Day 15 - On Which Matt & Rach Visit A Pretty Amazing Place and Eat Cheese
Summary: Yosemite
Itinerary said: Drive to Yosemite
Camp at Wawona meet a bear. If it’s a baby one
We got up at 5 this morning to give ourselves the maximum time possible in Yosemite. We said goodbye to Pauline, as she was going to spend a few days with Julie and Dan, and were on the road by 6.20.
We stopped at three supermarkets to find food of a sufficient quality to complement the cheese that we bought on the Castro yesterday. Despite the satnav telling us it was only 120 miles to Yosemite (it lied), we didn’t get there till nearly 12. We stopped a couple of times when we got there to gawp first at El Capitan, then at the Bridalveil falls, then parked the car and set off to walk to Mirror Lake. It was seriously hot, even the bottle of water that I carried got unpleasantly warm. Even though it was less than a mile and a half each way, we were knackered when we got back. Mirror Lake itself was disappointing due to the time of year, but the view up the side of Half Dome was good.
We swam in Lake Merced in a bid to cool down a little - it was REALLY cold. The river is fed by ice/snow melt from the mountains, so even though it was 100 degrees out, the water was decidedly chilly. We had fun playing with the current though, and it was certainly a stunning surrounding to swim in.
We drove up to Glacier Point to check out the view - it was incredible and definitely worth the long drive to get there. We had our picnic tea there (including the expensive cheese!), then headed to the campsite at Wawona (after paying a ridiculous amount for some fuel). We missed spotting our campsite the first time round, but found it the second. We pitched the tent then drank beer (I drank mine out of an applejuice bottle, as we hadn’t been able to find a bottle opener, and shattered the top of the beer when trying to open it on the bear-box) before turning in.
Day 14
Itinerary said: Drive to Yosemite
Camp at Wawona meet a bear. If it’s a baby one
We got up at 5 this morning to give ourselves the maximum time possible in Yosemite. We said goodbye to Pauline, as she was going to spend a few days with Julie and Dan, and were on the road by 6.20.
We stopped at three supermarkets to find food of a sufficient quality to complement the cheese that we bought on the Castro yesterday. Despite the satnav telling us it was only 120 miles to Yosemite (it lied), we didn’t get there till nearly 12. We stopped a couple of times when we got there to gawp first at El Capitan, then at the Bridalveil falls, then parked the car and set off to walk to Mirror Lake. It was seriously hot, even the bottle of water that I carried got unpleasantly warm. Even though it was less than a mile and a half each way, we were knackered when we got back. Mirror Lake itself was disappointing due to the time of year, but the view up the side of Half Dome was good.
We swam in Lake Merced in a bid to cool down a little - it was REALLY cold. The river is fed by ice/snow melt from the mountains, so even though it was 100 degrees out, the water was decidedly chilly. We had fun playing with the current though, and it was certainly a stunning surrounding to swim in.
We drove up to Glacier Point to check out the view - it was incredible and definitely worth the long drive to get there. We had our picnic tea there (including the expensive cheese!), then headed to the campsite at Wawona (after paying a ridiculous amount for some fuel). We missed spotting our campsite the first time round, but found it the second. We pitched the tent then drank beer (I drank mine out of an applejuice bottle, as we hadn’t been able to find a bottle opener, and shattered the top of the beer when trying to open it on the bear-box) before turning in.
Day 14