Yosemite
Just as well we had set 3 alarms, only one went off at 5.00am! I had only slept fitfully all night, bit of jet lag creeping in, so of course I was deeply asleep when woken up. No worries we were both up, showered and organised by the time the bus picked us up at 6.25 am. Lo and behold 'Boris' and his double decker from yesterday was taking us to the pick up point.
We had a pretty full coach for the day trip, very modern and comfortable. Some people were staying overnight at Yosemite and we were picking others up for the journey back. Our driver introduced himself as 'Helmut', "shust zink off de hat unt you vill be close enough"! Where are the Yankee drivers?
So we set off for our long journey, 700 km round trip, stopping for breakfast after 2.5 hours. It was interesting going through the city and out to the east over the old Bay bridge which has two layers, the bottom for going out and the top for the journey back in. They have just completed a new bridge which is due for commission any day soon. I dont think that we needed to be told that we were driving over a bridge which will probably collapse in the next big earthquake! It was foggy of course, and quite chilly - that's normal for summer in SF, over the bridge and through the docks and industrial area of Oakland, heading to the Bay Area, and the temperature increases by at least 10 deg and the sun soon burns off the fog.
Helmut made the trip interesting by telling us about the areas we were passing through, Livermore where there are vineyards and good wine tastings, but there are no tours there (he didn't elaborate) . We saw thousands of wind turbines spread over the ridges of the hillsides which looked quite fascinating. He told us about the economy of Central Valley which is dependent on a good season of spring rain. The soil is very fertile and can grow anything, but to grow you need rain. It is a vast area, we must have driven through it for an hour and a half before turning inland, and it would have gone on and on. It was very dry after a poor spring rain and dry summer and the only crops surviving were pistachios and almond trees. There are massive reservoirs in the Rocky Mountains which feed into a maze of canals which in turn run into the Central Valley and irrigate the crops, so when the rains don't fall the water is 'rationed' and the crops fail, the farmers can't employ workers and so on, which has a big effect on the economy. When we turned inland we noticed that the irrigation was better, crops of corn and hay and vineyards. The Central Valley also provides the majority of cheese produced in the States, we saw the cows under cover and it seemed a bit weird that there is so much land, albeit a bit barren, but not an animal roaming freely.
Another hour passed and we were heading for hilly country, narrow windy roads and rivers, Helmut stressed that we were not to expect the torrents rushing down the boulders that could be seen in the winter because of the dry season, but the rivers looked pretty enough. The scenery was not a lot different from the Rimutakas, just bigger and grander. However as we drove up to our first lookout at the tunnel entrance the view took our breath away, the valley below and the sheer rock faces of the high mountains is such a contrast that no photo can do it justice. We just stood there in awe, or we would have liked to if we hadn't had to jostle our way to the front pushing away all these tourists trying to take photos.
And so we were dropped off at the Yosemete Lodge to have a bite to eat and walk around imagining what the waterfalls would have been like had there been a good rainy season. The temperature at this time was around 102F far too hot for serious rock climbing (yes some people enjoy climbing vertical walls of rock - Helmut tells us they have to spend a couple of nights tied onto the rock face with special hanging nets screwed into the rock face it is too high climb in a day, I'll stick with my embroidery).
We caught the visitor shuttle bus after lunch and hopped off to check out the Awheenee Hotel which is truly delightful and so fits in with the grandeur of the surroundings. Very American Indian in nature, (or First Nation) so impressive and probably so expensive. We caught the shuttle bus back to the Lodge and boarded our coach for the trip back. We were all on time except for two people who were travelling back with us. Poor Helmut he must have counted us at least four times and the number didn't change! He walked around the bus, then asked us if we should "giff zem two minutes more", I'm not sure what we answered but two Brazilian ladies walked across from the shuttle bus stop and asked if we were going back to SF, they had been waiting for a quarter of an hour at the other bus stop. Helmut was not happy, "ver ver you tropped off?" Here they said. "Vell dis is where you are picked up".
Yosemete waterfall, in three parts, you have to imagine the water cascading down! Impressive eh??
Other than that the journey was uneventful, we stopped for thirty minutes to get dinner (MacDonalds) and arrived back at our hotel just after 9.00pm.
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