Apparently there was a bear in the camp last night; Manuel saw it and Lindy thinks she did. I was dead to the world. We were on the road at 8am and paused briefly at Starbuck’s, who produced coffee far superior to anything I’ve sampled in England within two minutes of opening shop. Zephyr Cove, for that’s where we were is clearly a resort for rich Nevadans who need a place by the water. Many of the homes were substantial but even so, the garages were often too small to contain the vehicles parked outside. Many aspects of the global petrol crisis and concern for the environment have started to manifest themselves but reducing the size of cars is clearly not yet on the agenda.
Slow progress due to road works – I assume they are busy making sure everything is OK before winter sets in. At least the work offers employment for ‘flagmen’ rather than mobile traffic lights that seem to be the case in the UK. At the California border at Lake Topaz there was a check point (the first of the whole journey) on the look-out for illegal fruit, vegetables and plants. We sailed through but a Japanese couple were not so lucky.
I think the problem was linguistic rather than contraband. Now in our 12th state of the trip we headed south through abroad valley to Mono Lake at a stately 55 mph which is all we were supposed to do in California. The valley was very green and the use of sprinkler irrigation widespread. From Mono Lake we turned westwards to start the steep climb into Yosemite. Greenness soon disappeared and the growing hills were spruce covered like the Black Hills but the soil was lighter as white/grey granite was beginning to show through. The road climbed to above 9,000 feet at the Tioga Pass and snow-capped peaks towered above us. A brief pause for lunch and we pushed on towards Olmstead Point where the first of many photos of the famous Half Dome were taken.
It was now downhill to our campsite at the inappropriately named Hodgdon Meadow where tent sites were scraped out from the forest. Facilities were very basic here. Not that we were able to dwell on the matter as we set off almost immediately, minus the trailer for Glacier Point via Tunnel Point to take more photos of the massive granite mountains of the central Yosemite area.
Task accomplished, it was back to Tunnel Point for sunset shots and then down to the Bridal Veil Falls for photos in the setting sun.
We got back to camp in the dark and found no nearby accessible water. Kate was on cooking duties and for once I’m glad that it wasn’t my turn. The van was driven up to the main toilet block and we filled up all the available pots and pans, miraculously spilling very little on the way back. Her stir fry was excellent despite my appropriation of half of her coriander the night before. A camp fire was lit and much rubbish talked before we turned in. Doubtless the arrival of another tour leader and some of his group were responsible for this. Despite the comparatively short journey from A to B we had chalked up over 300 miles with getting to all the photo opportunities.
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