Our RV Adventures

First off, I want to wish a Big Happy Birthday to our son, Chris. Enjoy your dinner at Ichibon’s.

Today was our day to visit Yosemite National Park. It was a second visit for us, since we were here last year, but the first time for Nick and Terry. So we had a great time showing them some of the fantastic views we had seen last year.

We left the park about 9, heading first into Oakhurst to pick up some things, like gas, breakfast, and lunch,

Gas, because there are no gas stations in the park proper, breakfast because everyone was hungry, so we stopped off at Jack in the Box, and lunch sandwiches from Subway, because we found out last year how bad the food is at the dining hall at Yosemite Lodge.

So we decided that with chips and drinks from home, sandwiches from Subway, and some of Jan’s delicious lemon bars for dessert, we were all set.

On our way into Oakhurst our daughter Brandi called with the latest Landon update. He had his 9 months checkup today, and Brandi wanted to let us know that he’s doing fine with no problems.

Finally, about 10 we left Oakhurst to make the 16 mile trip into the park itself. But the 16 mile trip takes almost an hour because the road is very curvy and we were climbing from about 2300 ft. to over 6000 ft. before dropping back down to about 2000 ft. on the valley floor.

After you enter the park, it’s about 35 more miles to the Lodge area. At about 4500 ft. we started encountering more and more snow as we climbed, But not near as much as last year. But then we were three weeks earlier last year.

Last Year.

This Year.

One of the most spectacular views in the Park comes as you exit the Wawona Tunnel and get your first view of the Yosemite Valley.

That’s the 3000 ft. El Capitan on the left and the 4700 ft. Half Dome in the middle of the shot. Half Dome just looks shorter because it’s a lot further away.

And this shot shows El Capitan, Half Dome, and BridalVeil Fall (Yes, Fall, not Falls. Don’t know why). Just a fantastic view.

Here’s a little closer shot of BridalVeil. Note all the mist at the bottom. We’ll see more of this later.

And here’s my Sweetie outshining it all.

This is Yosemite Falls, as seen from Yosemite Lodge. At about 2400 ft. it’s the highest waterfall in North America. BridalVeil is only a little over 600 ft.

That is a lot of water going over that cliff.

Last week, one of two people killed in the park was killed near these Falls.

After getting our National Park Passport stamped at the Visitor’s Center, we started on the loop that would take us back out of the park.

About 1:30 we stopped for lunch at a beautiful spot along the road.

We even had a helpful raven to clean up any crumbs we dropped. And of course Jan made sure we dropped a lot. At one point she even tore off a large chunk of my sandwich to give him.

Leaving the picnic area, we spotted two does right along the roadside, just walking around grazing.

Nearing BridalVeil Fall I found this Swallowtail Butterfly, although I’m not exactly sure which one it is.

This is a shot of BridalVeil Fall taken from the path leading up to Vista Point near the base of the Fall.

And this photo was taken from Vista Point. You can only get about one shot before the mist obscures your lens.

All that water coming down translates into some really strong rapids at the base.

Leaving BridalVeil and heading on, we notice the fog starting to move in along the mountain ridges, and it started to get colder quick.

Getting back to the Park entrance area we decided to make the 2 mile trip out to Mariposa Grove, home of Yosemite’s largest Sequoias, some of them over 300 ft. high. We didn’t get to do this last year as the road was snowed in.

Although there are over 500 giant Sequoias here, they really don’t measure up to the ones in Sequoia National Park where we plan to go next week.

We finally got back to Oakhurst a little after 5, and deciding no one was really hungry for supper after our late lunch, we just stopped off and got cappuccinos.

Later, around 8 Jan fixed us a light supper of Cheese Toast made with Miss Terry’s delicious homemade bread. Really good.

That’s about it for today.

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Thought for the Day:

The mystery of government is not how Washington works, but how to make it stop.

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Another cold, wet day greeted me when I got up about 10:15, but we fought back with a pot of hot snickernut/pecan coffee and the last of Miss Terry’s blueberry muffins. But we still have a loaf of her homemade bread left, so all is not lost.

The rest of the morning I spent working on client-internet stuff, and then about noon Jan heated up our left-over Italian from last night. It tasted SO much better after Jan added basil, oregano, and a little garlic salt.

Later I walked next door to Nick’s so I could take a further look at his black valve access.

The front valve is the black one and is about 18” inside the bay. Although you can’t really see it from here, only 3 of the 4 bolts used to mount the black valve are accessible from the front. The upper left bolt is completely blocked by the waste tank itself. And on top of that the nuts are on the back side and would be very difficult to get a wrench on.

The rear grey valve is 32” inside the bay and is just completely inaccessible if you needed to replace it. There must be another way.

This panel underneath the coach is directly under the valves but if you look closely about 2/3 down on the left side you will see a weld.

So it may be necessary to cut a access hole in the plate. More research is necessary.

A little before 5 we all headed out to Oakhurst for dinner. We decided to check out Todd’s Cookhouse BBQ which turned out to be delicious. It’s the best meal we’ve had since we ate at the Chukchansi Casino last Sunday night after we got here.

It turns out that Todd Leaf, the owner, won a Kraft Food’s National BBQ Sauce contest in 1999 and Kraft bottled and sold millions of bottles of his sauce. In fact it was the fastest selling sauce in Kraft history.

I had a great bowl of chicken & sausage gumbo along with a rib basket. Jan had a BBQ sandwich, while Nick also had a rib basket, and Terry had a Santa Fe salad with Chipolte dressing. All great.

Coming home we once again stopped for a cappuccino, this time at a new place that Jan was happy to find had the Pumpkin Spice flavor.

Tomorrow the weather is supposed to clear so we plan on driving up to Yosemite National Park, about 20 miles north of here.

Last year when Jan and I drove through, it looked like this.

We don’t expect to see this much, if any snow tomorrow, but we’ll see.

More then.

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Thought for the Day:

Freedom is not free. Free men are not equal. Equal men are not free.

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