The climb along Nevada Falls wasn’t nearly as damp. Odie is happy about that.

Once above the falls, we followed the John Muir trail for a couple miles. It’s quite a bit more tame for a while, as is the river, before we break off and head up the mountain.

After passing the Little Yosemite Valley camp, the trail starts the steady ascent toward Half Dome. Switchback after switchback, we climbed the dirt, then stone, then stone staired trail. Odie and I had different styles of attacking this problem. Odie preferred the spurts of fast walking, broken up by short rests, while I maintained a slower, steady pace. These two techniques meshed remarkably well, as Odie would sprint ahead and take his break while I caught up. However, on one sprint, Odie overexerted himself, and I came around the corner to find this scene.

Fortunately, he was just pretending.

After reading reports that 500-1000 people walk this trail daily, we were surprised at how rare our fellow hikers were. However, the ones we did encounter were clearly superior to us. One man in particular, walking alone with no pack and no water, tore right by us like he was walking on a track. We saw him again on the way down, no worse for wear, still motoring.

We’re still getting closer.