It came and went quickly.  Too quickly as usual.  My annual Fall extended weekend fishing trip to Tioga Lake.  One of my most favorite places to go, located on the far side of Yosemite.  Just past the exit gate in the Eastern Sierras.  Sometimes I wonder why I like it so much as its also home to the location I give to two of my top 5 worst nights of sleep.  A combination of the altitude(about 9700 feet) and below freezing temperatures(late Sept and Oct.)  This year fishing was a little slow, but I think the trade off came with warmer weather.  Since the fishing was slow it also motivated me to take a break from the lake and hike up to the top of one of the nearby mountains.  At one point along the hike a couple friends and I decided to go straight up the mountain side and were rewarded by an incredible view.  See photo below.  Two of us brought along fishing poles and found a couple small lakes with Brook Trout.  We caught and released a few of those before heading back down the mountain, scaling many boulders left over from a glacier.  When I got home I realized I had taken far too few photos, but they don't really do Tioga justice and I can still mentally picture it in 360 degrees :)

 Waren, Darin and Glen at the top.

Not too long ago there were 6 of us that went.  This year we had 33 guys including some sons.

We made it to the top of the left hand side and then scaled back down the rocks in the background to find some trout in this small but deep little pool.