Point Reyes Day 3

So we got up this morning (Tuesday July 20) at 5:30am and drove back into San Francisco to go whale watching. We got to the dock and didn't really see anybody. What we didn't know was that the company had cancelled the trip due to high winds without calling us. So, not only did we get up really early, we had to pay a $6 toll to go across the Golden Gate Bridge again and pay $10 for parking not to mention the money for gas. Needless to say, we were a little upset with them. We had planned on leaving tomorrow morning to come home, but now we are going to give whale watching one more try and alter our schedule a little bit. We'll still leave to come home tomorrow, but we're going to leave from the pier around 1:00pm when the boat gets back in.

We spent today doing a bunch of nothing. We went to the Point Reyes Visitor's Center to ask the ranger what we could see. We were interested in the tide pools and also an elk reserve that is close by. The elk there are in the rut, so we thought we may get to hear them bugle. The range said it has to be a negative low tide to see the pools, which means the water has to go out further than normal, which only happens twice a month. They don't really say much about this on the website, so we were a little disappointed there. The ranger also said the elk usually bugle at night, so we decided not to drive up there just to see elk, since we saw a lot of them last year.

We came back to camp and took long naps and ate some lunch and just hung out for a while with nothing to do. It was nice to be able to not feel like you had to go anywhere, but we also feel like we're wasting time just sitting here. After the nap we had a little ice cream then did some laundry. We're going to go out for dinner tonight and I'm going to have some fresh local oysters since this area is known for them.

At this point, Point Reyes has been a bust. We haven't really seen a whole lot that impressed us. The Pacific was cool the first day, but since then, it's been a bit disappointing. Let's hope for whales tomorrow.

Pray for our safe travels home as well and if all goes well, we'll see you Sunday morning!

Today we woke up at 5:00am after our coldest night yet. It’s so funny to us that the coldest nights we’ve spent have been at the beach. I can definitely say that this is the only time I remember wearing fleece all day in July at the beach.

It only takes about 45 mins to get into San Francisco, but we didn’t want to have to drive in Monday morning rush hour traffic, so we got up extra early. We drove across the Golden Gate bridge to get into the city and didn’t hit any traffic at all.

This is Alcatraz Island.

We had to be at the dock for our whale-watching trip by 7:30am and we got there around 6:30 so we had time to walk around Pier 39 for a while. We were the only people there besides the vendors so it was nice to walk around and see it without the crowds. We got to spend several minutes along with the famous San Francisco sea lions. They are funny to watch and pretty active early in the morning. All the really big ones are out in the seas mating, so we just saw the juveniles and some of the females. Someone told us that over 1,600 sea lions come there in Thanksgiving. It was still really cool to see and hear them.

They have the biggest piece of macaroni I’ve ever seen!

We met our captain and boarded the Kitty Kat, our boat and set off through the San Francisco Bay. We sailed under the Golden Gate Bridge and past Alcatraz on our way out to sea. I had gotten seasick on my last excursion out to sea so I took two Dramamine to fight off the sickness. I made sure to stare at the horizon constantly. I never got sick, but I felt nauseous a lot of the time. We were in some pretty rough seas. It was very windy and the waves were pretty big. Frankly I’m surprised we went out, but maybe it’s like that all the time. Some of the passengers stayed in the cabin but they started getting sick one by one and puking over the side. The key is to stay outside, no matter how cold and how wet you get so you don’t get sick. We had to put on the yellow rain slickers that you always see on TV in order to stay relatively warm and dry. It was a pretty uncomfortable 5 hours to be honest. Kate did better than I did.

Here’s the bad part…we didn’t see any whales! They said that’s the first time they hadn’t seen a whale since November. I could have dealt with feeling bad if I had at least seen some whales. Their policy is that if you don’t see a whale, you get to go on another trip for free. That works pretty well for them since most people are tourists and can’t go two days in a row. We, however, are not your typical tourists and we told them Kate would be back tomorrow (Tuesday). I decided to sit the next trip out. All I could focus on for the whole trip was not getting sick. My eyes were tired from focusing on the horizon the while time. As much as I like being on a boat in the lake, it looks like I’m a landlubber when it comes to the ocean.

We got back into port and had some chowder and shrimp at one of the Pier 39 restaurants. I was 51% hungry and 49% nauseous, so the hungry won out, but it was a close race.

We decided to go check out a local beach called Stinson Beach and drive up the coast a bit to check out some tide pools that you are supposed to be able to see starfish and other cool stuff.

Kate had to drive because the Dramamine was making me so sleepy I couldn’t keep my eyes open. We got to Stinson Beach and got a quick dessert. It was a brownie with chocolate and vanilla ice-cream, whip cream, strawberries and bananas. It was very tasty and didn’t last long. We walked on the beach for a while until we decided it was too cold. We probably were still chilled a bit from the boat, but we both had fleece on and were still cold. There were people laying out like it was 90 degrees outside, and I can’t figure out how they weren’t cold.

We headed up the coast to the area where the tide pools are supposed to be, but the tide was up so we waited for while to see if it would go down. I fell asleep in the car while Kate read. The tide was coming in so we didn’t get to see anything. We headed back to camp and I went to sleep for a few hours to try to shake off the Dramamine. I will not be taking that again if I can help it. We had some sandwiches for supper then climbed into bed. It was the coldest night we’ve had yet and had to really bundle up. We were prepared from last year’s experience so we never got cold during the night.

We’re getting up early again tomorrow to take Kate back for more whale hunting, so keep your fingers crossed!

Point Reyes National Seashore Day 1

We got up and left Yosemite this morning around 8:00am. We’ve got packing down to a science now. We set out for Point Reyes National Seashore, which is about an hour north of San Francisco. We had to travel through Oakland, CA to get to our destination. If you ever think you want to take a trip to Oakland, don’t. Driving there was a nightmare. Every exit we needed to take was blocked by the police or under road construction. I don’t like driving in cities anyway, but Oakland was about as stressful as it gets.

We got through Oakland and made it to Olema RV Resort and Campground. The road to the town of Olema was very curvy and very bumpy. Kate and I both are about tired of curvy, bumpy roads at this point. The straightness of the interstate is going to be a welcome site on the way home. I don’t get carsick very often, but I started to get sick around here. We set up camp and the first thing we did was laundry. We were both on our last pair of clean underwear, so it was necessary.

After laundry, we went down to the seashore. It’s cool to see the Pacific Ocean and how it’s different from what we're used to in NC. The surf is a lot heavier, and it’s cold out here. The water is freezing and the air isn’t that much warmer. It’s constantly windy. In some points the ocean comes right up against the rocks. We went to the Point Reyes Lighthouse, which is one of the oldest lighthouses on the west coast. They close the lighthouse when wind conditions are over 40mph, which is quite often apparently. The sign there said it might be the windiest place on the west coast. It was definitely colder and windier than the beaches we have back home. It’s funny that this is the coldest place we’ve been to yet and we’ve been in the mountains for the past week. We took a stroll on the beach and then headed back to camp for supper.

After supper, we took a much needed shower. I’m embarrassed to say that it’s been about 6 days since our last shower. I know. We think it’s pretty bad, too. They say if you can smell yourself then other people have been smelling you for 3 days. We passed that mark a while ago. We were glad to take a little time to clean up this evening in a shower that we didn’t have to put quarters into. The showers here at the campsite are the kind you have to keep pushing a button to get water to come out of. Once you push the button, you get 9 seconds of water so you really have to be diligent or you’ll get cold. While I was in the shower, I heard two people in the toilet area slamming stuff around and giggling. I knew something was going on that shouldn’t have been and my guess was that it was teenage boys running amok. I was going to try to stop them from doing whatever it was they were doing, but I was completely naked and covered in soap so that would have hindered my abilities, but the site of me naked and covered in soap should have been enough to scare away the toughest of customers. It turns out that they cut the water lines in all the toilets so that was a bit of a headache.

After our shower, we crawled into bed and got ready for an early morning. Whale watching tomorrow! Up at 5:00am. Yuck!

Yosemite Day 3

Today we woke up early thanks to some kids playing directly next to our tent at 6:00am. Camping etiquette is nonexistent out here. We had a breakfast of more sweet potato pancakes then headed out to the valley for our day’s activities.

Today’s big activity was horseback riding through the park, but we didn’t have to be there until 12:00, so we took a little hike to Mirror Lake first. It was only a couple of miles so it wasn’t a huge hike. Mirror Lake is a temporary lake and usually dries up by the time summer is over. Yosemite had a late winter this year so the lake was still there, but not very impressive since we saw it past its peak time. We still got a good shot of why it’s called Mirror Lake though. We took an unexpected detour on the way back, but we found our way back to the path.

We had lunch at a little taco stand in the park that was surprisingly good and relatively reasonable for the national parks. Pretty much all the food in the national parks is vey expensive. I really thing the parks service is messing up here, but I guess it’s like any theme park. Once you’re in, they have you so why not make some money off of you.

We got to the stables and checked in and they set us up with our mules. We thought we were going to be riding horses, but it turns out they had mules waiting for us. Kate’s mule was named Roxanne and mine was named Guinness. Mine was the biggest mule I have ever seen! It was half draft horse so it towered above the rest of the mules. It’s hard to tell from the photos, but it was a long way down to the ground from where I was riding. I had to dodge my fair share of limbs too because I was sitting up so high. He was a good mule though and he took care of me. When I got off, the inside of my legs were so sore because he was so wide. It was like riding while doing a partial split!

We rode through the park up the John Muir Trail. It was pretty steep and pretty rocky. I thought it was a lot steeper than the Grand Canyon trail and definitely felt a little more scary. The mules are trained to go to the outside of the trail, but ours seemed to take that to the extreme. There were plenty of times when we jerked the reigns back toward the trail because we were both uncomfortable with the path they were taking. Still, it was a good ride. As far as the ride and scenery, it was probably the best one we’ve taken yet. We got to see a lot of the park on the ride and the top was a great view from Clark’s Point where we could see the entire valley. As far as the guides, I was less than impressed with them. We had two with us and they couldn’t have been more than 23 or 24. Not than a young person can’t ride a horse/mule, but they didn’t really interact with us at all. The lead guide had a frisky horse that didn’t want to go where she wanted it to so she had to move to the back, which made me nervous. The other guide that came up to the front stayed so far ahead of everyone that you never really saw her. I’m sure they have to deal with annoying tourists all the time, but if we weren’t their giving them money, they wouldn’t have a job so I would expect a little more. We also felt like the mules were not as well trained as in other places we’ve gone. I had to control mine a lot more than I’ve had to in other parks. Even the people in the ticket stand acted like it was a hassle to do anything. Oh well. Normally we tip our guides quite well, but we didn’t feel compelled to do that this time. Their loss. Even with that, it was still the best ride we’ve been on yet.

After the mule ride, we went to the Ansel Adams gallery their at the park and Kate took a couple of photos in black and white in his honor.

We got back to our campsite to see that our neighbors, a new set, had set up camp in their site and partially in our site. They had 5 tents set up (the maximum is 2) and had 3 big vehicles, one of which a big truck which took up part of our parking space. I was pretty mad when we pulled in, then they offered us hamburgers for supper so I forgave them pretty quickly. We ate and talked with them for a while then went to bed.

Overall, Yosemite is a beautiful place that I feel has been a bit over developed. There are people everywhere and it’s hard to take in the beauty with all the people around. I think it would be a great place to go in September or even June, but July is not the time to go. Of course we were there adding to the crowds, but I wouldn’t feel compelled to go back.

Tomorrow we head to the coast!

Yosemite Day 2

So I went to bed last night with full intentions of not having to go outside to use the bathroom, since they have just as many bears in Yosemite as Sequoia. I purposefully didn’t drink anything after 6:00pm, but of course I had to go outside, so I did my now famous 5-10 minute ritual of gathering the courage to go outside in the dark. I woke up sometime in the night and heard animal footsteps outside the tent. I lay awake in terror for a good 5 minutes before I realized that it had to be a deer since it sounded like hooves and what ever it was was eating grass. As soon as I turned over it ran away anyway, so that was a relief.

As I was walking to the bathroom this morning, I saw a large pile of poo in our campsite. It was definitely not deer poo. It could have been dog poo from one of the other campers, but I’m betting it was bear poo. I can’t be certain, but of course it’s bear in my mind.

We had a delicious breakfast of sweet potato pancake and bacon. My sister, Nicole’s, mom got them for us when we were in Atlanta. It’s a mix where all you have to add in water and they are so good! You don’t even need to put syrup on them.

Today we planned to take a hike in the Yosemite Valley. On the way to the valley is a viewing point called Tunnel View. It is a spectacular view of the Yosemite Valley with great views of Half Dome, El Capitan and Bridalveil Falls. It’s an image that you may even recognize as it shows up a lot when you see pictures of Yosemite. We also passed the Yosemite Chapel on the way in. It’s pretty old and would be a cool place to get married.

Kate snapped a good picture of Stellar’s Jay while we were in the valley today. They are a pretty big blue jay and they like the tourists for all their food and trash.

We got into the valley at just the right time and prepared for our hike. The hike we took was on the Mist Trail and was a hike up to the top of Vernal Falls. The Mist Trail is the signature hike of Yosemite. We figured it would be kind of steep since we were hiking up to the top of a waterfall, but we weren’t prepared for what lay in store for us. Virtually every step of the hike was very uphill. When you finally get to the end of the paved uphill path, you start on the unpaved uphill path. I have never hiked anything like this before. You are picking your way up these paths and steps that are so steep. Not to mention the fact that there are people everywhere. Yosemite is so crowded in the summer and there were people trying this hike that looked like they may have a heart attack at any moment. Kate and I may have looked like that too because this hike was crazy. The total hike is 1.8 miles and over that 8 miles you climb over 1,000 feet in elevation. This trail is called the Mist Trail because you walk so close to the waterfall that it sprays mist on you for a good portion of the trail. We ere literally soaking wet by the time we got finished, but we were so tired that we didn’t care.

We ate lunch at the top of Vernal Falls and watch all the tourists ignore the 10,000 signs that say not to feed the squirrels. I hate squirrels, so when they come up to us, we scare them away, which is what you should do since they are wild animals. Instead, people feed them so they get used to getting food from people. There were over 300 squirrels bites in Yosemite last year, making the squirrel the most dangerous animal in the park.

We made our way down the trail, which was equally as strenuous because it’s so steep. Our knees hurt quite a bit from the strain of going downhill, and we were glad to get to the bottom.

We got a little snack and then rode our bikes around the park a bit. Yosemite has a bike trail that goes around the interior of the valley so you can see a lot of the valley on your bike. It was a nice ride and it made us glad we had brought our bikes with us.

After the bikes, we headed back up to Glacier Point to get Kate a t-shirt that she really liked. I liked it too and was going to get one, but it didn’t fit right. It is the only t-shirt I have seen on the entire trip that I really liked and now Kate has it and I don’t. Not fair. We had a little supper back at our campsite then lit a small fire for a while. Our neighbors had gathered a bunch of firewood and were leaving the next day so they gave us some of their wood to use. We now know for a fact that our trouble keeping a fire last year was 100% due to the bad wood we got in Gran Teton. This fire lit with one match and burned like a champ. We spent the time by the fire waging a small war against the Yosemite mosquitoes. They were a formidable opponent. I was doing well defending my front, but they were sending soldiers to distract me in the front while they bit me through my shirt on my back. I had a little section of 4 or 5 bites on my back. It was a good strategy, although they lost of a lot of good men in the process. Once I got wise to their strategy, I think I won the day.

As I was walking back from the last bathroom run of the evening, I saw our neighbors just casually sitting by their fire smoking a joint. They had been cooking massive amounts of food all weekend and now we know why.

So darkness falls again and fear returns. I am not the least bit scared of bears during the day, but something about them at night freaks me out. I know they don’t want to eat me, but I also know that people in California are crazy for the most part, so why would the bears be any different? Let’s hope my bladder and I can get on the same page.

That’s it for day 2!

Yosemite Day 1

I’m afraid I have to eat a little crow here. In my post from Sequoia, I was a bit skeptical about all the Californians screaming and yelling about bears. I’ve been to Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks where they have grizzly bears. I thought these people were being a bit ridiculous. Well, we were talking to several people, including a ranger and they all said that bears come into Dorst Creek campground (our campground in Sequoia) regularly. Every time you hear a car horn or people screaming and banging pots together, you know they are scaring a bear away. You can hear this happen about every 5-10 mins. One guy we were talking to said he was in camp two nights ago and felt a bear’s breath on his foot. Needless to say, all this freaked me out quite a bit. You would start to hear the people scaring the bears away as soon as darkness fell. It was like a zombie or vampire movie where you were scared to be out at night.

Kate and I both took a Benadryl to help us sleep through the bear noise that goes on all night. Kate was quite a bit more composed than I was, mainly because she doesn’t have to get up to use the bathroom at night. I wake up every night to go so all I could think about was running up on a bear in the middle of doing my business. I pee right outside the tent when we camp because I’m too lazy to walk to the bathroom. Last night I was terrified to walk to the bathroom. To be honest I was terrified to leave the tent. I woke up at 11:30 having to pee so bad I was in pain. I had gone to bed praying that I wouldn’t have to go, but I guess God wants me to face my fears. I laid there for a while contemplating how mad Kate would be if I just peed in the bed so I wouldn’t have to go outside. I’m 99% kidding about that. I finally got up the nerve to get a flashlight and peer out the door of the tent to make sure there wasn’t a bear outside waiting on me. I had a vision in my mind of a bear sitting at our picnic table reading the newspaper waiting on me to come out of the tent. I’m not sure why I feel so safe in the tent. Probably because we do a very thorough job of putting anything that may attract a bear in the bear locker. I laid there in the fetal position for another 5 mins trying to build up courage to go outside. I decided to take my chances and go outside. I had to pee a lot so it took a long time and I was feeling vulnerable to bear attack at any moment. Thankfully, I was able to finish and get back in the tent without incident. I was worried that I may have to go again since it was only 11:30 and I had drank a lot of water, but I didn’t wake up until daylight, so that was good. I don’t know if I could have gone out again. So, I take back all my remarks about the crazy people from California. I’ve yet to see a bear out here, but I’m sure scared to death of the night right now.

We woke up pretty early and got packed up yet again. We headed north toward Yosemite. I think we take for granted our highway system in NC. Usually, everything is pretty well marked as far as finding gas stations and food. California is not quite as efficient. We had to just pick and exit and rely on the GPS to get us to gas and a biscuit. The biscuits out here a smaller and denser than back home. They need a lesson in biscuit making from some of the Linkers. They do have sweet tea at the McDonalds out here, which I found interesting. Usually you can’t find any sweet tea once you get out of Tennessee.

We got to Yosemite around 1:00pm and grabbed a campsite at Bridalveil Creek campground. We wanted to stop at the first one we got to, to make sure we had a place to camp tonight and ended up with a nice campsite out of all the hustle and bustle of Yosemite Valley. Our campsite backs right up against a stand of trees with a meadow on the other side. I feel this leaves us open to bear attack, but the middle campsites were occupied with a bunch of screaming kids, so I’ll take my chances with the bears. We set up our tent and ate a little lunch. We decided to take a trip up to Glacier Point, which is one of the “must see” viewing areas in Yosemite. When we got up to the top, we realized why. We got our first view of the famous Yosemite valley with its huge granite mountains carved out by a glacier millions of years ago. At Glacier Point you can see the whole valley and all three waterfalls. It is a vista that is hard to describe and I don’t know how much the photos do it justice. We mostly took photos of Half Dome. We also got our first look at El Capitan, the largest stone monolith in the world. It’s pretty famous for rock climbers. We ate a hot dog and had some ice cream while we looked around the souvenir shop.

After Glacier Point, we went back to camp and cooked dinner. We’ve invented a new dish called Chicken Helper. We take grilled chicken and combine in a pot with macaroni, pasta sauce and green peppers and onions. It’s pretty good, but has a hard time rivaling Hamburger Helper, which is one of my personal favorites. Unfortunately we’re out of that, so I’ll make do with chicken.

We decided to go back up to Glacier Point to watch the sunset, which is supposed to be one of the “must do’s” here. The valley is in the east so the sun sets behind it, but the sun’s rays make the rocks turn different colors as it goes down and it was a pretty good way to spend an evening. We worked on some post cards while we were there, and took a lot of pictures.

Right before dark, we got back to camp and washed up so we could be in the tent before it was completely dark. Needless to say, I was a bit dismayed when I saw people had left out food containers and garbage, which is what attracts bears. I’ll talk about the night in my next post.

That’s all for night one in Yosemite.

Sequoia National Park

OK so here are the pictures from Sequoia. I didn't go through and put them with the corresponding text because I didn't have time. Enjoy!

I couldn’t get the pictures up for some reason tonight. I’ll go back in and edit this post to put our Sequoia pictures up as soon as I can. Sorry!

We woke up around 9:30am after out night out in Las Vegas. It was nice to have a bed and a shower that didn’t have a timer on it. We checked out and got on the road around 11:00 and headed toward Sequoia National Park in California. We stopped a couple of times and went on a bit of a goose chase looking for a grocery store to restock our supplies so we got to the park entrance around 7:30pm. That would have been fine, if it wasn’t over an hour to get from the park entrance to our campsite.

The entrance is at 1700 feet of elevation and our campsite is at 6700 feet, so you can imagine what the road was like though the park. It seemed an endless combination of steep uphill and 90 degree turns as we climbed up into the Sierra Nevada Mountains. We did manage to catch a great shot of the sun setting over the mountains as we were climbing. It was by far the steepest, curviest road I’ve ever driven.

As we were driving we began to pass into the Giant Forest. This is where the Sequoia tress start to grow. I have to say that they are one of the most awe-inspiring sites I could imagine. We couldn’t stop to get a good look at them because we were trying to get to our campsite before dark, but just driving through them makes you feel like you are in a prehistoric, Jurassic Park like environment. It’s not just the Sequoias that are huge, but every tree is massive. The pine trees here are the largest in the world. It’s like everything is magnified. Ironically, the Sequoias have really small cones while the Sugar Pine, the largest pine in the world, has enormous cones.

We finally made it to our campsite at Dorst Creek right as dark was falling. We got camp set up pretty quickly even though we were working in the dark. We’re getting pretty good at it. Apparently, in Sequoia and Yosemite parks, they have a lot of trouble with black bears coming into campsites and trying to get human food. Hey are very adamant about everyone putting their food and all toiletries in the bear lockers at every site. We made sure to do that, since we didn’t want an unwanted visitor in the middle of the night. During the night, I heard several car alarms and bear horns go off, so I don’t know if a bear was there or not. The campsite is really nice, but they are really close together so you can hear everyone’s conversations. A lot of people were talking about bears, but I don’t know how much of that was true. We’ll be sleeping with our bear spray just in case tonight though for sure.

We got up around 8:00am and fixed some breakfast. My sister Nicole’s mom Phyllis bought us some instant sweet potato pancake mix and it is absolutely delicious. We had that then headed down to do our first activity for the day.

Our first stop was the General Sherman tree. It is a giant sequoia and is the largest tree by volume in the world. Don’t confuse Sequoias with redwoods. They are not the same. Sequoias are bigger in diameter but a little shorter. The tallest known Sequoia is 311 feet and redwoods get upwards of 350 feet. Sequoias grow in the mountains and redwoods grow along the coastal region. Sequoias don’t’ die from old age. They die from falling over. The oldest known tree is 3,200 years old. Just wanted to pass along some of what we learned today.

Back to General Sherman. Walking along the trail to see the Sherman tree, you pass a lot of Sequoias, and they are all impressive. But when you get to the Sherman tree, you are blown away. The sheer size of it is hard to get your mind around and it’s really hard to capture that on film. The Sherman tree is 2,200 years old and still growing. The placard in front of the tree said looking up at Sherman is like a mouse looking up at a human. It’s something you have to see for yourself.

After Sherman, We drove to Tunnel Log, a downed Sequoia that you can drive your car through. Next, we did a hike up to Moro Rock. This was a 350 step climb straight up a granite rock to a viewing area that gave you a 360 degree view of the park. It’s a little strenuous, but definitely worth it once you see the view. We came down and went back to the campsite for some lunch. Hamburger Helper is an underrated meal.

On the way back to the campsite, we saw the park had named one of the hikes after me. Little Baldy. I like it.

After our lunch, we set back out to do another of the recommended Sequoia hikes to Tokopah Falls. It was about 3.5 miles round trip and was a good hike. The falls were definitely worth the effort. The water in the river is so clear that you can just about always see the bottom of the river. It’s very cold though because it comes from snow melt that is still happening right now.

After our hike, we got a quick ice cream and came up to the lodge to do some blogging. We’ll have dinner next them get ready to get up early to try to get the campground we want at Yosemite.

We don’t have any cell service anywhere in this park, so we won’t be reachable until tomorrow when we are on the way to Yosemite.