Tenaya Canyon Descent

As in many parts of the Sierra John Muir was the first person here. In 1873 he made a solo ascent of the canyon from Yosemite Valley to Tenaya Lake and along the way had one of his rare accidents in the mountains when he fell, bouncing down a slope and was knocked unconscious for a short period of time."As I look from the opening jaws of this shadowy gorge, South Dome is immediately in front - high in the stars, her face turned from the moon, with the rest of her body gloriously muffled in waved folds of granite. On the left, sculptured from the main Could's Rest ridge, are three magnificent rocks, sisters of the great South Dome. On the right is the massive, moonlit front of Mt. Watkins, and between, low down in the furthest distance, is Sentinel Dome, girdled and darkened with forest. In the near foreground Tenaya Creek is singing against boulders that are white with snow and moonbeams. Now look back twenty yards, and you will see a waterfall fair as spirit..." (John Muir, 1918)

Before Muir, in the early 1850s, the original residents of the Valley, the Ahwahnees were forcibly removed by invading white settlers anxious for farmable land. The leader of the Ahwahnees was the brave but overwhelmed Chief Tenaya and during one of the squirmishes his favorite son was killed. The aging chief expressed his anger eloquently cursing the white man. Hiking the deeply incised gorge it is easy to believe that Chief Tenaya and his ghosts still live here. We time this hike for the late fall when the water dries up allowing easy passage down huge water smoothed rock slabs and taking the easiest line. In places there are a couple of short rappels and cool pools of water to swim across. What took Muir several days to ascend takes us a full, but straightforward day down to the alleged "improvements" of Curry Village.

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