Floating down the river

Wildlife stories from Yosemite National Park

We found an understated bit of queer history on our way to Yosemite National Park, in the Groveland museum.

During the gold rush, James Chaffee and Jason Chamberlain built a house and lived together for decades as partners, planting an orchard, selling crops to travelers, and panning for gold.

The quote under the photo read: “We came to Second Garrotte, which consists of a few scattered houses. There while resting under the shade of some oak trees, we were overtaken by an old gentleman. He told us that right here was the best camping place on the road. He led the way into an orchard of apple and pear trees, in a peaceful little valley encircled by hills covered with pines and oaks. He and his old partner (Chaffee and Chamberlain) had lived here for forty years and keep their place neat as wax, and the Century, Californian, and other well-known periodicals are on their table.” — Jessie Heaton Parkinson

It’s really beautiful here in Yosemite National Park. Yosemite is one of the most popular national parks in the US, so, some of the challenge is to find enjoyable activities off the beaten path.

If you walk up the Mist Trail to Vernal Falls and Nevada Falls in the summer, you may find yourself in a thick swarm of people clambering up the slippery stone staircase. But up in Tuolumne Meadows, if you walk out onto Pothole Dome, you may feel like the only person around for miles.

While we didn’t run into many people, we did spot a marmot, a chunky housecat-sized creature with rodent teeth which ran into a crack between rocks when they saw us coming. We thought it was gone at first, but then saw the patterned fur still nestled between the rocks.

A minute later, the animal that we assumed was so reclusive climbed back out of the crack directly towards us! Woah, we said, and backed up. But the marmot, an herbivore, didn’t chase us, instead, flopped down on a flat rock in the sun, completely flat. You’ve never seen a marmot this flat. Arms and legs out to the side, head down, pancaked.

The marmot was so good at quickly switching from being alarmed at our presence to completely relaxed snoozing in the sun.

On our way back, we saw the same marmot again, nibbling on grass. An herbivore indeed.

We’ve been watching all kinds of different birds. I really like the free Merlin bird app from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. It’s a nice app for seeing a list of common birds in a new area, especially since I travel so much. I don’t have an intuitive knowledge yet to identify all the birds I see in different places.

If I see a bright yellow bird fly by, my first thought is Goldfinch, but actually in the Mono Lake area, it’s much more likely to be a Yellow Warbler.

It’s very neat to be out here with all the different creatures with less of a separation between us and them.

Living out of the rental van has been quite comfortable. We got a great mattress for free—we helped someone move out at the end of their school year and put the mattress and bed frame in our van. The mattress is wedged in with a suitcase on one side and the bed frame is up on risers we bought. So we’ve been sleeping in a bed all summer even though we’re out in the wilderness a lot.

I had tons of fun in Yosemite Valley pretending to be a duck. Well, almost. We got some inflatable floaties, sort of like an inner tube and sort of like a floating chair, and put into the river up at Curry Village. A lot of people rented rafts from the concession, and some people had their own inner tubes or canoes. We brought almost nothing with us, no phones, wallets, etc. I even left my glasses in the van. I dropped a phone off my boat once, several years ago, and it was gone. Not going to risk that again.

When I stepped into the river water it was so cold. I knew it was going to be cold but it was quite a shock when I first put my foot in. It took quite a bit of mental fortitude to sit down in the floaty. Then when my butt got wet I screamed all over again. Then, I had to push off into the current, which was rippling and moving a little too fast for comfort. But then I sank into the floaty, got a little more comfortable with it, and it started to become second nature to use my arms to paddle backwards to maneuver from one side of the river to the other.

Gliding down the river, I watched birds hanging out on the shore: blackbirds, jays, and several groups of ducks, some with ducklings, so cute and little and following the parent in a swarm.

The ducks were pretty calm as we floated by, just keeping an eye on us. We must have appeared as a nonthreatening part of the river and its other wildlife. We observed each other but were all doing our own thing, living our own lives, just happen to be in the river together.

Four mergansers, diving ducks, dashed across the water in front of us, three frantically chasing the first one, who had something in their mouth. It was a crab. The mergansers skidded around the surface of the water from one bank to the other as we drifted by. The first merganser tried several times to pause and gulp down the crab, but they were under hot pursuit from the other three. Eventually, the first got it down and the other three slowed to a float.

The water was so clear. In one deep pool, 18-inch dark and chunky fish were hanging out on the bottom. I kept an eye out for approaching logs and rapids, while gazing up at Yosemite Falls and Half Dome. We floated under several bridges. And of course, I worked on dodging the rental rafts and canoes with their minimal steering.

Looking up at the cliffs, the air was hazy with smoke that we hadn’t noticed in the morning. With no phone and no internet, I couldn’t pull up the Cal Fire map or the AirNow air quality map. I didn’t know where the fire was or how big it was. I could just smell the smoke and see the sun shining through it. Nothing to pull me out of the moment, no information about the outside world.

Floating down the river was a really cool, timeless experience that I am grateful for. It was an exercise in focus. Lose focus for more than a few seconds on the river and you might run into the river bank or a tree or a log or you might miss a fantastic view, a fish, or a bird. It’s an amazingly present feeling to float in the water, a feeling of being one with the river.

I highly recommend reading this beautiful piece, Embracing Ourselves, by

Robin Taylor (he/him)

in Trans Friend. Robin has an incredible skill for describing what it feels like to be present in a changing human body. I worked with Robin on an earlier draft of this piece in the memoir class I taught this spring, and I am honored to have played a small role towards this great piece and am so pleased to see this published. Please check it out!

Embracing ourselves

Thanks so much for reading! Let me know what you think in the comments.

Take care,

Rey