3.5 million people visit Yosemite National Park every year; most of those people never get more than a quarter of a mile from their cars while they’re in the Park!!! The highlight of their visit is usually to get a view from the valley of Yosemite Falls above, the world’s fifth tallest waterfall. Yosemite Falls consists of 1,430 foot high Upper Yosemite Falls, where the water falls down to the “Cascades” section which drops the water another 675 feet. 320 foot high Lower Yosemite Falls completes this incredibly beautiful waterfall system. During the Spring snow melt season, an astounding 2,400 gallons of water descend the falls EVERY SECOND! Approximately 50 square miles of land drain down to Yosemite Falls. I’ve now been to Yosemite around fifty times in my life, and have enjoyed exploring many areas not normally seen by people. One of those areas rarely ever seen by visitors is the “Cascades” section of the waterfall (between the Upper and Lower Yosemite Falls). During the DRY season which occurs in the early Autumn most years, it’s possible to work your way over to this area to see the highly polished granite and explore the large cave there and the large empty water channel that, for much of the year, has massive amounts of water raging loudly through it. It’s always an amazing experience to sit in quiet solitude at the base of Upper Yosemite Falls and realize that water has been carving the channel around me for millions of years. It's also a surreal experience, knowing that, simultaneously to me sitting there, busloads and carloads of people are continuously photographing Yosemite Falls from the valley below, as I sit contemplating in this "hidden" part of the Falls above them that they will never see. If you ever want to explore this area in person, just be careful to look out for the rattlesnakes that inhabit the underbrush areas! I’ve included a couple of photos of a BIG four foot long rattlesnake I walked by on my latest visit to the Cascades area. I hope you enjoy looking at these photos I took at a place almost none of the visitors to Yosemite will ever see in person. The song is “In My Life - If We Never Meet Again” by Selah (This is a song that combines two different songs into one song; I only used the “In My Life” portion, and “looped” it to play twice. The lyrics of “There are places I remember, all my life” TRULY applies to how I feel about Yosemite :) :) ) Here is the link to another of my Yosemite videos: http://www.livevideo.com/video/05D4CA30F6F1439F877638A36840AD81/-yosemite-national-park-california-.aspx
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