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NutAgain!
Trad climber
South Pasadena, CA
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Jul 12, 2016 - 07:07pm PT
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the sad thing is the loss of a rare and precious lifestyle that existed in that space.
We all have our memories of different places and times and people, but those places and people are in constant flux, and we can never really go back. I grew up in a small beach town, knew everybody and knew every back alley, and felt like a stranger going back a few years after college. It's like a parallel world- all the places look familiar, some familiar faces, but somehow everything is different and I don't belong. I ate at a tiny corner restaurant where as a kid my mom ran a bakery and I served customers and worked the cash register and cooked and washed dishes since I was 7 years old, where I fought with my brother in front of the display window while I was in charge after 10am because my mom was on a break after working since 3am, where I napped under the worktable held up by milk crates where my mom made cinnamon rolls. When I mention that my mom used to have a bakery here, that I spent much of my childhood working in this building, the girl serving food to me and my kids, she smiles quaintly with the plastic smile of service I remember so well when I was in her shoes.
Life moves on. So do we, whether we like it or not.
No harm in reminiscing, but no point in suffering. Embrace what is here, do your best to make your world the way you want it, and make peace with what is not.
As for the idyllic lifestyle livin' in a deluxe tent with easy access to food, drink, friends, and fun in a beautiful mountain setting- who wouldn't want that? If you have memories of it, consider yourself lucky and privileged that your life path brought you there at that place and time. And consider yourself lucky that this forum is such a magnet to find people who shared that experience with you.
I briefly worked for the National Biological Survey in the mid-90s on the Big Island of Hawaii, quickly forged great friendships there, and have no idea how to get in touch with the people. I don't even remember names of most of them to look them up.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Jul 12, 2016 - 07:09pm PT
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I'd warrant that the decision to close the mountain shop and relocate the guide service was more political and economic than preservationist and environmental. Seems to me it was along the same lines as eliminating pay showers at the TM Lodge: a way to prevent people hanging out for over-extended periods in the Meadows and putting up new routes. Like I said before: kill the culture and the "problem" (i.e. climbers and climbing) will be easier to manage, control and ultimately eliminate.
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Flip Flop
climber
Earth Planet, Universe
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Jul 12, 2016 - 09:21pm PT
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It was fun
Cars in the meadow was fun too
What those wize old dadz told Solomon
This too will pass.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Jul 13, 2016 - 01:45pm PT
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I don't think that installing a sign at the entrance to the Lodge Parking Lot stating that no one but Lodge guests are allowed to park within 500 ft of the Lodge was based on ecological considerations either. That way climbing bums wouldn't be able to park in the lot and hang out in the Lodge at night reading books in front of the fire, at least not without trudging 500 ft first. Also, much more difficult for a long-time resident bum without a car to cop a free shower at the Lodge; hence, cutting down on the transient climber "problem".
Interesting how ecological pretexts are always used as a way of specifically harassing climbers as an "undesirable" group in the Meadows. However, I do know for a fact that certain members of the Sierra Club have been howling to NPS about the lack of showers at the Lodge when they've returned from Club-sponsored hikes and been forced to drive to Lee Vining to obtain showers before driving back down to the Bay and L.A. Trouble with a lot of the rules designed to hassle climbing bums is that they also catch other big fish in their nets, big fish with money who complain loud and long to the authorities.
It's painfully obvious that a world-class climbing area like T. Meadows deserves a world-class guide service and a climbing store stocked with chalk, shoes, ropes and local guidebooks to serve as a center for the sport. It should be easy enough to do that without damaging the fragile TM environment if a serious effort was made.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Jul 13, 2016 - 02:39pm PT
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Bruce, you aren't the only one with that impression. As Fred points out, the NPS planners find themselves between impossible goals, and I understand they have political and practical limits on what they can do. I just wish their default position would differ from making things as inconvenient for campers - including, but not limited to, climbers - as possible. It also seems, always, to coincide with decisions that make staying with the concessionaire more attractive, relative to camping.
I don't like feeling like I subscribe to a conspiracy theory, but the decisions the Park planners made - and continue to make - don't seem to hurt the concessionaire and the gentry nearly as much as they hurt the ordinary working stiffs with limited vacation time.
John
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Jul 13, 2016 - 04:24pm PT
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But just try and go into the Meadows and guide outside the umbrella of the NPS and the concession. You're immediately infringing on the concession's monopoly and are "breaking the law". People certainly do do it, but the rules of supply-and-demand free-market capitalism are not allowed to operate within a National Park. A guide service like YMS certainly does a lot of good introducing people to climbing in Yosemite. Yeah, it's commercial, but many people go on to climb on their own after being introduced to the sport at YMS.
John, I've never known it to fail that an ecological pretext is always given by the authorities for limiting or restricting climbing activities. It's like they need to find an excuse that harmonizes with the environmental ethic to do what they want to do anyway. Couldn't they be more inventive?
I did notice this weekend that the CMS logo and sign seems to have been removed from the ice machine next to the grill. Does that mean anything? Who knows!
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Jon Beck
Trad climber
Oceanside
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Jul 13, 2016 - 07:42pm PT
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Well put NutAgain, life goes on. There is a bright side to what is happening in the Meadow, maybe the NPS has enough foresight to stop the meadow from going the way of the valley.
Sierra clubbers going to Lee vining to shower just to drive to the Bay Area is hilarious.
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aspendougy
Trad climber
Los Angeles, CA
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Jul 13, 2016 - 08:42pm PT
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Back in the day, climbers could more or less move into TM for the summer, and it sometimes meant that fewer people just passing through, once or twice in a lifetime, could find places to car camp. The current changes, whatever the motivation, discourage this sort of permanent summer residency. This is painful for those who enjoyed that lifestyle, but as the number of climbers continued to grow, I can see why this was one of the end results.
Having spent five summers at TM (1968-72) I could see a big change, even in that short span of years. In '68 it was still more or less a well kept secret, but by '72 it had become "the place to be" during the summer. If you look at the original "Eleven Domes" article, a handful of guys, Kamps, Higgins, etc. mostly had the place to themselves.
Some of the tactical decisions I can object to on certain grounds, but the basic idea of not letting TM become another Yosemite Valley, I can understand that.
An aviation pioneer in China is developing a drone where you just step inside, have GOOGLE MAPS, and it takes you where you need to go. Maybe in future, we can rent a drone, program in, for example, "The Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne" spend a day climbing, and come home. Times change.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Jul 14, 2016 - 12:20am PT
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I'm sure it'll always be possible to move into the Meadows and spend the whole summer climbing there. It just won't be as convenient and you'll have to work at it. But you can't deny that all these new changes in the Meadows are part of an overt attempt to discourage climbing and climbers from staying in the Park. In fact, the authorities have always despised the idea of long-term resident local climbers to a degree. If you become too high-profile, they'll figure out a way to boot you. The war on the climbing life-style has been going on a long, long time and won't be ending any time soon I'd guess.
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ontheedgeandscaredtodeath
Social climber
SLO, Ca
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Jul 14, 2016 - 07:34am PT
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I doubt the NPS is making these or any other decisions based on some nefarious desire to crush the climber lifestyle. I'm glad people have great memories relating to the store but I support getting as much infrastructure out of TM as possible.
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Jul 14, 2016 - 01:43pm PT
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ontheedgeandscaredtodeath: Yosemite NP is a little village. There are lists of names and plenty of scores to settle. Climbers and the climber lifestyle have not been especially popular with NPS and the concession for a long, long time. When it comes time to make a decision, the well being of climbers and climbing is usually not factored in. In fact, quite the opposite . . .
Here's a recent take on the Dark Side of the YNP Planning Process:
http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/3005112
Of course, I'm not worried about walking 500 to the Lodge to read paperbacks at night! I was just trying to indicate how petty and vindictive the whole process is. Dark Passages!
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Bruce Morris
Social climber
Belmont, California
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Jul 15, 2016 - 12:53pm PT
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Bump-o-lo!
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Risk
Mountain climber
Olympia, WA
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Sad day bump
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The Wolf
Trad climber
Martinez, CA
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I was one of the clients CF. You gave me my first lesson, Bruce Brossman my second and Don Reid my third.... A summer I will never forget.
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Toker Villain
Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
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NPS in Zion decided to go with solar toilets at the end of the Kolob Fingers road.
Contractor told them that it was only for occasional use and could not handle the capacity that demand at that location would incur.
Sure enough, $180,000.00+ tax dollars literally in the crapper.
We need more NPS accountability. You can bet that somebody in the Air Force who was supposed to tell the FBI about that Texan's (I like that they are using his name as little as possible) domestic abuse conviction is going to get the boot.
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Lynne Leichtfuss
Trad climber
Will know soon
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November 2017
More than sad. The end of an era. The end......
I went back this spring/summer to try and recapture the past years I have lived and worked in Tioga Pass/Tuolumne. It was not happening. At all. I bandit camped, stayed in Lee Vining, went to the Mobile and danced. Thank God the Whoa Nellie is still there. But the feeling was tilted, unsettled. Like hiking up and down talus, shifting. The steady spot was gone.
The Meadows and Tioga Pass Resort were the gathering places. Funny how two parking lots and several wooden benches were the hub of activity, friendships, folly and spur of the moment, random, outrageous fun.
Of course, life is never constant. Never. Treasuring my fav memories and knowing something new will evolve. lynnie
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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Meeting Lynne and Dave Yerian at TPR a couple years ago was one of those good times and a lasting memory.
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Lynne Leichtfuss
Trad climber
Will know soon
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MH2, that's what I'm talking about! Now TPR is gone as well as the Tuolumne Mountaineering School/Store.
Ekat, not sure what you mean?
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