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[Yosemite]

Elevation change of the sunrise lakes to cloud's rest?

Hiking, backpacking, running, biking, climbing, rafting, and other human-powered activities in Yosemite National Park

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Elevation change of the sunrise lakes to cloud's rest?

Postby joelin02 » Fri Aug 26, 2016 10:14 am

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Re: Elevation change of the sunrise lakes to cloud's rest?

Postby AlmostThere » Fri Aug 26, 2016 10:16 am

Does the number matter? You're going to take it one step at a time, whether it's 100 or 10,000 feet....
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Re: Elevation change of the sunrise lakes to cloud's rest?

Postby joelin02 » Fri Aug 26, 2016 10:17 am

The difficulty change of 1700 vs 2800 is pretty significant
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Re: Elevation change of the sunrise lakes to cloud's rest?

Postby AlmostThere » Fri Aug 26, 2016 10:21 am

The elevation at the peak is 9926. The elevation at Tenaya Lake is 8150. Sunrise Lakes is 9427 at the highest. That's on the topo map, which is arguably more accurate than people's GPS units.

Having done up to 5000 feet of gain in a day, the real difference is in how you hike it. If I feel like it's a lot, it feels like a lot -- if I just hike and enjoy myself it's easier. Barring any physical or elevation issues, that is. As a steady 2 mph hiker I do fine. People who dehydrate and push themselves too hard suffer a lot more than I do.
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Re: Elevation change of the sunrise lakes to cloud's rest?

Postby AlmostThere » Fri Aug 26, 2016 10:38 am

The difference may be that people aren't explaining the difference between cumulative gain, and just numbers on the map... You go up, and down, and up and down, along the way.

I hiked from Onion Valley to Horseshoe meadow, crossing four high passes, and at the end the GPS showed the cumulative gain as almost 30,000 feet -- because I hiked over high passes and back down again, repeatedly. That's why the gain for Clouds Rest can be 2700 feet instead of the simple math of 9926 minus 8150 equals 1776. The truth is, you will hike uphill more than 1,700 feet on the way to Clouds Rest because you will lose a lot of that gain, then climb it again going over ridges and moraines along the trail. If you sit with a map and figure out the high points and low points along the trail it's probably going to startle you at how much you're going to climb. It's a rare hike that doesn't have ups and downs.
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Re: Elevation change of the sunrise lakes to cloud's rest?

Postby Phil » Fri Aug 26, 2016 2:03 pm

What you really need is the elevation profile of the route. You can try to get a basic idea using point coordinates on the profiling feature here: http://www.hillmap.com/

A classic case of it is what it is. "The only way up is up."

My most recent example is 12,000 ft of gain in 17 miles. It adds up fast, and it is startling. And I was basically in the hills just above sea level.
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Re: Elevation change of the sunrise lakes to cloud's rest?

Postby AlmostThere » Fri Aug 26, 2016 2:55 pm

So the trail goes from 8150 at the trailhead to about 9200 at the junction to Sunrise Lakes. It descends to 8870 feet, then climbs again to 8990, descends about 20-50 feet, and then climbs all the way to 9926 at the top of Clouds Rest. 1050 + 1056 = 2100 feet of gain, roughly, and if I spent a bunch more time scrutinizing those micro-variations in the contour lines on the map it would be more gain -- so that 2700 feet of gain sounds real to me. Perhaps a little low, because actual trail can rise and fall within those contour lines as well, and those gains and losses of 10 feet can add up.

It goes right back to that age old hiking acronym - YMMV (your mileage may vary).

I've hiked that one -- it's typically called strenuous, and I suppose it is, but it's not a horribly steep or arduous one. We started around nine and got back to the cars around 3-4 pm. Just in time to watch someone be arrested for taking their dog on the trail.
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Re: Elevation change of the sunrise lakes to cloud's rest?

Postby Peasy » Fri Aug 26, 2016 3:10 pm

Train for 2,800. You will be glad you did. I trained for major elevation gain, my buddies did not. They were moaning and whining about the non-stop hills the entire time out there. I loved it (the hike - not their belly aching)
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Re: Elevation change of the sunrise lakes to cloud's rest?

Postby Phil » Fri Aug 26, 2016 6:08 pm

Ha! I've got 8140 at the trailhead, 9220 at the Sunrise junction, drop down to about 8650 feet-ish to the pond, begin a long, but steady climb from the pond up to the next junction at 9100 there, then to 9926 at the summit. I guess my elevation varied, and I stepped on a rock that I think added 2 feet, as well as only walking on the left side of the trail, which I thought was a shortcut, but maybe wasn't when I think about it in retrospect.

I prefer to call it: I'm here, I need to get there. Or: pain, no pain, pain, no pain, pain....it's not a good trip if someone doesn't whine at least once, and it wouldn't be Yosemite if someone wasn't getting cited or arrested for doing dumb stuff of some kind or another.
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