Yosemite Visitors Shake Off Recent Killings

YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK — It could happen anywhere.

Those are the thoughts, regretful but resigned, from women visiting this pristine wilderness in the wake of four brutal murders. A man stalked and killed Carole and Juliana Sund, Silvina Pelosso and Joie Armstrong, but it could have happened anywhere, they say.

“It’s not that I’m not concerned. I am,” said Marie Erickson of Santa Rosa, visiting Yosemite on Friday with her husband, brother and sister-in-law. “The truth is, there are crazy people everywhere. I’m cautious--all women have to be--but I am not going to live my life in fear.”

Most visitors seem to agree.

Despite a spate of cancellations in the days after Armstrong’s killing, lodges and campgrounds were booked solid by Saturday. Traffic clogged the roads. By 10 a.m., parking lots were filled for popular attractions such as the 3,000-year-old sequoias in Mariposa Grove and the ribbon of falling water at Bridal Veil Falls.

“People have been asking questions about the murders much of the week. But even the questions have stopped now,” said Susan Arthur, a spokeswoman for Yosemite Concession Services Corp., which oversees the 1,300 rental rooms and other services in the park. “A lot of visitors are telling the reservation agents, ‘Oh God, I’m glad they got the suspect.’ Everyone seems to be very understanding.”

Friederike Reinz of Germany heard about the murders from friends. Although initially alarmed by the news, she never considered changing her plans.

“This is something out of the ordinary,” she said, speaking through an interpreter. “I was afraid, but the authorities caught the man, so I am not afraid for my own safety.”

Yosemite employees are having a harder time.

Although 4 million visitors converge on the park each year, homicides are rare. Yosemite’s last murder was in 1987, when a man pushed his wife off a cliff. But now, residents who sometimes don’t lock their doors have become cautious.

“It’s scary now. We’re all pretty scared,” said Anais Daly, 19, who works a night shift in the gift shop of the Ahwahnee, the elegant lodge on the valley floor. She perched on a curb in the darkened parking lot, waiting for a shuttle bus.

“The first night after Joie’s body was found, I was escorted home by security,” she said. “Rumors were just crazy. No one went anywhere alone.”

While visitors to the park seek the isolation, residents say they strive for a sense of community in Yosemite’s sometimes forbidding wilderness. The Sund and Pelosso murders shook that community’s peace of mind. Armstrong’s killing seemed to shatter it.

“People know each other here. It’s not a big place,” Daly said. “But we live in tents and cabins. We’re pretty vulnerable. If something happens, we’re pretty much on our own.”

Unlike many tourists, Yosemite’s staff can’t take comfort in the arrest of Cary Stayner, who authorities say has confessed to the crimes.

“We knew him. A friend of mine used to go camping and skinny-dipping with him a lot,” Daly said. “There’s a swimming hole right near where Joie died. Who wants to go there now? And if you do, how can you help wondering about the person you’re with?”

Those fears will fade, said Alicia Salvinger, a ranger in Yosemite who often starts or finishes her day with a few hours of hiking.

“It’s a sad and terrible thing, but it won’t change the way I live my life. I’ll keep hiking,” she said. “It’s become big news in part because Yosemite is so beautiful and so well known. People think nothing bad can happen in a place like this. But the truth is--and I think we all know this--it can happen anywhere.”

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Staff writer Eric Bailey contributed to this story.