Sequoia Sunsets, Starry Skies, and Slippery Sandals
We made the trek from Yosemite to Oakhurst (a town outside Fresno). This was a productive 2 days working, grocery shopping, recharging, and hanging with Kolton. We stayed at the RV park much of the time, which seems odd, but was really quite relaxing. Thursday night we did the trek down toward Sequoia National Park, only 2 hours from us. We didn't do a lot of research (which is a common theme here), so on the way, we decided to ditch the trailer at an RV Park where we would camp that night, and then head up the hill. This was exciting, but in the end not that smart. We wound around all the curves of the park, and 2 hours later, we were at the top. We saw some big trees along the road, and then everyone was ready to get out - especially Kolton. We were in time to rush out to "Sunset Rock" for sunset. This was amazing as we were above the clouds, and there was not a sole on this hike. When the sun went down, we rushed back to the car before dark, and then begrudgingly had to drive back to the construction zone before 7:30. This was way too quick, and we missed a lot of cool sites, so we debated returning back up the 2 hour windy road again the next day.
In the end, our schedule called us to depart for Death Valley - a 6 hour trip- Friday after a little morning work. We made it to the Valley in the afternoon. It was pretty incredible to see how vast this park is with such few signs of human life. We made it to the Stovepipe Wells camping area, ditched Bessie, and drove up Mosaic Canyon for sunset. It was nice to relax, and Kolton got to wiggle around - which is when we discovered he has no fear. He was crawling over hills, scooting his butt down them, and standing on rocks. That night we had an epic starry sky. It was so nice to just sit and look at how big the world is, with very little distractions of real life.
The next morning we hike Mosaic Canyon on this cool ridge. It was rocky, and something we would have embraced before Kolton, but had to analyze the consequences of taking a kid up there. Narendra was up for the adventure of taking Kolton, so we did.
Then we set out on the rest of our trek from Death Valley to Zion - via Vegas. We stopped at a few more lookouts in Death Valley - one where they made Borax, which Narendra found interesting, but I did not. Bad business plan in the 1800's and that is all you have to show for this place?
We had very little rain in the Pacific Northwest, but it was apparently saved for the desert. We had rain on our drive, so we stayed outside Zion and did some life catch up like laundry and showers. Turns out you can't evade those necessities.
Today we drove to Zion after grocery shopping. It was shocking how many people were here. This was not a Narendra start time in the National Park, this was a Candice start time. We got here around 11, and luckily that was good timing for getting a campsite in town. Then we drove with the droves of people, and got lucky again finding a parking spot on the road where we could then catch the shuttle up to the Narrows. (This goes back to my point of not following the crowds. The lines were crazy everywhere, but driving to get creative with a parking spot was quick and much easier). We made it to the narrows, and thankfully Narendra was on board with jumping in the cold water. The circumstances were - he wore my shoes while I wore flip flops - because there was a chance he would do a big hike after. He didn't, but I still got some street credit for surviving the narrows in flip flops. He got some street cred for carrying the baby up the narrows. It was beautiful and a fun and challenging adventure. The water was pretty high after the desert rain (some guy told us 85cfs vs 41cfs normally), so we got real wet. Kolton was loving it, and smiled and chatted with the others we met along the way. Again, dream bigger - we left many of the droves of people back at the paved trail, and it was glorious to be in the flowing river, just the 3 of us at times.
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