Beautiful Sights and my First Truck Stop Shower

The first of many important life lessons this trip has taught me is how amazing showers are! I think most of us take that for granted until we haven't had one for a few days. One of the many new life experiences this trip has brought to me now includes showering for the first time at a truck stop. For those who have some sort of bias against the concept of showering at a truck stop, it is actually pretty amazing. I was blown away when the cashier told me it would be $12 for a shower, but after seeing the Flying J facilities it was worth every penny. Having your own private bathroom on the road kind of feels like being VIP in the showering and bathroom using community.

But I'm sure no one is reading this to hear about the Flying J bathroom, recapping the last four days is going to be pretty much impossible without posting way more than the 1000 or less words I set as a personal guideline. So here goes nothing....

Since I last checked in from Vegas four days ago. We have been to June Lake, Yosemite, the Golden Gate Bridge, Redwoods National Park. Sadly, I feel like the tight time table has cost us more beautiful sights than we will ever get a chance to see. We have camped at Sunset Beach in Watsonville, CA, Clam Beach near McKinleyville, CA, and roadside in the car for about 45 minutes in rural Oregon. At the moment we are finishing the last bit of the trip to Yellowstone and hoping to set up camp somewhere near the park for the night. I'll keep it very brief with my impressions so far:

Yosemite National Park

I think our favorite sites from the Yosemite area came outside the park. Based on a Facebook National Park's group suggestion, we took a scenic drive around the lakes near the Yosemite area. We stopped at the beach of June Lake and captured some beautiful pics.

Yosemite itself taught us an important lesson about traveling on 4th of July Weekend. The park was packed so we pretty much just spent out entire time there driving around the loop at Yosemite Valley. We couldn't even find parking so our only views of Yosemite Falls and Half Dome were from the car. In the end as we were exiting the valley area, we just decided to set up our camping chairs in an open meadow to enjoy a quick bite to eat surrounded by mountains on all sides. In the end, I will say it wasn't the scenery that ruined this section of the trip. It was the people.

San Francisco

The first thing I wish I would have known about Golden Gate is if you are driving up from the San Fran side, be sure to turn off to the right of the bridge, not the left if you want to walk on it. The left gives great views of the bridge, but gets so filled up that hiking down and up again would have taken hours. Instead we lost about 45 minutes going to the highest overlook, standing in line for the bathroom and then deciding to try the other side. On the right side we were able to park and walk an nice trail that was less than a mile to the bridge. It was cold, windy, and foggy or just a typical day in San Fran as I've heard from everyone else who has traveled there. 

I won't say anything about our trip to Fisherman's Wharf, except that it was the 4th of July, so again the people ruined the experience not the attraction itself. Parking ranged between $50-$80, so we hit the road without a stop. We did get to see the interesting architecture of the city. 

Redwoods National and State Parks

My apologies here, but I'm going to completely nerd out about this one. When I was in elementary school, I remember reading a story in one of those weekly news handouts they give to the class. I think it was Scholastic News but that really doesn't matter to the story, so I won't investigate to make sure that's accurate. The story talked about redwoods can be hundreds or thousands of years old and supply a large amounts of oxygen. I have dreamed of seeing these giants, touching them, and breathing the air of the forest. To be honest, this was the part of the trip I was most looking forward to. It did not disappoint! So much so that I'm willing to post this vid, that kind of reminds me of the double rainbow guy. Sometimes, things are so amazing that you have no control over how ridiculous you sound.

I'm sure Jenn thought I was crazy because at one point I put my hand on one of the Redwood burls and just sat there for 5 minutes or so breathing in the air and reflecting on how long it had been on earth and how it would survive long after I am dead. This was probably the closest thing I've ever had in my life to a truly spiritual experience. I know I need to go back someday and spend more than a few hours. I think the Lady Bird Johnson quote engraved on the plaque in the grove named in her honor:

"One of the most unforgettable memories of the past years is walking through the Redwoods last November – seeing the lovely shafts of light filtering through the trees so far above. feeling the majesty and silence of that forest, and watching a salmon rise in one of those swift streams — all our problems seemed to fall into perspective and i think every one of us walked out more serene and happier." - Lady Bird Johnson

Serenity and happiness pretty much summed up exactly how we felt on our way out.