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.