supervision. So if they could do it, I could too, right? I'm sure it wasn't allowable, but it was a really awesome experience. Being able to scale rocks over 5 feet tall (that's only a couple inches shorter than I am!), and being in an area that is usually submerged under water (or at least spraying water) was so neat.
It was also a serious workout, to boot. I did the trail believing it wouldn't be that bad (it wasn't), but climbing up and down those rocks was definitely a workout. It was fun navigating taller rocks and wider rocks, and leaping across chasms to get higher up. It really made me appreciate my body, and the things it can do. Gripping into rocks with my fingertips and arms, using precise balance to walk on the jagged edges, my leg muscles to propel me up, down, and sideways, my feet to maneuver into crevices and cracks. It made me feel very accomplished to climb for a little while and turn around and see how far I'd come.
Take that, summer visitors! Bet you didn't get to climb a waterfall bed.