Horseshoe Curve on Glacier Point Road

The Historic American Engineering Record survey of Glacier Point Road (HAER CA-157), held at the Library of Congress, has a photo captioned “Horseshoe Curve in Glacier Point Road near Glacier Point. Half Dome at center rear… Looking NNE”. Its coordinates are 37°43’44.3”N, 119°34’14.1”W. Y

The Park Service’s own Cultural Landscapes Inventory doesn’t name the bend. It calls that whole stretch of road the “Switchbacks Segment.” And that is about as accurate a description as you can imagine; these are switchbacks on switchbacks, and no matter how good your headlights, in the dark you cannot see around the bend. There’s no sign there, and no NPS viewpoint listing.

But it's there. Just before Glacier Point Road ends, the pines open there, and Half Dome stands framed between them. Most of us see this view through a windshield, for a second or two—if we even notice it all—on our way somewhere else. And if we're hoping to catch sunrise at Glacier Point, we blow right past it in the dark. The road is built to keep us moving toward the overlook at the end, where the railings are and where the view is supposed to be. Just this month, I had driven past this prospect almost a dozen times without stopping. But the road reaches its own answer a quarter mile before Glacier Point, in a bend that asks nothing of us except to slow down.

But today's venture was about finding this spot. A photographer friend and I left the Valley long before first light and drove up Wawona and Glacier Point Roads in the dark. Then we fumbled along the shoulder with headlamps until we found the right spot. Once we found the right viewpoint, I put my fluorescent safety vest on; we'd be shooting in the middle of the road around a blind curve. And it paid off several times. We did not know what the light might reveal, but we were rewarded this morning. Nautical dawn broke cold. For the first time all week, layers of cloud lay over the High Sierra. As they caught rose and amber, the granite stayed cool and pale, waiting for the sun.None of our apps or photo software predicted any sort of clouds or skyfire light. But this is why you have to find out for yourself.

And when you do find it, you give it a name. This image is titled Flexus, Latin for "a bending." You can find it in our Yosemite Gallery.

I keep coming back to places like this, the in-between ground where a famous landscape shows up without ceremony. No pullout, no sign, no plaque. Just a curve of pavement, a pair of pines that have watched a century of traffic go by, and the mountain waiting for us as it always has.