James Kaiser

“no place on Earth had more fantastically big walls in a more gloriously accessible location than Yosemite. In the 1940s and 50s, a motley collection of climbing personalities descended on the park to put their skills to the test. Among the new arrivals was a 47-year-old Swiss ironworker named John Salathé, who pioneered an important new piece of climbing equipment: the steel piton. This strong metal spike, fashioned with an eye-hole at one end, could be hammered into cracks to provide a safe, secure anchor for ropes. Although pitons already existed in Europe, they were made with soft, malleable iron that often buckled in Yosemite’s hard granite cracks. Salathé’s steel pitons, by contrast, held strong and could be reused, which meant carrying much less equipment on big climbs. Salathé then unleashed another revolutionary concept in Yosemite: the multi-day climb. After climbing all day, Salathé spent the night strapped to the face of the rock. No longer constrained by equipment or daylight, climbers could rise as high as their bodies would take them.”
― James Kaiser, Yosemite: The Complete Guide: Yosemite National Park

“Tuolumne Grove This small grove of giant sequoias is often overshadowed by the more famous Mariposa Grove in Wawona, but the Tuolumne Grove is definitely worth a visit if you’re enchanted by the big trees. The grove is located about a half mile past the Crane Flat junction. A two-mile round-trip path starts from the parking area and drops about 500 feet as it passes by 25 giant sequoias. Among the notables: a tree with a tunnel cut through the trunk (the tunnel was cut in 1878), and a giant tree that rises nearly 300 feet—one of the tallest giant sequoias in the world.”
― James Kaiser, Yosemite: The Complete Guide: Yosemite National Park