August 21 - 23, 2017
This weekend was the perfect alignment of a new moon at night, perfect for taking photos of the night sky and also the solar eclipse. Young Lakes is the one set of lakes you can hike to from Tuolumne Meadows that Wallace had not hiked to, so we opted for a new location with the goal of doing two nights at upper Young Lake and to do a day hike to Mount Conness. Unfortunately, Young Lakes is higher than 10,000 feet in elevation, so no campfires are allowed, making for a cold few nights. Below are some of the highlights from our first day/night.
After setting up camp at Upper Young Lake we were treated to a great sunset over the lower lakes from above. Bring up at such high elevation we also experienced thunderstorms throughout the afternoon making for some excellent clouds for photos the whole trip.
This trip was my first experience doing a all night time-lapse. Below is the video from the time-lapse of the Milky Way passing over Upper Young Lake.
I was able to continue the time-lapse in the early morning. Not a bad view to wake up to.
On our second day, we watched the solar eclipse in the morning and then set off on a day hike to summit Mount Conness. It was not an easy hike, but the views of the surrounding mountain ranges were incredible.
Approaching Mount Conness we stopped for a short break and I was able to capture the moving clouds with a short time-lapse.
Scaling to the summit was not for those scared of heights. You can see from the photos that we were like ants compared to the shear cliffs.
Our way home we took a separate trail down another section of the loop trail. We were treated yet again to great views. Below is a photo on the way back with Cathedral Peak in the background peaking through the trees.