Yosemite - The Most Popular Park

Yosemite - The Most Popular Park - Part 2

The end stop was the parking lot for the Lower Yosemite Fall trail. The hike to see the falls was surrounded by boulders and a few fallen trees that the kids loved playing on. We took some pictures by the falls and just like Kings Canyon the day before, the kids went to play on the rocks near the river. We spent ages crawling over rocks until the setting sun told us it was time to go. On our way back to the car, we picked up a snack and coffee at the lodge restaurant.

The drive towards Lake Tahoe started with driving the switch backs and tunnels to get out of the Yosemite Valley. Once we were at the top, and had filled up on gas, we started the trip to the east exit of the park. Yosemite National Park is a massive 3000 square kilometers so it took some time to get out. There was some mountain night driving with drop offs beside us. Not the most fun drive and we were agonizing that we wouldn’t be able to see it in the daylight.

We left the park and were looking for a campsite immediately. We found a few sites but nothing good enough, so we kept going. This led us to a massive downhill to take a thousand feet off our elevation. By the bottom, our brakes were smoking, we pulled over to let them cool. We found a National Forest campground and we drove the five minutes into the campsite and paid our $9 for a site. We set-up and went to bed. Next stop Lake Tahoe.

Comments

Mary in Malibu

Tuesday, June 7th - Angeles Mountains, Los Angeles to Santa Monica Mountains, Malibu, California - Day 117 It is great to welcome Mary back on the trip. The kids gave her a huge hug as we picked her up at the airport. They are all really excited to talk to someone other than their parents. We are all driving to our wedding on June 25th. Sixteen days until we need to be in Victoria, British Columbia. Our plan was to drive up the coast from Los Angeles, halfway to San Fran cut inland to Sequoia National Park and Kings Canyon National Park (which is close by) and then head north to Yosemite, before driving back down to Big Sur and then into San Francisco, potentially north east to Lake Tahoe and north to Redwoods National Park. It’s a busy schedule, we’ll see how it goes. On the way to pick up Mary we got a well-deserved oil change for the Santa Fe, courtesy of Valvoline. It was expensive but quick and easy. We were thinking of driving throu...

Back to the Coast

Tuesday, June 14th - Sacramento to Big Sur State Park, California - Day 123 In the morning, we got on the road and drove along the Sacramento river which watered acres and acres of fields on all sides of us. We took a scenic drive before getting on the highway. A brief stop at Walmart and Dollar tree replenished our supplies. We phoned Big Sur State Park to try to get a spot for the night. They had nine spots available, we were three hours away, we needed to hurry. When we finally reached the coast, we drove along a curvy cliffside road that was very beautiful. Views of waves crashing into the rocks on the coastline below were exquisite. Gen was behind the wheel. There were no passing lanes, she finally found a spot to pull off the road and subsequently had several minutes of vehicles continuing to pass us before we could get back on. We finally reached Big Sur State Park and were welcomed with a grove of Red Woods towering over the drive into...

Simnett Travels

Search This Blog