With the Sierra Club in 1914 



For four full days our camp was pitched here. Near at 

 hand were Lake Washburn, the Amphitheatre, and trout 

 fishing. On Lake Merced was launched the famous "Colby 

 Collapsible Canoe," and it collapsed only at proper inter- 

 vals. Knapsack parties ascended Foerster Peak and Mount 

 Clark, and a band of four hardy mountaineers set out for 

 Mount Ritter, to join us again in Tuolumne Meadows. 



When Sunday morning came, we climbed straight up 

 the sides of the Lake Merced basin, for over one thousand 

 feet, by what seemed, after a full breakfast, a sort of lift- 

 ing-by-one's-boot-straps-exertion. The pack animals and a 

 few others went by Vogelsang Pass, but the main party 

 by Babcock Lake and Fletcher Creek. Here we first set 

 our feet in snow and saw near at hand, sharp against the 

 sapphire sky, snowy ridges. There was the zest and sparkle 

 of winter in the air. 



In beautiful Tuolumne Meadows the party stayed from 

 the twelfth to the morning of the twentieth. Some sat 

 happily in camp. One man insisted that the altitude was 

 so great that it winded him to turn over in bed. Many in- 

 trepid souls went to Dog Lake for swimming and mosquito 

 inoculation, to Lake Elizabeth for fish, made the treacherous 

 ascent of Lambert's Dome, or sought Soda Springs for soft 

 drinks. Still others went further afield and climbed Uni- 

 corn or Cathedral Peak. One good-sized party ascended 

 Mount Dana, taking two days for the trip. 



By far the largest side trip of the summer was that up 

 Mount Lyell. At the beginning of the slope, at the eastern 

 end of the meadows, the base camp was pitched. Nature 

 surely never meant that spot for a camping site. Abrupt 

 from the swampy meadow rose the rocky steeps of the 

 range. The women's quarters were on a succession of 

 stony shelves, so narrow that the sleeping bags had to be 

 supported on the outer edge by logs or boulders. Bed 

 was separated from bed by a patch of yet unmelted winter 

 snow. At seven the purposeful party prepared to retire. 

 The night was very cold. By each bed rose, in the motion- 

 less air, columns of bright flame from little individual camp- 

 fires, lighting up the under side of dark evergreen branches 

 above, and revealing among the tree trunks mysterious 



