Yosemite

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The free breakfast consisted of orange juice, your choice of 1 cereal, and pastries. The breakfast room seated a total of 4 people. I'm guessing not a lot of people opted for breakfast. Still, it was better than breakfast bars in the car!

A relatively late start after yesterday's marathon drive. Soon we were approaching the park and the scenery gave hints as to what was in store. Plenty of pulling over to the side of the road to take photos! Finally we could see Half-Dome - we were close!

After entering the park gates we stopped off at the visitor centre to ask about walks etc and pick up some maps. We were somewhat surprised to learn that the Wawona Hotel - where we'd booked a few weeks before leaving - was actually about 30 miles south of the Valley centre!

We drive into the valley and park our car to check out the souvineer shop, general store and grab some lunch. The lunch was actually quite good and not too expensive! Pretty good considering they had a monopoly on fast food there! We sat and ate in a pleasant courtyard while the occasional squirrel ran around our feet looking for scraps.

Time to check out a few of the park's attractions on the valley floor. Half Dome, El Capitan, Bridal Veil Falls and Lower Yosemite Falls all within a few hundred metres from the car parks. Annoyingly they're in the middle of changing the 2-way valley loop drive to all 1-way, so we found ourselves driving right around twice - at least - during the afternoon.

It's getting late afternoon and time to head down to our hotel. On the way out of the valley there's a traffic jam. When we finally get through we see why - rangers stopping traffic as two bears are trying to cross the road. We quickly pull over and run back to the bear crossing. The rangers make sure we keep our distance but we get a pretty good view of two large bears running across the road!!! It's chaos as you can imagine, but at least we saw it and got pictures - the best we could manage on our little compact digitals.

Not 2 mins down the road Karina claims she sees another bear! I pull over and she runs back to the spot. Sure enough, there it is! A couple of people wander into the woods with a tripod. We're not quite sure it's the smartest thing to do, and we keep a safe distance. After a while, the bear retreats as the couple set up their camera. Karina walks over to them to get a better shot, figuring they can see the bear from there. Turns out they had no idea there was a bear there and - rather uninterested - start to photograph a large dead tree! Each to their own...

The hotel is an old 1800's building with a number of "cottages" around it. We have a share bathroom which is a little inconvenient but we had little choice. It's nice enough but not quite our "cup of tea". Great for old retirees who like to do nothing but sit in the loungeroom reading the paper while the piano is played after having eaten at the expensive restaurant.

We check in and dump our bags in our room - no larger than our bedroom at home - and go in search of a meal that we can actually afford! We're told about a few restaurants some 10 minutes down the road - but neither look like they've been open for a few years now. Running out of options but wanting something substantial, we drive 17 miles to Oakhurst. At least there's plenty of options there.

Pizza Factory it is, though we both have pasta rather than pizza. The drive back to the hotel, in the dark along winding roads, isn't exactly fun.

By the time we returned, we're beat so it's showers and bed with no TV tonight.

BTW our tally stands at 10 deer, 3 bears, 1 coyote and a thousand squirrels and lizards.

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