We spent last night at the Sierra Sky Lodge, and it was just lovely. It’s an old ranch, and still decked out like it was an old western saloon. The main house was once used to house recovering TB patients (don’t breathe in too deeply when in the rooms). We had a lovely dinner, which we didn’t share, because we were so bloody hungry. The waiter was fabulous, and we got a taste of that wonderful, friendly service that everyone raves about. He was telling us that the hotel had only reopened two days earlier as they had been evacuated the week before due to a fire “just there, on that mountain ridge” which was basically outside the door. We saw the results of that fire on our way into Yosemite.
Glacier Point had only been closed for the week but opened today. We uhmmed and ahhhed about whether we should go up as the ranger said the smoke may impinge the view. We decided to go. Why not, I mean, we’re only going to be there once right? On the single road in, everything seemed pretty clear. Then we passed a sign saying ‘smoke on road’. Around the next corner there was smoke on the road. And everywhere else as well. There were smouldering fires all around us, and many that had little flames crawling up what was left of tree trunks. It was like driving into a science fiction movie - everything was black and grey and smokey. It stopped just as quickly as it started. It was like there was a line on the road with a “You shall not pass” sign for the fire. As we drove on, we saw the devastation it had left behind. Very eerie.
We made it to Glacier Point and the view was just out of this world. It looks across the entire Yosemite Valley and takes in all the peaks. Directly across from us was Half Dome. We could also see the Yosemite Valley falls off to the right. Yosemite is all granite peaks, and so everything had this greyish white colour, and truly, no photo I have will do it justice. Majestic is the only way to describe the view. It was so breathtaking, we ended up spending an hour and a half up there, just looking at it all from every angle we could. The air was crisp and clean and totally invigorating. Some people had taken their dogs and thought it was funny when they’d snap at any squirrels that got close (?!?). Or maybe they were chipmunks. We don’t quite know the difference yet.
We headed back down and made our way into Yosemite Valley itself. At one point, there is ‘tunnel view’. Strangely, it’s at the end of a tunnel. It’s aptly named in more ways than one though - its a view into the valley, with the mountains on either side so it looks like…. a tunnel! It was stunningly beautiful as well. I’d like to say I’ve mastered the selfie stick at this point, but alas, no. we did end up with some ok photos though. When you take photos of the view though, you can’t go wrong. I don’t think it’s possible to take a bad photo in this place. Everything is like looking at photos that appear in National Geographic magazine.
There’s a big ring road into the valley, with a nice meadow and a stream in the middle of it. We tried to get into Bridalveil Falls but couldn’t get a park, so we just wound our way around the ring road, double parking to take photos and gaze at the views when we could. We saw Half Dome from underneath this time, and the sheer face of El Capitan. We managed to grab a park in the centre of the valley (finding a car park mid-afternoon is like finding angel wings. I was going to write fairy wings, but there are at least a dozen pair sitting under our house, so that’s not particularly rare at all). We found some (bad) lunch and then walked in to see the Yosemite Falls. They were beautiful as well - nature is like that, you can’t really say it isn’t great to look at - and then we walked around to find the shuttle that would take us to the base of El Capitan. On the way, we saw some deer: a stag, a couple of mumma deer and some babies. We were suitably impressed, they didn’t give a rats patootie that we were so excited.
We found the shuttle stop, talked to some people from Sacramento who tried to explain the difference between squirrels and chipmunks to us, but they decided that they didn’t really know and that “both carried rabies so don’t touch them”.
The Groveland Hotel is in a little town that appears to be mainly tourists. It was an old hotel (120 years) and the rooms were very old fashioned. It felt like stepping back in time - rocking chairs, fancy draped curtains, armoires and the like. All American beds are really, really high, and this one had an old fashioned quilt (as in quilted quilt) and the most divine feather pillows ever! Ever! We had dinner at the Fork and Love (yep) and that was just awful. Everything was covered in Ranch Dressing. They did however, have a lovely Syrah wine, produced in the Yosemite Valley - so I had my first glass of wine in months. We decided (Mark would say I decided) to share ‘S’mores’ for dessert. I have never in my life eaten so much sugar in just two spoonfuls. I couldn’t actually do it, and that’s saying something as I have such a big sweet tooth. There were figs on the plate, and there was no sweetness to them at all, compared to the s’mores. It was disgusting - sorry to my American friends who love them. The sugar rush was so intense, I was immediately awake (after such an exhausting day) and I think I got the shakes a little. Never again.
No comments:
Post a Comment