A Ride On An Avalanche
Few Yosemite visitors ever see snow avalanches and fewer still know the
exhilaration of riding on them. In all my mountaineering I have enjoyed
only one avalanche ride, and the start was so sudden and the end came
so soon I had but little time to think of the danger that attends this
sort of travel, though at such times one thinks fast. One fine Yosemite
morning after a heavy snowfall, being eager to see as many avalanches
as possible and wide views of the forest and summit peaks in their new
white robes before the sunshine had time to change them, I set out early
to climb by a side canyon to the top of a commanding ridge a little over
three thousand feet above the Valley. On account of the looseness of
the snow that blocked the canyon I knew the climb would require a long
time, some three or four hours as I estimated; but it proved far more
difficult than I had anticipated. Most of the way I sank waist deep,
almost out of sight in some places. After spending the whole day to
within half an hour or so of sundown, I was still several hundred feet
below the summit. Then my hopes were reduced to getting up in time to
see the sunset. But I was not to get summit views of any sort that day,
for deep trampling near the canyon head, where the snow was strained,
started an avalanche, and I was swished down to the foot of the canyon
as if by enchantment.
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