We knew starting out on this adventure that we would take our time, not rush, and to be back by Halloween, or at least back to Grandma’s house by Halloween.  Our trip planning has gone smooth as butter, until hitting Auburn where biking trails and friends lured us into a longer visit, topped with a lovely stomach bug that made the rounds with Savannah and Jim. I won’t go into details, but when your child gets sick from the top of her bunk bed and doesn’t get down in time… well.. just imagine.

Since we didn’t visit Victoria, BC and scooted through Washington and Oregon fairly quickly, we had some time in the bank (about 4 days). However, with Savannah and Jim being sick for 2 days each, that was how we spent it.  That being said… I had a BLAST riding the mtn biking trails in and around Auburn the “endurance capitol of the US”.  Jim was able to ride the day of the night he got sick, and Savannah was able to hit the trails after her speedy recovery.  You can literally run or bike a different trail everyday for a month in Auburn!

We had a tough time deciding whether to backtrack to Squaw Valley and travel easterly back through Colorado and Kansas to Grandma’s.. OR, continue with the original plan of heading South from Auburn through the Sierra Nevada mountain sites with no backtracking and new sites all the way back to Pensacola before Nov 2 (that is our deadline).  After much thought, i am writing the blog this am from Yosemite, NP. 🙂  We could probably make MO after passing Flagstaff.. but would only gives us like 2 days there with significant driving for just two day. Guess we’re buying Grandma an airplane ticket for Thanksgiving! 😉

Saying our final good byes to the Warshower family we hit the road.  I expected the drive to Yosemite to be non climatic, but i stood corrected!  After popping out the South side of Sacramento, we headed into the little two lane farming roads, gorgeous plots of rosemary, huge citrus trees, vineyards, almonds… just spectacular.  The mountain range was in the far distance and the drive was lovely.  As we headed deeper into the rural Sierra Nevada the towns were quaint, and bustling on a Saturday afternoon.  On hwy 49 we ended up having to make a hairy U turn with a lot of people starring at us since they had closed the only road that accessed the town of Angles Camp, due to a BIG street fair. The detour put us back on hwy 49 on the OTHER side of the closure where we continued on course until our next turn off onto hwy 120… of which we had to turn around once more because the road did not permit RV’s or trucks.( (thank fully we noticed the signs). Our only choice was to get back onto hwy 49 which took us across the outer edges of the canyon.  Probably the most hairy driving i’ve ever done, especially driving an RV and towing. The drive had very steep gradients and sharp hair pin turns with towering sheer walls of rock on one side and literally two feet of gravel separating the road and 1000 ft down.  There were several pull outs to let cars pass us, but we only saw motorcycles on the road.  Guess this was a clue.  I must have done an excellent job driving, because we’re here to tell about it!

We made camp just outside of the Yosemite Park in a lovely wooded campground.  We arrived early enough to decorate our table with a fall setting of pumpkins and pinecones. (be sure to bring your pumpkins in at night or the bear will eat them!) We filled the cast iron with yummy comfort food and had a wonderful evening. We even got to see a bobcat sneak past our site!

The drive through the canyon leading to Yosemite was eerie and a bit claustrophobic to me.. Between the landslides, rubble, and marks on the canyon wall and streaks of fire retardant from the fire fighting plane that went down the previous week was intense. However the site of El Capitan quickly snapped these thoughts away.  This massive, granite monolith stands 3,593 feet from base to summit. From Spring to Fall, climbers come from all over the globe to scale El Capitan.  There was a climbing festival at the park on our visit, which was really cool to see all of the hot bodied younger people, camping and climbing. The park was very busy in general with other tourists such as ourselves, i can’t imagine it in the summer! We had planned our hike the evening before, so it was just a matter of finding parking which ended up being over a mile from the trail head to the top of the upper falls.

The Yosemite Falls is the 5th tallest waterfall in the world falling 2,425ft. We climbed to the top!  Hiking to the TOP of the upper falls- Yosemite, 7.2 miles round trip with an elevation gain of 2700 ft. We then continued further to the overlook, making an 8 mile day in 5.5 hrs. Hiking guide pamphlet suggested 6-8hrs.. guess that explains why my calves are so sore today! Jim hiked with us to the upper falls about a 1000 ft gain and 4 miles round trip before his sciatica got the best of him. Not to mention he was pretty sick just 2 days prior.. (either that he wanted to watch the.. uhm..female climbers.. haha) Even thought the lower and upper falls were dry as a bone, it was fascinating to see how the granite has been molded and sculpted by the water falling from such a grand distance.

Hiking with my daughter solo to the top however was really amazing.  There were not a ton of people and the sense of adventure and exploring was really surreal.  Towards the top the wind was howling and when you looked up up or down you would get instant vertigo. Savannah was totally amazed by this.  In the distance you could see Half Dome which is a seasonal hike on a permit lottery system.  That hike is 17 miles round trip with a 4,800 ft gain This has been added to the Momma/daughter bucket list.  It seems the more we empty our bucket list, the more we add to it at the same time!

Even if you are not climbing mountains with your child, time spent with your preteen at this tender age between “child and adult” is truly magical.  It’s almost like a secret pathway between two different lives.. quite fascinating if you don’t fight it.  Kids in this age have such an interesting outlook and take on things, and they really do like to spend time with their parents!