California Vacation ... third leg.

Yes, I left off last time at The Claim Jumper. We arrived in Fresno around 3:00 PM and had not had lunch. We Google texted the Claim Jumper, keyed the address into the GPS and before we knew it, we were pulling into the Claim Jumper restaurant. When you walk into the restaurant, there is a counter loaded with their deserts. There deserts are huge. This was one of those days that I just wanted to start with the desert first and then work backwards, but I restrained myself. As I am writing this note, I don’t remember what I ordered that day for lunch, but I know at the conclusion of our meal, we ordered one piece of chocolate cake. This cake had six large layers. It was a massive piece of cake. We all grabbed a fork and dove in. It was a wonderful way to break up the day’s trip.

Well, after lunch we pointed the GPS toward Mariposa, CA. We drove another two hours and arrived at the Best Western of Mariposa. It was a clean hotel located near Yosemite. By this time, my kids were a little spoiled. We walked into the room (we had two that night) that we had booked for two days and within two minutes all three of them were in our room complaining about the accommodations. Sarah could not believe that we were staying at a hotel where the door to the room opened to the outside. When I was a kid, that’s all I knew. Hotel (ie. motel) doors opened to the outside. The boys, (Stuart and Samuel) were upset because the television was old and did not have inputs that allowed an X-Box to be played on it. We were in crisis.

I convinced them to go on a walk with Patty and me and let’s scout out Mariposa. It was a small town with little or no activity. When I booked the room, I thought that I was booking a room that had views to the river, but I was wrong. Mariposa had a creek that looked over-grown and had limited accessibility. We did a walking tour and covered the town in fifteen to twenty minutes and then, I made the decision to check-out in the morning and move on. The owner of the establishment was kind. He was Indian and reminded me of the many, many days working with off-shore software developers as we launched SecureGive. He tried to change my mind, but could not. When we woke up the next morning, I took a quick look at the hotel’s complimentary breakfast and decided that we needed to eat somewhere else.

We pulled out of the Best Western and drove through town. We drove a restaurant called The Happy Diner and noticed that the parking lot had a lot of cars. It was not fancy at all. It was probably built in the 1950s or 60s. The folks were nice and the food was terrific. Now, I don’t want this blog to be all about restaurants and eating establishments but the Happy Diner was a bright spot in the town of Mariposa, CA.

We drove that day around forty-five minutes and arrived at the entry way of Yosemite National park. We paid the $20 entrance fee and within a few miles had our first stop at Bridal Veil Falls. The first thing noticed was that Yosemite had a lot more people than Sequoia or Kings Canyon. The parking lot was packed with people. The restrooms had long lines and it seemed like a theme park instead of a national park. We followed the crowd up to the falls. It was beautiful. The power of the water was strong and the force of it hitting the rocks at the bottom created a mist that covered the viewing stations. There were people from all over America and many foreign countries gazing at this natural wonder. We left there and drove to the center of Yosemite Village and marveled at the post card-like scenery. It was amazing. Just the day before we are over-whelmed by the size of sequoia trees and now we are mesmerized by the size of the granite mountain in the front of us. The scientists tell you how these were formed thousands of years ago, but I know that God spoke and the worlds were formed. God spoke and Yosemite came into being. Today the hills declare the glory of God and the mountains speak of His power.

We parked the car at the visitor’s center and got on a tour bus and drove toward Nevada falls. We climbed nearly a mile up the mountain to see these falls. When I say, “up the mountain” I mean it. It was a trek. We are in good shape over-all, but this walk made us huff and puff. Like I said, you see the falls after nearly a mile. The trail continued another a mile or so for those who wanted to feel the waters as it hit the bottom of the falls, but we chose to gaze at it’s beauty and then walked down the path that we had just climbed. It was a lot faster going down then climbing up. Once we made it down, Patty, Sarah and Samuel went over put their feet into the ice cold waters of river that formed from the falls. I can appreciate the river without having to put my feet into the cold water. I like it when the ocean is around 82 degrees; these waters were probably around 50 degrees. Too cold for me. We left the falls, pulled out the peanut butter and jelly and had a picnic. Now, my family all loves creamy, but I am a crunchy peanut butter man. I have always been adamant about JIF, but recently I tried the Wal Mart brand and to my surprise, it’s pretty good. On this particular day, it was the WalMart brand.

We headed toward the south entrance of Yosemite after lunch. If you have never been to a national park, you need to realize that going from one place to another may take you an hour or two. We saw great views and scenic valleys as we drove. At the south entrance of Yosemite is a town called Fish Camp, CA. It was there we found the Tenaya Lodge. The Tenaya Lodge is a four diamond AAA Resort and was just what the doctor ordered. All five of us checked into one room because one room at the Tenaya Lodge costs more than two rooms at the Best Western. The property was amazing. We were worn out and quickly discovered the hot tub. After an hour or so at the hot tub, we turned in for the night.

When the sun rose the next morning, Stuart, Samuel and I were walking mountainous trails in hopes of finding that perfect fishing spot. We had purchased a California fishing license the day before and just knew that we were going to land some trout. It was 48 degrees again that morning. It felt more like fall than it did the first week in July. As we walked down into the woods toward the stream, I kept one eye on the trail and another one looking for bears. I did not see any. We found a picture-perfect spot and started to fish. The water looked as though it flowed from the faucet out of our house. It was clear. We had a can of corn and we shared that for bait. We moved up and down that stream with no luck. It really did not matter. We were in the midst of beauty and I had both of my boys with me on an adventure.

After a couple of hours, we decided to drive to another spot. We had wandered down the stream quite a ways and the journey back to the car was longer than we expected. At one point, we were concerned that we were headed the right way. We kept going and eventually found the car. We stopped by the general store in Fish Camp, CA and I talked to the proprietor. He told me that it was illegal to fish with corn in California. What? That’s what we use in Georgia’s trout streams. He sold me some trout bait (whew it stunk) and we went to another stream. This one was off the main road and had rushing waters. This looked like a legitimate stream. I had high hopes. After an hour of casting, I decided not to cast for fish, but to open my eyes and look for them. As I said the water was clear and all you had to do was look to find fish. Well, we did not find any. Stuart went on up the stream and Samuel and I worked the lower part. Neither one of us had any luck fishing, but we made great memories.

We packed up and headed back to the Tenaya Lodge where we found the girls laying out at the pool. We had negotiated a late check-out and it was time to leave. We hated leaving this spot, but our budget knew that it was best. We made a quick stop in Oakhurst for lunch at a Mexican Restaurant. California Mexican food is not like Tex-Mex (we love that) or like Augusta-Mex. The sauces are different. I am not a fan. In fact, we tried one other Mexican restaurant on the trip and then made an official ban, no more Mexican food until we land in Georgia. After lunch, we programmed the GPS for downtown San Francisco. Here we go.