Heading to Yosemite in late July, I certainly expected the rainbow parade to be long gone. It was summer; it was dry; many of the rocky peaks were still snow-covered; all reasons to expect little more than a dandelion or two. Well, I was wrong, and for all the amazing and breathtaking wildflower sights of the previous months, I found I could still be amazed. (Yes Virginia, there are still wildflowers.)
As I wrote last week, we discovered a nice variety of drought tolerant species, and as we ascended Tioga Pass, we found lush green springtime-like seeps full of colorful blossoms, all the way up to the 9,000' entrance to Yosemite National Park. We were as giddy as kids at Christmas, and it wasn't the thin air.
We had one last objective in mind: Mt Dana. While we were lead to believe there would be some wildflowers up there, in that cooler, thinner atmosphere, we were skeptical. Sure, maybe we'd find an alpine species or two scattered about among the rocks, but surely nothing on the scale of, say, the gentle sloping rainbows of Gorman Post Road, or dry rocky slopes of Jawbone Canyon. I mean ... it was the end of July!
The path toward the sloping ascent up Mt. Dana took us through some meadows and ponds and stands of conifers, and there were outbreaks of color scattered about haphazardly, but it wasn't something unexpected. It was a joy to be among, sure, but a little bit anemic after the previous few months of wildflowers.
At some point we rounded a curve and found ourselves facing a blanket of purple beyond which a backdrop of snow-capped peaks stood. It was a lovely sight, a real Kodak moment that brought to mind some of colorful explosions of March in the southern sierra Nevadas around Kernville.
We had come upon the lower end of a mountain meadow, wet and wonderful from the late July snowmelt. The purple was a combination of Large-leaf Lupine and Tall Larkspur. Closer inspection revealed some pink Sierra Onions and Giant Red Paintbrush. The lupine and larkspur both stood three feet tall or more, a very impressive jungle of pigment. Certainly it wasn't going to get nay better than this.
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