Photography Challenge

 Week 18 May 3 - Documentary

Week 19 May 10 - Macro

Week 20 May 17 - Out My Window

Week 21 May 24 - Faceless Portrait

Week 22 May 31 - Sunburst

Yosemite - Day 4 Yosemite NP

Chris, Kristen, and I were all up and out of the Airbnb by 6:30 am. We still had an hour drive to Yosemite National Park entrance. We figured it would be a busy weekend and didn’t want to spend hours sitting in traffic just to get in the park. 

Though we had a short detour due to a rock landslide that crews were working on, it didn't slow us down for too long. We only had to wait for about five minutes before driving past the entrance station into Yosemite National Park on El Portal Road  and through the Arch Rock Entrance.

Driving into the valley at Yosemite was simply stunning. The grasses were green, the trees were plentiful, and the river was running strong. 

And then we looked ahead and saw Yosemite Falls. The valley was surrounded by sheer rock faces.

El Capitan (rock face)

Our plan for the day included hiking first to Vernal Fall and then on to Nevada Fall along the Mist Trail. It was also the plan for a lot of other tourists. We joined the throng walking toward the base of the trail, many who had camped overnight in the tent city at Yosemite.

Once we got going on the Mist Trail, I had to pace myself so as not to go too fast. I have a tendency to speed uphill. Chris, Kristen, and I did pass a lot of people as we began our hike that would have an eventual 2000 ft elevation gain. 

The path was a paved incline with very few flat sections until we neared Vernal Fall. That was a hard 1000 feet climb.

As we neared the first waterfall, the pathway became misty with spray from the fall. You had to watch the people around you, the slippery granite steps, and the crazy people who brought their dogs (even though the signs were clearly posted that no dogs were allowed on the trail).

I covered my camera with Chris’ waterproof backpack cover to protect it from all of the moisture.

We stopped for a rest and to take in the view after reaching Vernal Falls.

As we continued on, the granite steps continued. And it was as though we were on a never ending stair stepper to the next waterfall. The path to the upper waterfall was a loop. It was easier to take the stairs up than to try and maneuver down them. The descent was said to be less steep. I was looking forward to that.

We finally reached Nevada Falls. What do you know, but we had the best cell service on the top of the mountain. We chatted with Amy a bit.

Misha was driving with friends so we texted with her.

The nice thing about the second hike was that fewer people opted to hike it. Seriously, the first hike was crazy and hard all by itself.

We had snacks and drinks on our hike, but were happy to have a late picnic lunch once we returned to the valley floor.

The gift shop was our next stop where we found some t-shirts and a hat for Chris. We looked for better hiking socks for me as I hadn’t planned well with just ankle socks. I had rubbed a blister and some skin on my right ankle.

As it grew later in the afternoon, Kristen opted to rest in the car as Chris and I took a short walk to the bottom of Yosemite Falls and then a viewing area.

As there weren’t a lot of dining options in Mariposa or in the park, we ate dinner at the Basecamp Eatery before driving back to the Airbnb. We would do that drive a couple of times over the next few days.

Yosemite - Day 3 Hike and Mariposa

We planned to check out of the John Muir lodge this morning, but not before Chris and I hiked to the Fire Lookout from Panoramic Point. It was a five mile round trip hike. 

Kristen opted to stay in the hotel room until checkout at 11 and then would wait for us in the lobby of the hotel until we returned. We had already packed everything in the car, so she didn’t have to worry about moving suitcases.

We got an early start, which was great for avoiding the heat we had been experiencing. 

As Chris and I hiked, we listened to a General Conference broadcast and then a book. It was a nice way to pass the time and spend a Sunday morning.

As we reached the fire lookout, the volunteer fire spotter invited us to climb the stairs to the viewing platform. As you might imagine, he had a pretty grand view of the surrounding mountains. 

Chris and I hiked back to the Panoramic Point and down to our car in the parking lot. Already the lot was full and people were creatively parking outside of the designated parking spots.

We stopped to pick up Kristen at the lodge and enjoyed a picnic lunch not too far away at the Big Stump Rest Area.

In order to get to our next stop for the night, we had to skirt around the edge of Fresno to get to Mariposa. Talk about dry. Everywhere we looked around Fresno was covered in grasses that looked like hay. In Colorado, we would associate such dryness with late summer and fall, but not even to this extent.

We stopped at a Walmart for more groceries as our Airbnb in Mariposa was not terribly close to a lot of commerce. In fact, as we were driving to the Airbnb, we were surprised that it was so far out of town. At least twenty minutes. It was in a quiet, beautiful, but very secluded area.

Kristen snoozed along the way, enjoying have the entire back seat to herself.

I think we were all grateful though that the house had WiFi.

It was early in the afternoon and the car needed gas. We drove to the small town of Mariposa to look around and fill up the car. There was not much there.

Since we hoped for a very early start on Monday morning, we made and ate dinner, got picnic lunches ready for the morning, and showered. 

Yosemite - Day 2 Kings Canyon and Sequoia NP

Chris and I were up earlier than Kristen and both of us went down to the lobby to check messages and access WiFi. 

There was a tiny microwave in the lobby that we used to cook oatmeal in cups for breakfast.

Today we were going to drive Kings Canyon Scenic Byway to the Roads End Permit Station. It was pretty much a road to nowhere following a windy road that dropped 6000 feet to the valley floor. We passed a lot of viewpoints, pulling over at a few of them. 

There were a number of pull-outs for slower cars, and amazingly, the cars in front of us pulled over quite often for the vehicles behind them. 

We got an early start for the day which was wise for a holiday weekend. The traffic down to the valley was minimal; however, there were a lot of cars already in the parking lots making us think that hikers and backpackers got a day's jump on the weekend traffic as there were numerous hikes of varying lengths and difficulty leaving from the Roads End Permit Station.

We started off on a short hike from the permit station past the Zumwalt Meadow. Sadly, the meadow was closed. We decided to walk back along the road and noticed that the traffic volume had picked up greatly. Not sure where all of these cars were going to park since many of the lots were already full.

As we started our return back up the winding scenic byway along the mountainside out of Kings Canyon National Park toward Sequoia National Park, we spied a momma bear and her two tiny cubs. 

The rangers were watching over the bears carefully, and even our slowing down to watch the bears earned a “whoop” from the ranger's car siren. I would have like to snap a picture or two, but no such luck.

Chris pulled into an old-fashion gas station for me to take some pictures there. I had spied the station on the way down to the Permit Station and mentioned to Chris that I wanted to stop for pictures on the way  back up. 

He and Kristen enjoyed some ice cream cones. In fact, the sign leading up to the roadside stop was pretty clever, “Caution: Ice...Cream Ahead.

Just as I got out to take a picture, a camper truck pulled up to get gas. I never would have thought the pumps were still working. I waited patiently while the attendant filled the tank up the top of the pump with gasoline and then as the camper dude then filled his truck. 

As soon as he was finished another camper truck pulled up. I asked if they would let me get a picture or two before pulling up to the pump. 

There was even a cord that dinged as vehicles drove over it. The gas was $5/gallon. It was the only station around for miles, so if you needed gas, that was your option.

Our next destination for the afternoon was the General Sherman tree in the Sequoia National Forest. As we were visiting much later in the afternoon, the traffic was crazy busy. We had thought to take a shuttle into the park, but the pick up spot was a couple miles away. We just opted to drive to the lot ourselves and see if we could find a parking spot.

We were in luck as tourists were coming and going pretty constantly.

The hike down to the General Sherman was a steep descent and signs were posted all around warning people of the decline as well as to be prepared for the steep incline climb on the way back up.

The famous tree was thronged by people. I had about three seconds to take this picture before another family jumped in to take pictures with this iconic tree. It was quite enormous. It is the largest living tree on the earth today and grows bigger every year by adding girth to its trunk. The tree is dead at the top and no longer grows taller. One of the distinctive features of the sequoia tree is that the trunk does not taper much at the top.

Unlike the Redwood Forest which was primarily made up of redwood trees, there were many varieties of trees growing in the Sequoia National Forest. The sequoias grew in small groves or single trees here and there.

The Congress Trail took us on a hike through the grove where we saw the President’s Tree, The Chief, The Senate Trees, and the House Trees. Such a beautiful forest. You could tell that many of the trees had some type of scarring from burns, perhaps through lightning strikes. The tannin in the bark made the trees hard to kill.

After climbing back up the hill to the parking lot, Chris continued to drive down to another valley. It was a narrow windy road. After an hour, we found a place to turn around. It was slow going with lots of holiday and tourist traffic.

Upon reaching the turn off to the General Sherman parking lot, traffic slowed to a complete stop. I got out and walked ahead to check around the bend to see if there was an accident. Nothing. And then cars just started moving again. Apparently, we were all just backed up from the traffic. I jogged back to our rental car and hopped in as Chris was putting the car in gear.

Yosemite - Day 1

Chris, Kristen, and I left for the airport on Friday morning at 8 am after a quick goodbye to Amy and Misha.  Amy was leaving for work, and Misha had work on Friday as well as Saturday morning for graduation before leaving on her own adventure with friends to San Diego.

Parking lots closer to the airport was still closed, much to our disappointment and frustration. So we drove to The Parking Spot, adding extra time onto our travel time to the airport.

We arrived at the airport to find it packed for the Memorial Day weekend. Pretty sure I have never seen it so busy. Gratefully, we were able to check our luggage without much delay, including an extra duffel bag filled with our hiking boots and some snacks.

If you don’t have Pre-Check at the airport, here’s a plug for getting it. The security lined snaked through the normal rows at Security, then out into the hall, down the hall, around the corner, and past baggage claim. There were surely many flights missed Friday morning.

With Pre-Check, we waited in a pretty short line of less than ten people, and were through security within a matter of minutes. We tried to stay out of the way of those people who took off running once they made it through security and were trying to catch their flights. I hope they made it.

The flight to Fresno, CA was uneventful, landing in a pretty small airport. Those kinds of airports have a nice homey vibe.

We were going to stick around Fresno for the afternoon to tour an underground garden built by a Sicilian immigrant over 100 years ago. Baldassare Forestiere had a great vision for his underground home and garden and spent years digging. 

He started with a few very simple rooms that included a place to sleep, a place to eat, and a few small gardens. The benefit to the underground space was that it was so much cooler than the heat of Fresno—at least 10-20 degrees cooler underground.

When we toured, the temperatures were pushing 100 degrees. The temperature underground was cool and pleasant.

The Underground Garden continued to grow in size as Baldassare added an upgraded living area, a chapel area, more gardens, tunnels, and open air vents to allow citrus trees to grow and get water in his courtyards. It was all pretty ingenious. The tour took about an hour. FYI, you have to have a reservation for the guided tour.

After leaving the garden, we drove by the Fresno temple and then stopped for some groceries. We continued on toward our first couple of night's stay at the John Muir Lodge in Kings Canyon National Park. 

There were very few amenities or hotels close by, so we opted for two nights in the lodge. As the only lodging option, it was busy. It could do with an upgrade. 

The WiFi was pretty much non-existent in the rooms, and we had to go down to the lobby to get even the slowest connection. You definitely have to plan to "unplug" if you visit the area.

A short distance below the lodge were small cabins (with a centralized bathroom), the gift shop, a post office, the markets, a visitor center, and a small but busy takeout restaurant. The eat in portion of the Grant Grove Restaurant was still closed from Covid.

We ordered food from the takeout window and then walked back up to the lodge to eat on picnic tables there. We had hoped that we would be able to access WiFi outside of the lodge, but you really had to be inside the lobby.

Since there was still plenty of light, we drove to the General Grant Grove to see the General Grant Sequoia Tree and the other sequoia's in the grove. 

Panoramic Point was about a ten minute drive from the lodge. We still had plenty of light before sunset, so we drove up to enjoy the view. The road was quite narrow for us to reach the point. Two cars passing made for a tight squeeze. But the sunset was awesome.

We were on the ridge line of the mountain and could see both north and south. 

Chris and Kristen started on a short hike toward a Fire Lookout. I was busy taking pictures and followed after a bit. I finally reached a spot where the vista opened up and I enjoyed a great view of the sunset.

I heard Chris and Kristen pass by on their return to the Point, speaking to another couple who were also enjoying the view, but Chris and Kristen must not have seen me. I followed them down the path after a bit, joining back up with them in the parking lot.

We returned to the room to settle in. 

Kristen went down to the lobby to chat with her friends for a bit.

After a full day of travel, it didn’t take long for all of us to fall asleep.

Crazy Tennis Courts

Kristen finished off her tennis season on May 27. In fact, she had matches every day of her finals week. Chalk it up to Covid and trying to fit it all in.

Her team played Holy Family on Wednesday the 26th and the courts were covered in a wind break fabric. It made it really difficult to watch the players.

Her coaches laid on the ground to watch the girls and give advice to the players!

The assistant coach

Kristen and her friend Sophie

You have to zoom in to see the coach on the opposite side of the courts lying on the ground. Crazy.

YW Activity

For the Young Women activity this week, the girls explored their inner Bob Ross and painted some "happy trees". I thought Kristen's painting was great for the short amount of time they were able to work on it.

Lemon Plant

I really tried to grow a Meyer lemon tree. It would flourish all summer long as it was outside, but once I brought it inside, it pretty much fizzled. I ordered it online and in the seven years that I tried with it, it never once blossomed or showed any signs of growing and lemons.

So, I bought a new plant from a nursery that was already established with blossoms and itty bitty lemons. I am really hoping I can be successful with this one. Cross your fingers!

The blossoms are gone now, but they smelled heavenly.