The trip is nearly coming to an end: the circle is as good as closed on the route update:
If you're wondering how many miles are in that loop: the end mileage for my rental van was 7614 or 12253.5 km. That's quite a ridiculous amount for two months of driving. For instance: it's the distance when you draw a line from Amsterdam to Bali, or from Alaska to Rio de Janeiro. By now I no longer have the van : it's public transportation and backpacks again. It feels really strange without my glass bubble :-( . I'll have a few busy days coming up with lots of traveling, but I hope to catch up with the blog before I am in Florida. So let's start: back to Mothers day just outside of Yosemite.
First of all: it was mother's day, for which I had been planning something with my sister: a skype videocall with my mother. This took quite some setting up: about a week before i had used teamviewer to control my sisters laptop, install skype, video drivers and teach her how to make a video call. Furthermore we tested bandwidth: in my motel at the time it worked perfectly, at starbucks not so much, so I decided to get to a big town on the day itself to go to an internet cafe.
So first mission this morning: drive to Fresno and find an internet cafe before my parents would be at my sisters for coffee after having dinner at a restaurant. This would be around 11:00 in the US, so with getting up at 07:00 I would have ample time. Just outside of Fresno I got the directory with internet cafes out and started marking them down. At the same time my sister messaged me that they had just finished dessert and were heading for her place. I had to hurry! What followed was a frantic race to various internet cafes all the while keeping my sister up to date and waiting.
The first one did not obey its posted opening hours, nor answered the phone, the second didnt exist anymore and the third turned out to be a cafe. The fourth was the one I had originally thought most probable, but this one would only open at 12:00. About an hour of waiting for my parents who had already finished their coffee by now. I parked my van right in front of the internet cafe and waited for it to open. At 11:55 a big fat girl turned up and opened the door. I told her that I wanted to hook up my laptop to skype with my mother and she was all difficult about it: they had only gaming software on pre-installed computers which didnt have skype, they didnt allow to hookup laptops, etc. I persisted and she gave in, pointing to network cable and telling that i could hook up there... Really strange that she was difficult while the infrastructure was right there!
It was good to see my parents again and talk with them a little. Turns out they had a surprise for me too: they would fly over to Florida to join me there for a week or two! That was something I hadn't expected at all: very nice surprise! This would mean some extra planning the coming days, but great to see that my parents have caught the travel bug!
After the call I planned for some potential places to stay the night just outside of kings canyon, got my stuff together again and drove off. I had spotted a nice hill with a radio mast on it amongst all the ranch land, but alas, there was a gate closing the only road up there. Another identified road turned out to be in the middle of an orange plantation. So, then to the fall back scenario: just drive on to see if a suitable turn out would turn up. Of course serendipity did its thing and just outside the park gates, on the side of a hill a nice turn out, a little further away from the road, out of sight, with a view. Cooking, eating, selecting pictures and sleeping... you know the drill by now.
The next day started with a visit to the visitor center to learn about my options: where to go? Could I camp here on a first come, first served basis? Should I just visit Sequoia or would King's Canyon also be worth it? The ranger assured me that I should definitely go and see kings canyon: the vistas would be fantastic, the road is on a cliff hugging the longest whitewater river section in the US and there's a really nice hike at road's end. Depending on how long the hike would take I could camp near road's end, near the visitor center, or even in Sequoia. I bought a few necessary supplies at the camp store and went off on the drive to king's canyon.
First stop: the General Grant Sequoia grove. A small hike to another zen-like area of ancient trees. I'll leave you to just view the pictures on Picasa, it's not that much different from the trees at Mariposa in Yosemite. What was kind of different was the mountainside driving up to and into Kings Canyon. The ranger in the visitor center had assured me amazing views, but really it was not that impressive (I am getting spoiled, I admit it). The most spectacular part was driving into the canyon itself: you pass a few very jagged rock formations, with a near vertical cliff in the background: cool driving! In the canyon itself you drive besides a whitewater river which is pretty beautiful. At the end of the valley the landscape turns into forest (it's called cedar grove after all).
If you're wondering how many miles are in that loop: the end mileage for my rental van was 7614 or 12253.5 km. That's quite a ridiculous amount for two months of driving. For instance: it's the distance when you draw a line from Amsterdam to Bali, or from Alaska to Rio de Janeiro. By now I no longer have the van : it's public transportation and backpacks again. It feels really strange without my glass bubble :-( . I'll have a few busy days coming up with lots of traveling, but I hope to catch up with the blog before I am in Florida. So let's start: back to Mothers day just outside of Yosemite.
First of all: it was mother's day, for which I had been planning something with my sister: a skype videocall with my mother. This took quite some setting up: about a week before i had used teamviewer to control my sisters laptop, install skype, video drivers and teach her how to make a video call. Furthermore we tested bandwidth: in my motel at the time it worked perfectly, at starbucks not so much, so I decided to get to a big town on the day itself to go to an internet cafe.
So first mission this morning: drive to Fresno and find an internet cafe before my parents would be at my sisters for coffee after having dinner at a restaurant. This would be around 11:00 in the US, so with getting up at 07:00 I would have ample time. Just outside of Fresno I got the directory with internet cafes out and started marking them down. At the same time my sister messaged me that they had just finished dessert and were heading for her place. I had to hurry! What followed was a frantic race to various internet cafes all the while keeping my sister up to date and waiting.
The first one did not obey its posted opening hours, nor answered the phone, the second didnt exist anymore and the third turned out to be a cafe. The fourth was the one I had originally thought most probable, but this one would only open at 12:00. About an hour of waiting for my parents who had already finished their coffee by now. I parked my van right in front of the internet cafe and waited for it to open. At 11:55 a big fat girl turned up and opened the door. I told her that I wanted to hook up my laptop to skype with my mother and she was all difficult about it: they had only gaming software on pre-installed computers which didnt have skype, they didnt allow to hookup laptops, etc. I persisted and she gave in, pointing to network cable and telling that i could hook up there... Really strange that she was difficult while the infrastructure was right there!
It was good to see my parents again and talk with them a little. Turns out they had a surprise for me too: they would fly over to Florida to join me there for a week or two! That was something I hadn't expected at all: very nice surprise! This would mean some extra planning the coming days, but great to see that my parents have caught the travel bug!
After the call I planned for some potential places to stay the night just outside of kings canyon, got my stuff together again and drove off. I had spotted a nice hill with a radio mast on it amongst all the ranch land, but alas, there was a gate closing the only road up there. Another identified road turned out to be in the middle of an orange plantation. So, then to the fall back scenario: just drive on to see if a suitable turn out would turn up. Of course serendipity did its thing and just outside the park gates, on the side of a hill a nice turn out, a little further away from the road, out of sight, with a view. Cooking, eating, selecting pictures and sleeping... you know the drill by now.
The next day started with a visit to the visitor center to learn about my options: where to go? Could I camp here on a first come, first served basis? Should I just visit Sequoia or would King's Canyon also be worth it? The ranger assured me that I should definitely go and see kings canyon: the vistas would be fantastic, the road is on a cliff hugging the longest whitewater river section in the US and there's a really nice hike at road's end. Depending on how long the hike would take I could camp near road's end, near the visitor center, or even in Sequoia. I bought a few necessary supplies at the camp store and went off on the drive to king's canyon.
First stop: the General Grant Sequoia grove. A small hike to another zen-like area of ancient trees. I'll leave you to just view the pictures on Picasa, it's not that much different from the trees at Mariposa in Yosemite. What was kind of different was the mountainside driving up to and into Kings Canyon. The ranger in the visitor center had assured me amazing views, but really it was not that impressive (I am getting spoiled, I admit it). The most spectacular part was driving into the canyon itself: you pass a few very jagged rock formations, with a near vertical cliff in the background: cool driving! In the canyon itself you drive besides a whitewater river which is pretty beautiful. At the end of the valley the landscape turns into forest (it's called cedar grove after all).
Youtube: http://youtu.be/p5-FWA1mqUg
The drive was pretty long, and the road's end was really that. I had come here for a small hike, so I got some gear together and studied the local maps (and made a picture of it with the camera: I do learn a little along the way). The hike would be a small 4 mile loop. This place is actually also the staging point for multi day hikes: all the area east of the road is dubbed 'wilderness' or the most protected status the national park service has to offer. There were lots of bear warnings and also stories about bear and cougar posted at the start of the trail. All were single incidents from more than a year ago, so I opted for just getting a big walking stick and hoping I'd scare any bears away. Hiking solo is discouraged, but I didn't really have an alternative. This was the first place in bear country where there were not many people which did make me a little nervous.
The hike started out as just your normal forest hike which I could also about 5 miles from my parent's home. After a little hiking this did not change. You'd get a glimpse of the surrounding cliffs through the trees every once in a while, but nothing really spectacular. After about 2 miles the path crossed the river and the scenery still hadn't really changed, also around the river there were no really good views. After crossing the river the country opened up a little bit, and with it my mood as well: I was on the way back. Here you could sometimes get a few good glimpses of the landscape, but I ended up being so bored that I started poking dead logs apart with my walking stick. After a good selection you actually end up with some good photos, but overall I had the feeling that hiking up the mountains would have been much nicer in this area.
When I arrived at the parking lot a couple who had passed me earlier on the road had a nice little problem: their battery had died because they had left their fridge plugged in. They had no starter cables, and neither had I, nor anyone on the parking lot at that moment. I ended up driving the girl to the nearest ranger station for her to get some help there. We had a little chat: her husband was working as a pilot in the private jet business and had been to 78 countries already: what a fun job that must be! It's not as for an airliner pilot with a busy return schedule: if a customer has a week of business you most of the time stay a week! When I dropped the girl off she handed me a twenty for the effort... I was too surprised to give it back, so this meant that I would have a little free gas to get me out of the park again :-).
The drive back offered some more nice picture ops, check Picasa for the result. I opted for another route on the way to Sequoia then the one I came in with, this time passing by Hume Lake: a nice change of scenery amongst all the forest.
As it was still pretty light and the ranger had assured me that campings do not fill up at this moment I opted to drive all the way down to lodgepole in Sequioa, to camp there. This decision resulted in a sighting of an animal that had been very, very high on my to see list:
Very cool! A bear at the roadside! After it went back into the woods I finished the little trip to the camping. Time to relax. My German neighbor came over to share some of his stuff with me: he had been on a four day hike and had to return his car early the next morning. We had a nice little chat and I shared my Sequoia beer with him. He had missed the bear, and was pretty jealous that he hadn't seen any while hiking in the wilderness for 4 days! He actually told me he had met a guy there who had seen a cougar and a bear in one day... that guys must have smelled pretty interesting! Nice to meet a fellow traveller and share stories, but I was totally knackered though, so it was off to bed pretty early. More about the final park in my third post!
Picasa:
Day 53: Exploring Kings Canyon
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