SF and Mariposa Grove

Well, I've flown down to San Francisco for the next trip. This one goes out to Yosemite, Death Valley, Grand Canyon, Moab etc. This one is through a company called Explore, whom I have used before (for the Tanzania safari).

Before the trip officially started I had a day in San Fran where I visited the Folsom street fair. For those of you who haven't heard of it before, I highly recommended you do not look it up. Its rather kinky and perverted and may offend your sensibilities. For those of you who have heard of it, I wasn't overly impressed, but I've not really had my head in that sort of space for many years now.

Joining the trip was a bit odd as the guide couldn't meet is the first evening due to a family emergency. We all met in the morning for brief chat and then a driving tour of some of the harder to get to parts of SF. Up to Twin Peaks for a stunning view. I have contemplated walking up there on previous visits, and am so glad now that I didn't, it would be a heck of a trek!

Quick stop at the 5 Sisters (or something like that), old houses that survived the great SF earthquake and fire. Up to the Golden Gate Bridge, and down to Fisherman's Wharf, then the afternoon free to do what we wanted. I went to look at the sea lions (some fighting, one practicing pretending to be a shark) and wandered generally as I've done lots of that stuff before.

The do your own thing afternoon didn't really help with group bonding, but it is getting there slowly and I had dinner with some of the guys whom I met on the cable car on the way back to the hotel.

Today we drove to Yosemite and had a walk to see the giant Sequoias at Mariposa Grove. Massive trees (very thick), but not many of them remaining are of the huge size. To my mind, not as mind blowing as the scale of the Redwoods at Muir Woods, but still impressive in their own way.

A lot of fire damage around, part of the natural cycle

California Tunnel Tree

The Tunnel Tree is bleeding!

Dry grass that looked like it was fire

Something weevil this way has been!

Its felt like a bit of a bitty day really, with a long drive to start, a very late lunch stop (3pm), and as I'm writing this it's 8:30pm and we are driving back to the hotel in the dark to check in. We did have a nice group dinner that I think has properly broken the ice a bit, but still not as smooth a start as the previous trip (admittedly, I didn't really have anything to compare that one against, so maybe its not fair making a comparison).

Tomorrow is Yosemite Valley, and we shall see how that goes!