Referred to as the "Bermuda Triangle of Yosemite," this section stretches from Tenaya Lake to Yosemite Valley and is notorious for slips, trips, falls, and unusual experiences. It is also a site where rockslides occur frequently, leading to helicopter rescues and unfortunate fatalities.
Adventurers who dare to venture through the 10-mile Tenaya Canyon will encounter challenging obstacles such as smooth granite slabs, risky rappelling, mandatory swims, and precarious ledges.
From San Francisco Gate:
Many have tried, many have succeeded and many have been hurt. Even John Muir, the “Father of the National Parks,” was knocked unconscious when he fell here. It’s so accident-prone that park officials warn that “a trip into the unforgiving terrain of Tenaya Canyon … should not to be taken lightly.” There’s also an ominous park sign that greets visitors at the entrance of the treacherous canyon: “TRAVEL BEYOND THIS POINT IS DANGEROUS.”
“There are lots of places where you can slip and fall. Then you’re really in trouble,” Christopher Brennen, who climbed Tenaya Canyon in 2000, told SFGATE in a recent phone interview. Brennen, now 81, said the route includes “lots of climbing over boulders and waterfalls” with “very bare rocky slopes you have to be careful about slipping on.” In all, it took his team 10 hours to complete the journey.
“You’re always wondering what’s around the next bend,” he added. “That’s what makes it exciting.”
But like Yosemite itself, the canyon has a troubling and complicated history.
It was the site of at least one bloody conflict during the Mariposa Indian War, which took place across what is now Yosemite National Park and the surrounding Sierra Nevada from 1850 to 1851. The war followed the arrival of white European settlers years prior and decimated the Indigenous population living in the Yosemite foothills and Yosemite Valley.
In the late 1840s, that number stood at 7,000 people in the southern Sierra foothills.
It had been reduced to fewer than 700 not even a decade later.
The term "Indian burial ground" is often used loosely, becoming a part of the lore associated with numerous sites across America. However, it is worth considering that these legends may hold some truth...
It is possible that certain areas carry a cursed or ominous aura. Take, for instance, Gettysburg, a place that witnessed a tremendous loss of human life. Such locations seem to exude a distinct and darker energy. Call it eccentric, but there might be something unsettling lingering in these spaces.
