I was in San Ramon, California on a business trip to meet the people who worked in the Voice Mail Tier I/II support center who I had just been assigned to manage. Since I was conviently close to Yosemite, I stayed over an extra week to backpack through the wilderness for 8 days. My first day of backpacking was on October 17th, a little late in the season with many facilities closed or cut back in an area famous for its heavy snowfalls. The positives was were vanished crowds and...