Yosemite. The last time I was there I was a teenager and did not appreciate anything other than it being pit stop on the excruciating cross country road trip with my entire family packed in one car. So considering I don't remember actually being there, I am going to call this my first real trip to Yosemite.
We took 350 photos in 4 days. That is how beautiful this place is. Every 5 seconds we just stop because the view is so gorgeous you can't believe you are looking at it. I won't make you look at all of them, but this is going to be photo overload.
There is something very romantic about driving an old chevy truck through the winding mountain roads, the smell of pine trees, listening to Marty Robbins. It's one of those moments that is so perfect you want to store it away in your mind like a home movie.
We had to send some Ansel Adams postcards to our sister missionary from the cute little post office.
Because it was unusually hot for this time of year, we spent a lot of time in mountain streams. That ice cold water sure cools you down real quick.
We did a few easy hikes and one that turned out to be pretty intense. It took me way longer than it should have to get to the top, but it was worth it because Vernal Falls was the only waterfall that we arrived at that actually still had water flowing through it!
The dreaded steps. It was like being on a stair master while watching the nature channel.
Throughout our stay we saw a ton of deer all over the place, birds, squirrels, and all sorts of little creatures. Surprisingly Gus wasn't much of a help when it came to scaring the wildlife out of our camp. We had a raccoon walk right up to our campfire and scare the crap out of us without so much as a bark out of him. What's up with that? The biggest news was that we even saw a bear. They are crazy strict in the park about bear safety and where you store your food, etc so I was having some anxiety about the idea that a bear might come tromping through our campsite but I have to say it was really amazing to see a bear where it belonged out in the meadow. I am just glad it was a small bear, from a very comfortable distance, with plenty of rangers around. : )
We loved that all of the bike paths were almost completely shaded so we could ride our bikes where ever we wanted to go in the valley, and Gus could get around with us.
Our last hike was on the way out of the south entrance of the park, called Meadow Loop. It was a nice change of pace since we were the only ones on the trail, we loved the quiet and the momentary feeling of being the only people on the planet.
