Day 12 - Merced, CA to Kingsburg, CA

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Today we saw Yosemite. Of course the day started a few minutes later than we planned due to another minor Harley issue. I know, Dad will say it's because it's a Harley, but the bike has been running great for the entire trip. This morning the kickstand extender was loose, so Brandon at the front desk at the hotel let me into the maintenance room to grab any tools I needed, so 5 minutes later it was fixed and we were ready to hit the road.

We headed east past a lot of pistachio and almond groves to Mariposa, and then north to Coulterville, a small gold-boom town. We continued on through some fantastic roads, on California 49 and 120 which was really twisty with great views. 120 is the road into Yosemite, so we entered the park and saw a ton of great scenery. The first glimpse of Yosemite Valley is breathtaking to see Half Dome and all of the waterfalls. We made a lot of stops along the way for photos.

We had a quick lunch of leftover fruit from the stop we made yesterday, and visited the Yosemite post office where dad struck up a conversation with the postal worker there. We continued on our way to twin falls, and then south towards the Mariposa Grove, where there are some giant sequoias. Unfortunately we had just missed the last tram that would take us to the California Tunnel tree, and the hike would have taken over an hour, so I'll do this another time I'm in California and it gives me a reason to come back and see it again.

We made it through Fresno and on to Kingsburg by about 7, grabbed a quick dinner at Jeb's Hill Country Cooking (not nearly as good as the other meals we've written about, so not worth much of a mention), and it's off to bed in anticipation of another great day through Sequoia National Park tomorrow.

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Photos

Fixing the Harley
Getting the morning started

California 49
According to the CHP Officer dad met, this is the 'Little Dragon'

Coffee Break
Coulterville, CA

Another waterfall
I can't remember the name

Upper Falls
One of the twin falls

The view from Tunnel Overlook
On the way out of the valley

Giant sequoia
It's not that impressive in a photo, but when you look at some of the other trees in comparison and realize those are full grown, large trees, then this becomes more impressive.