The Tuolumne Meadows store and grill close after Sunday the 20th. The lodge, the shuttle and the hikers bus all stop today, the 13th. Tioga Road stays open until the first storm that sticks; the last five seasons it closed between October 21 and November 15. After the 20th a high-country day is drive-yourself and carry-everything: fuel at Crane Flat, none in Tuolumne.

On the site this week

• The Park Service quotes two drives from Las Vegas: 400 miles and eight hours over Tioga Pass in season, 495 miles and up to ten around the bottom of the Sierra when the pass is shut. The calendar decides which one you get. https://thetalusfieldjournal.com/articles/yosemite-from-las-vegas
• The all-weather road into the park is the one that closes without a schedule: ten times in twenty years, most recently September 1, when the Colorado Fire shut it at Briceburg. How to read a closure notice, the detours, and when to keep the room. https://thetalusfieldjournal.com/articles/highway-140-closed-yosemite
• The winter guide now quotes the concessioner's published floor rates: the Ahwahnee from $389 on two-night stays, the Valley Lodge from $172, Curry Village from $95, late November through March 25, with blackouts. https://thetalusfieldjournal.com/articles/yosemite-in-winter
• Animals of Yosemite has a bats section. A dead bat found at Curry Village in May tested positive for rabies, the park said on September 2. Never touch a bat; report one on the ground or near people. https://thetalusfieldjournal.com/articles/yosemite-wildlife-viewing-guide

In the park

• YARTS ends by route, not by month: the Fresno buses on Highway 41 run through September 25, Sonora and Mammoth Lakes through the 30th, Merced year-round.
• Evening talks at the Conservation Heritage Center, 7:30 pm, free: mountain lions on the 18th, bats on the 19th. The season's last Moonlight Tour runs September 22, four days before the Harvest Moon.
• The Yosemite Facelift runs September 23 to 27; the volunteer guide now carries the Rush Creek and Evergreen lodging offer for volunteers.

From the archive

September 1935, Ranger-Naturalist Paul W. Nesbit on Old Bill, the tame buck at the Glacier Point hotel: "By fall Old Bill is always fat and ready to migrate with other deer to lower altitudes where the snow does not get so deep." Yosemite Nature Notes, Vol. 14 No. 9. https://thetalusfieldjournal.com/archive/1935/vol-14-no-9/

The Field Guide

The Secret Guide inside the Field Guide grew by thirteen entries this month: Siesta Lake, Bennettville, the three lots at Tenaya Lake, the Yosemite Falls moonbow and the great gray owl watch at Crane Flat among them. Fifty entries, each pinned on the offline map, and additions push to existing buyers. One payment of $3.99 for 18 months. https://thetalusfieldjournal.com/guide

Go high while the store is open. Back next Sunday, when there is something to say.