California, Throwback Thursday

Central California – Throwback Thursday

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“The mountains are calling, and I must go.”

John Muir

Yosemite National Park has always been high on our list of places to visit, but seemed out of reach for an RV trip in our working days.  In early 2005, we happened upon round trip tickets to Sacremento from Chicago Midway on Southwest Airlines for $99 each, so we made plans to head west and check it out without the RV. After touring the California state capitol, we headed to Yosemite.  Our base while we were in the area was the unique Penon Blanco Lookout bed and breakfast in Coulterville.  One of the great features of Penon Blanco was the stocked refrigerator in our room.  Each day, we would head out with our cooler packed with their drinks, and they would refill the fridge each day…no additional charge.  They would even replace the beer and wine!  (That policy appears to have changed since then, per their website). We stopped at the local deli each day to stock up on food, which allowed us to picnic outdoors.  As a result, we felt like we were still on an RV vacation!

When we arrived in Yosemite Valley, we were awestruck.

  

Yosemite was everything we had hoped it would be.  The vistas were simply amazing.  As a bonus, we were fortunate to be able to experience the valley with the waterfalls flowing heavier than they normally would be in the summer months.  This was due to the heavy snowpack in the Sierras from the previous winter. What a difference between then and the drought conditions that exist now!

  

Here is El Capitan standing proud against a gorgeous blue sky.  For those of you who are unfamiliar with Yosemite, El Capitan is the largest granite monolith in the world.

  

From the lookout at Washburn Point, visitors really get a sense of the magnitude of the valley.  Here is a profile photo of Half Dome as viewed from the west.

  

Looking north from the northern edge of Glacier Point, Yosemite Falls can be seen across the valley.

  

Looking back east, the valley appears in all of it’s grandeur.  It is easy to see why Ansel Adams loved to use Yosemite as a subject of his photographs.

  

Yosemite is also home to a stand of Giant Sequoia trees.  Some of the trees in the Mariposa Grove are 3000 years old.  Looking up at one of these beauties really puts things in perspective, in terms of a human’s lifespan.

While we were there, we decided to spend one day exploring the eastern side of the Sierras.

  

On our way across on Tioga Road, we saw this view of Half Dome from it’s eastern side.  Most Yosemite visitors don’t get to see this side of the landmark.

  

Heading across Tioga Pass, we encountered leftover snow from the previous winter.  It is always fun to see the white stuff in mid summer!

  

Our destination for the day was the old mining town of Bodie, California.  Now a state park, Bodie is well preserved by the dry conditions that exist on the east side of the Sierras.  We definitely want to spend more time in this town!  On our way back, we encountered a young couple who were hiking the Pacific Crest Trail.  They had gotten off the trail to get supplies, and we’re trying to get back to camp before sundown.  We had rented a Ford Expedition and had plenty of room, so they got a ride from us back to camp.  They were fairly ‘ripe’ from hiking, but it was fun to talk with them about their experience. We don’t usually pick up hitchhikers, but it seemed pretty obvious to us that they were thru-hikers.

Once we left Yosemite, we headed to San Francisco for a few days.  Our base in the City By The Bay was the Marriott Fisherman’s Wharf.

  

Here is Lombard Street, which is billed as the ‘crookedest street in the world’.  It was fun to walk down the sidewalk, and was even more fun to drive!

  

Getting a chance to ride one of the famous cable cars was a special treat for us Midwestern kids.  🙂

While we were there, we ventured up Columbus Avenue to a restaurant called Mama’s.  Our breakfast that morning became the benchmark to which all others are measured for us.  Simply outstanding.

  

Across the street from Mama’s is Washington Square Park.  Each morning, the local residents begin their day with Tai Chi.  It was fascinating to watch.

Once we left San Francisco, we headed north along the coast.  The coastal fog was very thick that day, so we asked a local if there was any chance at seeing the sun.  We were told to drive north to Tomales and if the fog hadn’t lifted by then, head east to Sonoma Valley and skip the coast.  That is what ended up happening.

Sonoma was enchanting, and we thoroughly enjoyed our time there.  We toured many of the shops in the area and visited a couple of wineries.

  

We took a tour of the Benziger Family Winery, which was very interesting.  Here is a photo of their cellar.

  

It was here that we learned how a winery uses the topography of it’s property to produce various types of grapes.  It all has to do with the amount of sun a vine receives each day as to what variety is grown on a specific parcel.

After we finished up at Sonoma, we headed to Napa Valley to tour more wineries.  Once we got there, we realized that Napa was geared more towards production and was not as quaint.  Next time through, we plan on focusing more of our time in Sonoma.

So thanks to some great airfare, we made a trip that might have otherwise been delayed until our retirement.  John Muir’s words struck a chord with us, and we are glad we followed in his footsteps.

20 thoughts on “Central California – Throwback Thursday”

  1. Sounds like a great trip. Barb and I have never been to Yosemite but we will get there some day. The Sequoias are simply amazing, I can’t even fathom a 3000 year old tree!

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    1. Diana commented to me last night that we haven’t seen any posts about Yosemite from our fellow fulltime RV bloggers. Any ideas on why that is? We really want to spend more time in the area, that’s for sure. Be sure to monitor the snowpack, if you plan on seeing waterfalls. We just got lucky! Nina from Wheelingit did a great post on Bodie recently, which is worth checking out: http://www.wheelingit.us/tag/bodie

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  2. Yosemite is a place we want to spend some time at. But our problem is whether doing so in light of the water crisis is really a responsible thing to do. I know it’s their problem but it’s our problem too… Lovely images, Jim,

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      1. I feel sorry for them, but this is a problem that has literally been 50 years in the making and it would seem that as of this morning there remain a lot of people who refuse to change with lifestyle — or their occupations…. sigh. Humans can be so stubborn…… Myself included.

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  4. Oh Yosemite, the first National Park we’ve visited in the US. I was blown away. I have a story to tell about this park. My boyfriend bought a key ring at the shop, but it broke after a few months (we were already back in Europe), and he sent a funny email saying that life was too cruel, that his key ring broke and it was such a great memory, that he was devastated etc etc etc. The guy from the shop sent him a new keyring, free of charge ! We couldn’t believe it ! People are so friendly 🙂

    Glacier point is a great viewpoint, you can see all the iconic bits of the park and sometimes, people climbing the half dome 🙂 We stayed there for a very long time 🙂

    End of June, we also encountered some snow when we took Tioga Pass to go to Mono Lake (another incredible landmark of the area). We didn’t make it to bodie unfortunately.

    I really like San Francisco, but I was SHOCKED to see so many tramps around (that was before I made it to Seattle…. a few months later….much worse). It was really scary. I wasn’t aware of this reality.

    Napa valley sounds interesting, we didn’t visit !

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    1. That is great about the keychain! We can’t wait to get back to Yosemite and explore some more.

      The homeless are prevalent in so many U.S. cities. It must be difficult to come into an unfamiliar area and know how to handle the situation. Best advice is to always be aware of your surroundings and stick with a group of others.

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  5. Stunning scenery in Yosemite National Park. El Capitan is truly majestic standing tall! I hope we get to visit some of the National Parks in the States one day. There are so many to explore and not enough time! The giant Sequoia trees is also something I would love to experience.

    I actually stayed at Marriott in Fishermans Wharf last time I was in SF:) Did you get scared by the ‘bushman’? Fun fact – when we visited this time there was a car on its roof at the bottom of Lombard Street:)

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  6. Absolutely jaw dropping photos of Yosemite! We really need to get ourselves there for some exploring. We love San Francisco and surrounding wine country.
    Thanks again for the help with my blog post! I appreciate it so much. 🙂

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    1. We like to tease that Ansel Adams kinda had it easy. :). Thanks for the roses!

      We thought maybe your lack of a 13th point was a vehicle to get people to comment. I was amazed no one had noticed! 🙂

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  7. Yosemite NP has always been my favorite NP even if I have visited other NPs during our travel. I did not blog about it as we were there before retirement and I had a full time job then 🙂
    But thank you for taking me back, Yosemite is also just a three hour drive from where I used to live in CA.

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