At Olmsted Point overlook, you can study many features typical of granitic rocks and movement of glacial ice, amid views that span from jewel-like Tenaya Lake to Half Dome.

At Olmsted Point, boulders brought in by a glacier rest on a jointed granite surface.	The Tenaya Creek valley upstream of Half Dome, as seen from Olmsted Point, localized by the same joint system that localizes Yosemite Valley.
South of Olmsted Point, granite exfoliates (peels off) parallel to the land surface.	Tenaya Lake occupies a depression gouged by the glacier that flowed toward Yosemite Valley from the Tuolomne Icefield.
At Olmsted Point, dark xenoliths, pieces of the rock invaded by granitic intrusion that formed the Half Dome Granodiorite, are cross cut by a still later dike.