We woke early, left most of our gear behind, and biked to Camp 4 to get a spot for tonight, since the backpacker site is one night only.  To our surprise, there was already a group of roughly 20 people waiting in line when we got there, around 5:30AM.  We were very jealous, as most of them were sleeping in camping chairs or on sleeping pads on the ground.

Luckily, it was posted on the ranger station (where the line began) that 70 people were leaving today, so we would get a spot for sure.  However, we would need to wait in this line until at least 8:15AM, when the ranger arrived.  While we waited, we met Sean in line, who is from Lexington, KY and going to college in Washington DC.  He was vacationing with the rest of his family in Mobile, AL and decided to venture on his own to Yosemite afterwards.  He is planning to stay at Camp 4 for the next 4 or 5 days and day hike as much as possible!  It was a pleasure meeting you, Sean; we hope you get to do Half Dome while you’re there!!

After patiently waiting in line, we got our site, and then headed back to the other campsite to retrieve our gear.  On the way there, we stopped for breakfast in the village with Sean.  Afterwards, he headed out to hike to Glacier Point, and we decided we would settle for a leisurely bike ride up to Mirror Lake.  While packing up the tent, though, we spoke with a ranger who said the lake was merely a mud puddle at the moment, so we decided to go for an even easier activity: stopping to lounge at the river on our way back to Camp 4.

We laid out our tarp in a shady spot under a tree, where we both napped for an hour or so until the shade migrated elsewhere.  At that point, we were warm enough to wade into the river, which was extremely refreshing.  We spent the rest of the afternoon by the river, which turned out to be very enjoyable.

When we finally mustered up the energy to get back on our bikes to ride the rest of the way to Camp 4, it was dinner time.  We made another stop in the village and had pizza for dinner.  That way, when we finally made it to Camp 4, all that was left to do was set up the tent and get to sleep, which we did as the sun was setting!  It wasn’t a very exciting day, but I think it was exactly what we both needed 🙂