A CHANGED YOSEMITE NOW OPEN.

Byline: Eric Brazil San Francisco Examiner 

Seventy-three days after record flooding by the Merced River closed it down, Yosemite Valley, America's most popular national park, is open for visitors.

But the tourists who began pouring into the park on reopening day Friday are seeing a new Yosemite.

Post-flood Yosemite Valley ``will be a different and more natural experience,'' said park Superintendent B.J. Griffin. ``The human footprint will be smaller.''

The closure is the longest in the park's 107-year history, and Griffin acknowledged that the damage done by the flood is far from repaired.

``It's going to take three years or so before things are back to normal,'' she said.

Sandbags and yellow police tape are still everywhere. Hard-hat crews are digging trenches for new water lines, while other workers yank out the stumps of trees washed away by the great flood of Jan. 1-3. Some of the campgrounds that used to be down by the Merced River will never be replaced.

Griffin predicted fairly light crowds for the weekend, but ``next week will be busy.''

For the time being, it's come one, come all - as long as you have the fee, which was raised to $20 from $5 on Jan. 1. But in May the park intends to introduce a day-use reservation system that figures to keep tourism down.

``It's probably time,'' said park historian Jim Snyder. ``There has been a reservation system in effect for the back country since 1972.''

Yosemite's bears had a high old time while visitors were kept out. Most of the bears didn't hibernate, said park Ranger Lynda Doucette.

``They had a terrific supply from all the Dumpsters that were overturned during the floods,'' she said.

But more than 1,000 employees of Yosemite Concession Services, the park's concessionaire, didn't fare as well; they were laid off, and just 400 have been called back to work.

``This went on so long it seemed like it would never be over,'' said Vicki Rowland, a housekeeper at Yosemite Lodge, who lost her job and is awaiting a call-back. On Thursday she was shoveling chunks of snow away from a campsite fire pit.

Signs of last-minute tidying up were everywhere in the valley: clerks stocking store shelves, groundskeepers picking up trash, carpenters hammering and electricians wiring some concessions that weren't quite ready to receive thirsty, hungry, demanding customers.

The luxurious old Ahwahnee Hotel is booked up this week, but a few rooms are still open at Yosemite Lodge and Curry Village. Two of the lodges' restaurants are still being repaired, but otherwise, said Yosemite Concession Services spokesman Chet Brooks, ``We're ready to rock and roll.''

Yosemite's public information chief, Scott Gediman, acknowledged that ``we're not quite ready yet, but we're getting there. We couldn't handle the kinds of crowds (20,000 to 25,000 people) we get in the summer. By no means is this work done, but people are going to be pleasantly surprised by what they find here.''

Indeed, the valley's renowned waterfalls are in full flow, and the sheer cliffs rimming it are bright with a dozen springtime freshets brought on by the melting of a high Sierra snowpack that is twice the normal depth.

There are fewer visitor accommodations in the post-flood valley - 346 rooms and 400 campsites were lost, as was the Mirror Lake horseback riding trail. The valley's stables will not open this year.

Riverside campgrounds and employee housing in the Merced River floodplain are just a memory. They never should have been built there, Griffin said.

``Nature has already begun a process that people have only talked about,'' Griffin said. ``As we rebuild, we intend to avoid the mistakes of the past.''

The Clinton administration is asking Congress for $178 million to repair Yosemite flood damage. Griffin said she's hoping the money will be approved by early next month.

Still closed is the Happy Isles nature area, which was badly damaged by a colossal rock fall last summer, although the famous Mist Trail that leads from Happy Isles to the top of Vernal Falls is open. The trails to Yosemite Falls and Glacier Point also are open.

Before the flood, Yosemite Valley had three all-season entrances. Now it has two. Highway 140, which enters the valley via Mariposa, was badly damaged and is still not open to two-way traffic. Highways 120, via Groveland, and Highway 41, via Wawona, are both open.

Highway 140 will be open to limited bus traffic until Labor Day, when it may be open to some two-way traffic. But it will take about 18 months to restore the highway to its pre-flood condition because some re-engineering will be needed, Griffin said.