mite National
Park]

The Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne, through which the river descends from
the level of the Tuolumne Meadows almost five thousand feet to the Hetch
Hetchy Valley, possesses real Yosemite grandeur. Much of this enormous
drop occurs within a couple of amazing miles west of the California
Falls. Here the river slips down sharply tilted granite slopes at
breathless speed, breaking into cascades and plunging over waterfalls at
frequent intervals. It is a stupendous spectacle which few but the
hardiest mountaineers saw previous to 1918, so steep and difficult was
the going. During that season a trail was opened which makes accessible
to all one of the most extraordinary examples of plunging water in the
world.

The climax of this spectacle is the Waterwheels. Granite obstructions in
the bed of the steeply tilted river throw solid arcs of frothing water
fifty feet in air. They occur near together, singly and in groups.

V

The fine camping country south of the Yosemite Valley also offers its
sensation. At its most southern point, the park accomplishes its forest
climax in the Mariposa Grove. This group of giant sequoias (Sequoia
washingtoniana) ranks next, in the number and magnificence of its trees,
to the Giant Forest of the Sequoia National Park and the General Grant
grove.

The largest tree of the Mariposa Grove is the Grizzly Giant, which has a
diameter of twenty-nine feet, a circumference of sixty-four feet, and a
height of two hundred and four feet. One may guess its age from three
thousand to thirty-two hundred years. It is the third in size and age of
living sequoias; General Sherman, the largest and oldest, has a diameter
of thirty-six and a half feet, and General Grant a diameter of
thirty-five feet, and neither of these, in all probability, has attained
the age of four thousand years. General Sherman grows in the Sequoia
National Park, seventy miles or more south of Yosemite; General Grant
has a little national park of its own a few miles west of Sequoia.

The interested explorer of the Yosemite has so far enjoyed a wonderfully
varied sequence of surprises. The incomparable valley with its towering
monoliths and extraordinary waterfalls, the High Sierra with its
glaciers, serrated cirques and sea of snowy peaks, the Grand Canyon of
the Tuolumne with its cascades, rushing river and frothing Waterwheels,
are but the headliners of a long catalogue of the unexpected and
extraordinary. It onl