Wagner Road Trip 2014 - Yosemite

I had no idea that when we left Death Valley after lunch that day, that we would have another 7 hours of drive time to reach Yosemite National Park.  And the last hour of driving was inside Yosemite driving on twisty and turning switchbacks along a mountain road (read: cliff).  To summarize... by the time we made it to our hotel inside the park I was suffering from a bad case of car sickness (which I never get!)

We arrived at our hotel, the Wawona Hotel around 8 p.m. when Randy mentioned, "Hey, by they way... our hotel room doesn't have a toilet or shower."

WHAT?!  (I guess since it was built in 1876 and maintained it's historical past, they didn't feel the need to add bathrooms to all of the rooms.)  There was however, a very nice common area bathroom and showers, which in retrospect, wasn't so bad after all.

To add insult to injury, because of the bears that live in Yosemite, we had to haul our entire truck-load of stuff into our 2nd floor teeny-tiny room of our "historic" hotel (including 4 large suitcases, 2 large storage bins and two ice chests.)  Needless to say, we barely had room to walk around our room.  But,  I digress...

Historic Wawona Hotel

The next morning,  after a wonderfully quiet and peaceful night of rest and a delicious continental breakfast at our hotel, we headed out to our first trek of the day.  We stopped by the Yosemite Falls and caught a view of the Upper and Lower Falls. 

The Lower Falls of Yosemite Falls.

This is called the "tunnel view" of Yosemite Valley.  This view can be seen as you emerge from a tunnel in the park.

We ventured out on a hike called the Mist Trail.  It was a relatively strenuous hike along granite steps.  The closer you get to the falls, the wetter and slippery the steps become, i.e., the "Mist Trail" (see below).

See the mist of the falls and lush green grass?

At Vernal Falls.

The Park Ranger told us about an easier trail that would get us back down.  So, rather than head back down once we reached Vernal Falls, we kept heading up to the top of the falls so we could connect with another trail.  (Um... easier?)

My family at the top of Vernal Falls.

The top of Vernal Falls.

The Silver Apron is basically a water slide of water streaming across a sheer granite face before it turns into Emerald Pool which leads to Vernal Falls. (Unfortunately, several people have died by sliding on the 'slide' and being swept up in the current in Emerald Pools only to plummet to their death over the falls.  Warning signs people... read them, adhere to them.)

We finally connected to our alternate route trail, which was the John Muir Trail and headed down another 2 miles to the bottom.  Many, many dirt trail switchbacks.  No fun, but definitely better than climbing down slick granite rock steps with the masses.

After 3 hours and 8 minutes of hiking, we finally made it to the end.  A cold sandwich from the deli cooler and a soda was the best food I have ever eaten.  It was a rough day of hiking, but honestly, I feel fortunate to be in the physical shape it requires to hike these types of trails.  There weren't many people making the 4.5 mile round trek we took and I can see why.

 After lunch, we stopped by the visitor center.

We arrived back to our hotel, showered and had a lazy afternoon.  Next up, day two at Yosemite.