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| Picked up Jay from the airport on the way out of town |
I haven't blogged in so long. Who knows if I will get to again, so I thought I would go for it. I had the opportunity-incredibly last minute-to go to Yosemite with my Dad, Jeremy and his family, and Jay and Emily (2 of my brothers and one of my sisters). We went there a couple of times as children. My dad on the other hand went there many many times as a child and teenager. I was very hesitant to go because going entailed taking Walter with me-who still nurses and I wasn't wanting to suddenly wean him. So in about 36 hours time, I packed up Walter and me and we headed out carpooling with my dad, Emily, and Jay.
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| On the Road-headed to Yosemite |
I had no idea how Walter would do camping-he's an amazingly good baby, but I had not slept with him in a sleeping bag in the cold. Well, it was supposedly going to be cold, but he and I were never really cold-we thought it was pretty darn hot. Anyway, he was amazing and awesome and I actually loved cuddling with him. Originally I thought it was going to be hiking in the day here and there and hanging out at the campsite in the evenings and possibly some in the day. Boy was I wrong. Yosemite has so many hikes and views that you don't have any time for campground jollies. We only made a fire the last night just for the sake of making a fire. What we learned was that if you aren't staying in the valley, you needed to be there around 9am to get a parking space. Then the hikes we did were generally very long and by the time we got done and back to our campground it was usually 9pm. We were at the Wawona campground, which is about an hour away from the Valley. The Valley has shuttles to the places you need to get to, so you find a parking space and then shuttle to where you need to be. Walter and I stayed in our own little tent-which I was nervous about at first, but it worked out great.
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| Old Nevada Pizza in Hawthorne Nevada |
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| You can't tell in the pic, but the tables were the shape of the state of Nevada |
So on to the trip-we stayed in a hotel in Hawthorne Nevada on our way down. It was a tiny little town that we were sure the movie Cars was based off of. There were a total of 2 places you could eat there. One was a casino type diner and the other was a pizza place. The diner had over an hour wait for food. The pizza place had great reviews, so we went over there...and it was only a 40 minute wait-ha ha. Boy do they know how to make pizza though! It was legit homemade, with fresh toppings and looked gorgeous and it was super delicious! We had a blast paying games together-Dad was hilarious as we played phase 10. I forgot he can't shuffle cards very well and he struggles with organizing his cards. After waiting for him to get his cards organized for while to start a hand, Jay asked him if he needed help and he peaked over at Dad's hand and exclaimed, "How are you organizing those?!?!" Dad gave the best answer, looked at his hand, started laughing and said, "Randomly?"
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| Entrance into Yosemite |
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| Walter and I at the Tunnel View |
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| Lookout point on the road to Glacier Point or Wawona (Tunnel View) |
The next day, Sunday, we arrived in Yosemite-it was quite majestic. I hadn't realized that it was all granite and huge bolders and mountain range of granite. It wasn't as green as I thought it was going to be, but it was really amazing. We drove through the valley to get to our campsite. We got to our site and got set up as quickly as we could so that we could head back to the valley. We started off by doing a simple hike to Bridal Veil Falls (not to be confused with the one up Provo Canyon). It was a very simple walk to a beautiful waterfall. Then we headed over to hike Lower Yosemite falls. It's really more of a nice walk to a very majestic and beautiful water fall-we went there again on our last day-it was Dad's favorite and he loved going to it.
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| Bridal Veil Falls |
Monday morning, a bird was sure to wake us up a little before 5am. That was ok though because we had a lot to prepare and I did everything I could to take care of Walter and not to keep anyone waiting on us. We were doing the Panorama Trail-supposedly an 8 mile hike that was mostly downhill. You start at Glacier Point, which is about a 45 minute drive from the Valley up above the valley. There are several hikes from that point. The Panorama Trail begins there and you hike back down to the Valley. I was really nervous packing Walter as I am not in great shape at this point in my life. I had hiked it one other time as a young teen with my dad, grandpa, a couple uncles and cousins. I didn't really remember much from that and was excited to be there again.
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| Panorama Trail hike |
It was a really neat hike. It was really fun to hear Dad talk about the hike and point out the views and what we were looking at. He clearly knows Yosemite well. He was like a giddy school boy. I loved the different views and I loved loved Nevada Falls. It was so amazing, raging full, huge, and majestically. You really just can't tell how majestic it is unless you are there. Walter was adorable and would wave to people and smile and kick his legs and make cute noises. People thought it was pretty awesome that I was hiking with him. Going down the path from Nevada falls to Vernal falls was the hardest part for me. I think mostly because I was carting a baby and the trail was large rocks with sand around them and quite slippery. By the time we got to Vernal falls, I was actually really struggling physically. I was out of energy and realized I had not been drinking or eating enough. I felt we had gone more than 8 miles already. I sate, ate, got regenerated and decided I needed to just move forward as quickly as possible to get to the bottom or I wasn't going to make it. So I did. And I would stop here and there for amazing views. I was blessed and able to get down safely and quickly. Though I kept wondering when we were going to get to the end of the hike-my legs were so so tired of going downhill (as most of the hike is downhill and going down granite steps or rocks). We finally arrived and I nursed little Walter who had been awesome, but gotten a very sore bum and was also a little famished. It was an awesome and amazing hike, but it was very hard (as most things worth doing in life are). Everyone was exhausted as we all arrived at the bottom within about 40 minutes of each other. The hike was longer and harder than we all expected. And we came to learn something about Yosemite-the term "Yosemite miles" became a common phrase. Pretty much on all the hikes the miles are way off- less than what it really is. Everyones GPS watches stated that we had hiked 11.4 miles. We thought those "8 miles" took longer than it should have.
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| Panorama Trail-lunch break |
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| Dad taking a pic. We ate lunch on these huge rock slabs in this river |
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| On the bridge over Nevada Falls |
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| Raging Nevada Falls |
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| Lookout next to Nevada Falls |
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| Panorama Trail hike |
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| Vernal Falls |
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| Panorama Trail-awesome dome next to Half Dome |
We now had a problem though-our vehicle was at Glacier Point. We were tired, it was getting late and we wanted to get to camp. Rosanne (Jeremy's wife) had their mini-van and small kids with her in the Valley. The original plan was for Rosanne to drive Dad or Jay up to Glacier Point and then they come back down and get us. That would take about 2 hours-and then we would still have to go to our campsite-3 hours. She was so kind and let us all pile into her van along with Jeremy and her other kids and she took us all up to Glacier Point to our vehicle. I was a little nervous-if we got pulled over we would be in huge trouble. Jay and Emily got in the trunk. I was squished on the front bench with 2 other little kids and holding Walter. Jeremy, their friend and 2 of his kids were on the other bench. Dad sat in the front. We were very blessed as we drove to Glacier Point for driving safely-Rosanne is an excellent mountain driver, and because we passed 4 cops on the way that didn't notice-one was following behind us for quite a while and then turned off another way-phew!
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| All of us squished into Rosannes van |
The next morning, Tuesday, my legs were so incredibly sore, I could hardly get up and barely walk-pretty much everyone felt that way as they started getting going for the day. This was a big day for Dad, Emily, Jay, and Jeremy. They were hiking Half Dome, there was no way I was going to hike that with a baby-not even sure if I could without a baby. Rosanne and I were going to take it easy and do simple hikes in the valley. We hiked to Mirror lake with the kids-it was really fun to play in the water and was a relatively simple hike. We got to camp later than we had planned-8pm. We got a fire going and started getting dinner ready. We were getting pretty nervous that we hadn't heard back from the Half Dome hikers when 8:30 rolled around. Though just after we started getting really nervous, they called saying they were on their way-they had all made it to the top-alive!
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| I loved waking up to my snuggling baby |
Wednesday was a day we had planned to go to the Valley, do some laundry, shower (you can pay to do laundry and take a shower) and eat out (they have different restaurants and stores in the Valley). It was really nice to get a shower and wash some laundry. We explored a few places in the Valley and looked for some fun souvenirs. We did a little bit of hiking as well. It was nice to look around and enjoy the Valley-you really could just hang out in the Valley if you aren't a hiker and have a really nice time.
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| Eating lunch in the Yosemite Village |
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| Eating Haagen Dazs in Half Dome Village |
Thursday we were hiking Upper Yosemite Falls (a pretty hard hike) and those that were really tough (Jay, Emily, and Dad) were going to continue on to El Capitan. My plan was to hike for the first half of Upper Yosemite Falls-to a lookout point. I wasn't up for a really hard hike carting a baby. It was a good hike though-I did about 2.2 miles to that point and then headed back down on my own while they continued on. Walter was again, adorable and people loved smiling at and waving at him and he loved it.
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| Upper Yosemite Falls hike |
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| Upper Yosemite Falls hike |
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| The view from a trail on our bike ride around Yosemite Valley |
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| Bolders along the Lower Yosemite Falls. |
When I got to the bottom of the trail, I had the day to do what I wanted in the Valley. I ended up hiking or walking on over to Lower Yosemite Falls to nurse (found a boulder to sit on a little out of the way). Then I was really tired of carting Walter. My back was pretty achey. I had heard that you could rent bikes and bike around. So I decided to look into that. And I rented a bike with a Burley trailer on it (we have the exact same trailer). It was so nice to take Walter off and put him in the trailer. Then we went for a bike ride. My legs needed that too-they were so tired from the hiking and walking and it was good to have a change in movement. And I loved the bike ride! That is a great way to see Yosemite! They have a path you can bike around. I got to see some incredible views and places as I biked around. It was really fun-it turned out to be one of my favorite things I did there, and I would highly recommend it.
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| Walter and I on our bike ride |
After I turned my bike in, I found a place to nurse off a trail again and called Jon and the kids and realized I could do a video chat. So then I walked around a bit and tried to show them the beautiful trail, river, boulders, and whatnot that I was around. And then I hiked over to Lower Yosemite Falls again to show them that. I realized I hadn't been taking any pics or videos because carting Walter I just hadn't pulled out my phone much. So I got some footage for them to see. It was fun to try to give them a glimpse of the beauty I was in. Then Jay texted me that he was down the mountain and to head over to the car. We all went out for Pizza in Half Dome Village and snuck in another shower while we there (you get so so dirty hiking all day).
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| Walter did great in the backpack! He loved waving and smiling at people. |
Friday was our last day. It was sobering. I hate saying goodbye. We had planned a simplish hike-sentinnel Dome, and Taft Point to see the Fizures.
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| Glacier Point lookout |
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| This is at the top center of Sentinal Dome. It's showing all the views that you can see from that point. |
We started at Glacier Point again. We discovered they had a nice gift shop there as well and got some yummy icecream after the hike. Anyway, as we got started, we realized this was going to be a bigger hike than we realized. We decided we probably had enough fluid and food to continue. We ended up barely having enough-but we made it. But I will say it was my favorite of our hikes-well, maybe. It was for sure super awesome and beautful and majestic! We ended up doing a large portion of the Pahono trail-which included hiking to senntienal dome, then on to taft point and fizures. And then we hiked back a different way-doing a loop. I was very nervous about the fizures and had decided that if it was too scary when we got there, then I would just wait while they went on and came back to me. Well, it was not too scary. It was super neat. It was nerve racking in that we were so so high up and on the edges of cliffs, but there was plenty of flatish space around us that you didn't feel too much like you were up high on cliffs.
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| At the top of Sentinel Dome |
Taft point and the fizures were awesome and I couldn't believe that I was brave enough to go up to the edges. I discovered that without my kids with me, I was much braver than I am when I hike with my kids and they get close to edges and I freak out. I don't know if I could have hiked taft point with my kids.
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| By the fissures at Taft Point-someone had hung a hammock across three points over a complete drop off down by the valley |
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| Taft Point-we are on the edge of an extremely high cliff |
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| Standing next to a fizzure at Taft Point |
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| Taft Point |
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| Jay standing at the edge of a fizzure |
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| I loved the huge granite bolders throughout the park. This is on the Pohono trail. |
The way back from taft point was a loop and part of the Pohono trail, so a different way than the way we came. It was my favorite-gorgeous veiws of the Valley along the whole way. Essentially it was another panorama trail on the opposite side of Yosemite. Dad loved it too and couldn't resist stopping at any good lookout.
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| A look out off of Pohono Trail |
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| Here we are at the trailhead after our hike. Walter was completely out-he did awesome. |
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| Bridge on one of the paths to Lower Yosemite Falls |
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| Dad on our final hike to Lower Yosemite Falls |
It was so fun to see his excitement. He told us that he had dreampt of returning to Yosemite many times and loved being back. It was awesome to be a part of this trip with him! I was so glad I had gone because I really almost didn't.
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| Final hike/walk to Lower Yosemite Falls (you can see upper and lower falls here) |
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| Grandpa/dad with Walter |
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| Walter and I on our last walk to Lower Yosemite Falls |
Saturday we got up early and packed up camp as quickly as we could so that we could get on the road as we had to get back to Utah that evening. It was so sad to leave. It was such a wonderful trip and I can't wait to take my own children there and show them the many neat things I got to see.
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| On the way home. |
