Day 3 – Best Laid Plans…
Posted on 23. Jun, 2010 by Brad Cansler.
One thing about changing your vacation location at the last minute, it doesn’t give you a whole lot of time to plan. We had however, laid out how many days we wanted to spend where – or so we thought. Today we began by eating breakfast at The Grove. The hotel had recommended it yesterday but we never saw it on our way to the cable car so today we asked a different person where to get some breakfast. Same thing, up the street a block on the right. Only this person added, “it’s next door to Peet’s Coffee.” That helped lots, because it was not actually on the street we were walking on, it was on the side street. Also, you know how you have a preconceived image of some place in your mind based on the name, well I was thinking fruit and nut shack in the airport, not a cool restaurant with great food. We each ordered a different omelet and then did taste tests. The OJ was fresh squeezed and we thoroughly enjoyed the meal. (Good thing, because it turned out to be our only one today.)
Next we set off for the Palace of Fine Arts which is under renovation so we couldn’t go in. We took some pictures outside the building, while Brad complained about how late it was and how the light wasn’t good (the disadvantage to being married to a photographer). Then we found the visitor center at the Presidio to get Sydney a national park stamp.
A little after mid-day we headed across the bridge and up to Muir Woods. Sydney learned a lot about the park doing the Junior Ranger program and got her badge. The light coming through the Redwoods was so pretty and we got a nice little hike in. It is amazing that these trees can be so tall.
The thing is, we were supposed to be going the other direction. We had planned to drive down the coast and go to Monterey Bay. Well we still ended up on the coast, because after leaving Muir Woods we thought we would drive up to Point Reyes. The road was so curvy that it took a lot longer to get there than what we thought from looking at the distance on the map. We arrived just before sunset and realized there was no way to make it to the lighthouse for sunset photographs. So we headed back down and stopped close to Stinton Beach to take a few photographs of the setting sun. By the time we got back to San Francisco Sydney was asleep in the back seat, so we skipped dinner and just went straight to our hotel – that we booked 15 minutes before arriving there. (Helen normally plans everything out but last summer was the first by the seat of our pants vacation that we had ever taken in our thirty years together and it turned out awesome so she was a little more relaxed about the lack of pre-planning this time.)
It wasn’t what we had planned but we had a great day!
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Day 4 – Trying to do it all
Posted on 23. Jun, 2010 by Brad Cansler.
We let Sydney sleep in some after keeping her up so late last night. This means we are getting a late start but decided to head back to the Grove for breakfast. Then found a Whole Foods to replenish our supply of fruit and nut mix, protein bars and apples (this has been lunch since we’ve arrived).
Sydney was dying to go to the Japanese Tea Garden at Golden Gate Park so this was our next stop. Of course, it really was the wrong time of day for photographs but still beautiful. The park was packed with people – I mean really packed – which amazed us considering it was a Tuesday.
Next we headed over to the Conservatory. The last time Sydney had been there she had ridden in a stroller, sleeping for part of the time , so this time she was seeing it for the first time. The orchids that they had there were out of this world. I love orchids and usually have at least one or two plants blooming in the house. There were so many here that I’d never seen. We didn’t realize how fast the time was passing until they literally ran us out.
What now? The beach. I really wanted Sydney to see a little of the coast going down the Pacific Coast Hwy. We stopped a few places and took some snap shots and watched some wannabe surfers. Finally, we came across of beach located at the bottom of a cliff, so we traded our hiking boots for water sandals and headed down. Sydney had a blast letting the waves chase her, writing in the sand and exploring on the big rocks.
Just a little before sunset we headed away from the beach and towards our next destination which was Yosemite. The next city of any size that we would be going through was San Mateo. Out came Zagat on the laptop and I searched for somewhere to eat. Pancho Villa Taqueria was one of two options; as much as we love Mexican we decided that was where we were going. It looked a little like fast food, but at 9:00 pm we weren’t about to look for something else. It turned out to be more like Taco Rock(in Chattanooga) except on steroids. It had an amazing salsa bar, great food, lots of choices and very fresh, incredible value. Once again our culinary luck is going strong.
With full stomachs we headed for Modesto to spend what was left of the night.
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Day 5 – Yosemite
Posted on 23. Jun, 2010 by Brad Cansler.
We drove the rest of the way to Yosemite first thing this morning. There is a visitor center as you go in the north entrance of the park so we stopped to get Sydney’s Junior Ranger program. This one included a bag to pick up trash, a book to fill out activities and she had to participate in a Ranger led program. I don’t think we made a stop after that where she didn’t find some trash to pick up. Her bag was full after the first day. I’m glad she was so enthusiastic about picking up trash; it was sad there was so much of it.
The rangers were very helpful and made lodging suggestions (we didn’t have a hotel for the night – remember we weren’t supposed to be here) and even gave us a phone to use to make reservations. Our cell phones didn’t have any service.
We didn’t go far before we saw people stopped and sure enough there was a bear in the meadow beside the road. As we got out of the car to go look at it, we saw a bear on our side of the road in another meadow. There was no reason to try and fight the crowds to see that one when we had our own to look at. After taking some photographs and video we took off again. Sydney was really excited about seeing her first bear in the wild on this trip (she had seen bears in the Smokies).
After stopping several times along the way to take photographs, we stopped at a really pretty waterfall. Sydney wandered around a bit and is very proud of the fact that she found a trail that we could hike down to get to the falls. She is not crazy about hiking on the paved roads but give her rocks to climb and she can go all day.
Our first stop after entering Yosemite Valley was Bridal Veil Falls. We hiked to the bottom of the falls but the closer we got the more water there was. Water was poring across the paved path and the air was so full of mist we were wet before we even got to the bottom of the falls. What a treat awaited us; there was an intense rainbow because of all the mist at the bottom of the falls. The sun was in the perfect position; we were there at just the right time. At times it became a double rainbow. As we tried to take photographs and keep our cameras dry, we became more and more soaked. It was too pretty to pass up without Brad getting his big camera out. He literally had his back to the falls and just swung around and snap. He did that 4 times and we were amazed at the result. I mean I know he’s good but I was still amazed.
We stayed in the valley doing photographs at different spots until sunset. At one point Brad lost his reading glasses so we will be looking for new ones at the valley store tomorrow. We ended our day at the pizza restaurant located at our hotel. Pizza, salad and breadsticks; it was good which kind of surprised us. The room was great; it was located right on the Merced River which was really roaring because it was full of water from the snow melt. We opened the back door and windows to let in the cool air and sounds of the river. Sydney claimed that it was so loud she wouldn’t be able to sleep; that was about 30 seconds before she passed out!
