Mt. Lyell is the tallest peak in Yosemite NP at 13114 feet, and regarded by many peakbaggers as having some of the most impressive views of the Sierras based upon it's proximity to many other highpoints (with the others being Mt. Brewer in King's Canyon and Mt. Hoffman in Yosemite near May Lake). 

For this trip, Marie and I camped out along Hwy 120 at one of the many small Inyo NF campgrounds on the east entrance, and met up with Aaron at the ranger station early the next morning. We were easily able to nab a walk up permit for backpacking via Lyell Canyon from the Tuolomne Meadows Trailhead. After organizing our gear, we set off for our base camp at the upper portion of Lyell Canyon, just below the tree line. There were 3 or 4 campsites on the west side of the river, which provided plenty of ample water flow still in early September. 

The next morning we awoke leisurely, as the peak was only a few miles away at this point, and hiked up to Lyell pass, the edge of Yosemite NP, before turning west towards the peak. The approach was mostly clear of boulders until the last mile, which began turning into dense scree. We passed a couple who had turned around for fear of some ominous storm clouds, but we were keeping a watchful eye on them the whole time, and in fact didn't hear our first bit of thunder or see any lightning (on another, very distant peak) until we had actually reached our own summit. 

When we reached the large Lyell glacier, we immediately wished we had crampons in our packs, as the trip around them to the north added easily an extra 30 minutes over just climbing straight up the glacier to the final summit approach. There was a point at which due to the distance and perspective of the mountain, it seemed impossible to scale without ropes, and had it not been for Marie pushing us along, we would have never summited. Sure enough, she was right (as she always is) and we found the final summit climb very easy with minimal exposure. The summit was beautiful, and showed an impressive set of afternoon storm clouds in the distance which caused us to go back down with haste. We reached our basecamp well before dark, and leisurely packed out the next day, making for a very enjoyable and relaxed backpacking trip to a beautiful summit. 

Friday we left fairly early from LA for the eastern side of Pinnacles National Monument, and arrived at the shady and oak-strewn campground after a long stretch of winding and hilly rural roads. I never get carsick or any other form of motion sickness, but the last couple hours I had been increasingly more and more sick-to-the-stomach. Unfortunately after setting up the tent and air mattress, which we finished fairly early in the afternoon, I was more nauseous than ever. I had overlooked the fact that Marie had previously had a light stomach bug of some sort, and I must have eaten the same thing as her a few days later, because it was a horrible pain. Slowly everyone else arrived and pitched their tents, including Susanne, Justin, and Eric-- who had an amusingly large, rented 8 person fortress tent. I napped and stayed in the tent until dinner when I had a few bites to eat before going back to sleep, still sick.

Saturday morning I woke up feeling slightly improved, but still couldn’t eat anything. The options were to skip the 12 mile loop hike I had planned through both famous caves (and a possibility of bats), to do a small dayhike by myself, or to tough it out. Well if you don’t know me, I’m pretty stubborn, so the third option was the only one. As a result, they were forced to go slowly, but we still had a good time overall. The first cave was not too far in and it was great to crawl through the tight cave (especially being 6’3”), but unfortunately no bats were visibly roosting. We continued the hike to the top of the peak in the middle of the park, and followed some precarious stone ledges around to the other side. This was made easier with some metal pipe railings, but be advised that if you are over 5’10” or so, it is actually more difficult because the railings are at mid-thigh height and just waiting for some over-brave soul to fall over the railing a few hundred feet.

At this point I started feeling worse and they had to go increasingly slower to wait for me, but after descending the other side and reaching the western TH and campground, I drank gallons of water and laid down. Next we hiked through a wash to the second cave and saw some even more impressive drops and descents, but once again no bats. (I was just in a rush to get through it though, so there could have been some). Once on the other side, it was a fairly level hike along a stream back to the TH. I felt increasingly better and better, and by the time we had driven back to the campground I felt good enough to eat a huge meal and enjoy the campfire.