This is the scene in the high country of Yosemite National Park: a light dusting of snow at Mount Dana above Tioga Pass. Photo courtesy Timothy Hopp.
Rangers at Yosemite National Park reopened Tioga Pass/Highway 120 as warm days with bright sun melted off snow that had covered the road.
Tioga Road is the popular east-west crossing of the Sierra Nevada in the northern portion of the park that connects the Tuolumne Meadows area eastward to U.S. 395, Lee Vining and Mono Lake.
This past weekend, photographer Timothy Hopp captured this amazing photo of 13,061-foot Mount Dana (with a lenticular cloud behind it), Yosemite’s second-highest mountain behind only Mount Lyell (13,120 feet). The photo shows that the high country has retained a light cover of snow and that only cold nights has kept the snow from disappearing off the towering summit slopes.
This month’s storms, for the most part, have poured into Canada and the Pacific Northwest and missed the central Sierra.
Since a storm in early October, Tioga Road has been closed twice and then reopened. Clear, cold weather is forecast for the high country this coming week. The Glacier Point Road remains closed for the season (it will reopen to Badger Pass when the ski park opens).
Regardless, Kari Cobb at park headquarters said that all roads within Yosemite National Park are subject to chain control or temporary closures due to hazardous driving conditions. Tire chains may be required at any time during the fall and winter season. She recommended that all motorists carry tire chains while driving in the park during the fall and winter months.
“The Tioga Road can close at any time due to winter weather and hazardous driving conditions,” Cobb said. ” Visitors are urged to drive with caution as there may still be ice and snow along the roadway.”
For updated 24-hour road and weather conditions for Yosemite National Park, call (209) 372-0200 or go to http:www.nps.gov/yose.
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