Yosemite

Six years ago, Jeff and I went to Yosemite for our honeymoon. We absolutely loved it and were so excited to have the chance to return for a weekend this summer!

The first day we drove to the high country along Tioga Road. We were going to do this the second day to gradually acclimate to the altitude by spending the first day in Yosemite Valley, but the weather forecast changed our minds - we decided avoid Yosemite Valley when the forecast was above 90! The only problem with that was that we didn't make all the hikes we wanted to - we became winded way too quickly. Plus we were tired from driving 5 hours that day!

The pictures do not do it justice at all, but this is Half Dome as seen from Olmstead Point. (Sean said "Big piles rocks!" and was very excited.)

Driving further east, we came upon Tenaya Lake.

Tenaya Lake had "little waves,"

so according to Sean it was safe to stick his feet in.

A rare picture of all three of us.

We look completely bored in this picture, but we were actually just enjoying a quiet, peaceful moment. It was AWESOME in the high country (we didn't go up there at all the last time we visited Yosemite - I had no idea what I was missing out on before!).

Driving further east we saw some people climbing up the face of this rock. They dropped one of their ropes and we watched it tumble all the way down to the bottom. They had to go all the way down to the bottom to get it, and I assume start over. We didn't wait to find out.

Next we came upon Tuolumne Meadows in August. Just grass. I don't think I saw any wildflowers.

We starting climbing up Pothole Dome, which I read about in a guidebook. The book said you could get to the top of in ten minutes starting from your car in the nearby parking lot.

The book forgot to mention that that's only true if you're used to the altitude! We were so exhausted from the lack of oxygen that we didn't make it. We got about 3/4 of the way up and just took some pictures. Sean likes to help me rewind the film in the camera.

Here is a shot including Tuolumne River. It kind of looks like a creek here. It would be interesting to return in the spring - I'm sure it looks completely different.

Lembert Dome.

The next day we spent in Yosemite Valley. We brought our bikes (one borrowed from our landlord, one borrowed from a coworker of Jeff's) to ride around. Unfortunately the first trail we went on was back in the woods, chock full of bugs. We got out of there so fast we didn't even take a picture! We biked on for a while, just wandering around. Then all of a sudden my bike tire was flat. We had to walk over a mile back to our tent, but we had trouble removing the tire and patching the tube, so we gave up. It was not a nice way to end our morning. I had been really excited about biking the whole day, all around the valley. We ended up riding the valley shuttle around the loop a couple of times, not knowing what else to do. since our plans were interrupted. Sean loved it, and it gave us a break for a while!

We decided to do a little hiking to the footbridge to Vernal Falls. The falls were barely going. In 2003 we were there in at the beginning of June, and it was spectacular. This was still pretty cool.

Sean fell asleep in the carrier, which he hadn't done in a long time. He wasn't able to nap in the tent because it was too hot, so I was wondering if he would nap at all that day. I'm glad he did because he was in a much better mood afterward!

Later we drove out the south entrance of the park and took a ride on the Yosemite Mountain Sugar Pine Railroad. It was really cool. Sean was very excited. We sat with another family who also had a 2-year-old, so that made it fun.

We topped off our trip with dinner at the Narrow Gauge Inn, which I highly recommend. We had gone there on our honeymoon and the food was so good we went out of our way to go back. Still delicious, and Sean had fun too!