Yosemite

The drive from Santa Rosa to Yosemite National Park goes through miles and miles of farms and farm towns until you start to climb the Sierra Mountains.

The road to Yosemite NP is steep, curvy,  and treacherous. Yet it is the easiest way into the park from the west.

Our first view of Yosemite valley.

Unfortunately, I didn't keep track of the names of all these peaks.

Yosemite Facelift is not a new plastic surgery service. It is an annual volunteer program to clean up the Park. The volunteers gather here to get assignments. They go to various parts of the park and pick up trash. Every year they remove tons, literally tons, of beer cans, bottles, paper, old car parts, camping gear, and the like.
Almost no food is found since the bears find that first.

Here are some items picked up in the past. These are also used to help train the
volunteers on the dangers involved, including the Hanta virus.

Yosemite Valley Visitors Center

This mock up of the valley shows the approximate angle of view of the photo above.

This view of Half Dome is the the view of Ansel Adams' iconic photograph.

One of our friends, and Debbie's personal physician, is Dr. Degnan.

This photo and the next several were taken from the floor of Yosemite Valley.

At our campsite, Yosemite Pines RV Resort & Family Lodging, near
Groveland, CA, about 17 miles from the west entrance to the Park. We enjoyed our stay here. The is no grass and lots of dust, but that is the same everywhere around here. They had no snow last winter and almost no rain this summer.

Hi, Uncle Hal & Aunt Sandy!

There are at least 3 major groves of old huge redwood trees in the park. The most renowned is the Mariposa Grove. But this was 80 miles further from us than Merced Grove. We did not want to do the 160 mile round trip.

The trail to the Merced Grove is 1.5 miles and drops 600 feet in altitude.
Similar to the trail to Crater Lake but without the fabulous views at every turn

The exposed roots of this redwood were right on the trail.  I could have, and should have,
placed my backpack into one of those holes in the roots to show the scale.

Three thick trunks.

this made us think of a Star Trek episode.

Groveland, CA, is an entrance town for the Yosemite National Park. Our campsite was about 3 miles from the town. It was the only place we could get cell phone service. There was a quite nice grocery store and several good shops and restaurants.

Yosemite National Park is spectacular. Fantastic vistas. Unfortunately, there was a severe drought this year and everything was dry and brown. We were constantly worried about fires. It looked like one cigarette thrown out the window and the whole area would go up in smoke. I hope they get lots od snow this winter and tons of rain next spring and summer. They certainly need it.

We had been planning to leave Yosemite and head to the Grand Canyon via Bakersfield, Ca. But the forecast was 104 F for the whole of south central California and we saw that cooler weather was forecast for the central coastal area of California.  At our campground there was a couple from San Jose, Ca. They told us about the towns near Monterey and Carmel. We had been there 25 years ago and loved it. They told us about Marina Dunes RV Park about 10 miles from Monterey and about 50 miles from silicon valley and Apple. How could we resist.  We made reservations there for 6 days. Next post: Marina California and the Central Coast.

Frank

View Where we have been so far in a larger map

Arcata and Eureka California

We left Crater lake National Park with somewhat low expectations only because Crater Lake had been so fantastic it was hard to imagine topping it. We had always heard of the Northern California coast and how spectacular it was. We headed out of Grant's Pass Oregon on Highway 199 which went through beautiful rolling countryside. The last 50-60 miles of 199 are very difficult. Steep and curving.At some points the road does not look wide enough for 2 vehicles (it is). 199 leads to Crescent City on the coast and then it's Hwy 101 to Arcata. There were probably some excellent views of the Pacific if it had not been so foggy that we couldn't see the water the whole way.

In Arcata we checked into the Mad River Rapids RV Park one of the nicest private RV parks we had stayed at. Very convenient to town and to the Pacific Ocean. We had made reservations for 3 days but after we visited Arcata and Eureka we decided to stay for the week, to rest up and refill the batteries, so to speak. After 4 days the sun magically appeared. This RV park is the first one that allowed me to wash Diva.

One of our first visits was to Woodley Island and its' marina. Someone had recommended that we eat at the "Somoa island marina" but when we got to Samoa Island there was no marina. Two days later we found out that it was the Woodley Island Marina which you get to over the Samoa Island Bridge.

The Woodley Island Marina is a nice place to visit if you are not a dog.

The whole island? Shame on you, Woodley Island!
Rosie spent a lot of time in the truck.
 I hope that was not illegal since technically she was on the island. 

Well, since you DON'T EVEN LET THEM ON THE ISLAND,
 I guess I won't walk Rosie.

Lucky for Woodley Island Marina that everything was so picturesque.
And the sun had finally appeared.

Across the Marina is Eureka

We took a day trip to the Avenue of the Giants. this is a 31 mile scenic road which used to be Hwy 101. Mostly in the Humbolt Redwood State Park the road goes through some very impressive Redwood forests. The Redwoods here are Coastal redwoods also called giant redwoods and Sequoia semprevirens. These are different from the Sequoiadendron giganteum which grow inland. The coastal redwoods are the tallest trees in existance while the giganteums are the largest in girth.

Near Humbolt Redwood State Park

Pretty ordinary looking tree until......

....until you see Debbie in front of it.

The RV helps in judging the size of the trees.

At least Rosie was allowed in this Redwood grove

This is at the campground next to the headquarters of Humbolt Redwood State Park.
Very impressive to have your campsite surrounded by these giant trees.

This campsite is surrounded by Redwoods. Our solar panels would not be useful here.

We took Rosie to the Mad River Bluffs county park in McKinnleyville, CA

We are always looking for an off-leash dog park for Rosie to get to run around. This one in Mckinnleyville, just a few miles from our campground, was amazing. No fence but hundreds of acres of fields and trails and other dogs to play with. There were several giant redwoods in the forest parts. Some of the trails lead to river overviews.

At the last dog park we went to there were 3 dog fights. Guess who was involved in all three?
No matter, Rosie would not keep the muzzle on.
She growled at a few large dogs but managed to stay out of fights.

There are coastal redwoods in the park.

This photo fails to capture the sense of peace in this very dark grove of trees.

Arcata is a nice looking town. There is a nice plaza in the center of town. Unfortunately, there are dozens, maybe hundreds, of homeless young people milling about the town and plaza. It looks like homelessness is a life-style choice here. There is a dress code, a hair code, and general appearance code that looks like Haight-Ashbury 50 years ago. On the other hand, most of the people look like regular yuppies, like us. There are fine shops, restaurants and cafes. Cafe Brio had such great bread I had to go there 3 times.

Unfortunately, the skies were overcast most of the time we were in Arcata.

An Airstream is a tin can also. I think there is TinCan blogger.

The Saturday Farmers Market in Arcata, California on the Plaza.
Three colors of Pattypan squash, a variety of summer squash.
We'll have on yellow and one dark green, please.
Roseis smells something good under the table

Too bad Rosie can't read.
What is it with all of the NO DOGS ALLOWED signs?

I guess some people like pink flamingos even without having an Airstream.

I did not get the name of this red leaf ornamental tree.

This little boy insisted that his father dress just like him. They even had similar shoes.
He said it took him a long time to train his father to keep the beret on his head.
At Cafe Brio a great place to have coffee, pastries and great crusty bread.

So Pattypan squash, fried in bacon grease (yum, yum), white corn and multicolored potatoes  for dinner.
The crusty Italian bread is from Cafe Brio.

We visited Eureka several times but the sun seldom poked its' head out while we were there. Eureka is the largest coastal town north of San Francisco. The downtown has many beautiful old buildings. It has a boardwalk with no boards and no shops. It seemed to be blocked to entrance from most streets. So we didn't go on it.

In Old Towne

The William Carson mansion is considered (by the owners) to be the most grand Victorian house in America.
It is now a private club. The sun did make a brief appearance today.

Across the street from the Carson House.

Madison was the nicest person we met in Eureka. She has to be a good person since Rosie liked her immediately.
She works for Work Ability, a non-profit developmental center. She is helping to beautify downtown Eureka.

One of my favorite things, the charcoal grill, that is.
Oh yea, the ribeye steaks were good too.
The grill folds up flat and stores easily.

This photo by Michael Enloe has nothing to do with this blog. It was sent to me by a friend.
This is South Boundary Avenue, Aiken South Carolina, the street where we live.
I think it was taken from our front yard or very close.

Tomorrow we are off to Santa Rosa and the Sonoma Valley wine region. We plan to spend 3 days at a hotel just for a chance to have a change of pace and for Debbie to spend some relaxing time in a real bathtub.