Relief Reservoir

Hiking to Relief Reservoir has been on my bucket list for way too long. My husband asked where are we heading for this weekend's hike and getaway weekend. I told him east and a high elevation with few crowds--hopefully. So we headed towards Kennedy's Meadows off just off Hwy 108, but everyone else had the same idea for camping in that area. It was too crowded for our liking.

Instead, we check the other campgrounds near Kennedy Meadows and then found a quiet spot in the Dardanelle campground, across from the burnt down Dardanelle Resort.

Two years ago a fire destroyed a huge area of the pristine forests on Hwy. 108. This campground was partially burnt.

The Stanislaus river runs just below our campsite. The steps leading down to the river were completely destroyed that it isn't safe to use them.  There is a sign stating that it isn't safe and the area below is restricted to use. Almost all the the pines that covered the peak across the river were burnt.

After settling in and eating an early lunch, we headed back to the trail head parking lot at Kennedy Meadows. From there we hiked past all the campers and folks enjoying the amenities of the resort to start our strenuous and beautiful climb to Relief Reservoir.

There were numerous groups of hikers heading up, but we hiked most of the time with nobody close by us.

We did pass a family of four with their goats hauling their camping paraphernalia. One goat just didn't want to climb the mountain. And here I thought all goats loved to climb, but not this one.

The river was flowing swiftly from all the heavy amounts of snow fall this past winter and spring.

The views were spectacular! This hike is up there in ranks to the Yosemite hike that I did with my son four years ago. The huge reward with this hike was that there were no crowds. Few folks were hiking this trail compared to the hundreds the make the climb to Vernal Falls.

The green, the granite, and the waterfalls were all stupendous!

And our little "goat" just kept on climbing.

We came across some pulley system that was left to retire after being used to build the dam.

After numerous hours of climbing, we came to a vista above the north end of the lake.

We found a perch among the granite to rest our weary bodies and nibble on some snacks while enjoying the beauty of the reservoir.

On the way back down, we had the trail mostly to ourselves. We enjoy the serenity of the canyon as we made our way back to Kennedy Meadows.

After two bridge crossings, the trail heads to the pretty meadow. Will we come back here again to hike this gorgeous area? You bet we will!!