THE SIERRA CLUB OUTING OF 1919 

 By Charles A. Noble 

 1^ 



THE 1919 summer outing of the Sierra Club in Tuolumne 

 Meadows was, in some respects, a duplicate of the club's 

 preceding trip in 1917 — the official outing of 1918 was omitted 

 because of the war — ^but the region visited is so big and at- 

 tractive, and so centrally located for side-trips of great number 

 and variety, that it would require many duplications to give one 

 person familiarity with it, and no mountain-lover would ever 

 feel that he had exhausted its charms. 



The outing party, about one hundred and seventy-five, reached 

 Yosemite Valley July 12th, shortly after midday, via Merced 

 and El Portal, and remained there until the morning of the 

 14th. The camp, selected well up in Tenaya Canon to facilitate 

 the climb out of the valley, was less comfortable than the for- 

 mer one, near the Stoneman bridge, and less convenient for 

 valley excursions ; but to a Sierran bound for the high moun- 

 tains the human noise and dust of Yosemite seem desecration 

 of primitive nature; so that the wait-over of twenty-four hours 

 in this anomaly of automobiles and silks he regards, at best, 

 merely as a necessary evil. 



An early start enabled the party to make the tedious zig- 

 zags of the Tenaya trail in shadow, after which the route to 

 Lake Tenaya lay through fine forests and beautiful meadows, 

 with repaying views into the rugged Tenaya Canon. After a 

 night in camp, at the mouth of Murphy's Creek, followed by a 

 tramp of eight miles along the Tioga Road, the party settled in 

 permanent camp on its private estate at Soda Springs for a 

 stay of eighteen days. 



For persons of all degrees of physical vigor Tuolumne 

 Meadows is an inviting camping-place. The altitude of 8500 

 feet insures invigorating mountain air ; the skyline to the east, 

 south, and west follows a succession of mountains which, at all 

 times of day, in sunshine and storm, but especially in the morn- 

 ing and evening colors, are of unfailing beauty. The less hardy 



