Out of the Haze into the Mountains

The day started super early. 7am OMG! Everyone was like super half asleep. The itinerary was super long today. So many places to visit. I really doubt that we can do it all in time. Lucky that we have a lot of drivers on stand by.

Wonderful morning sky

Visited the Yosemite Falls. Not much water left at the falls as it is already summer. It was like spraying tiny droplets of water down. The walk in the woods to the falls was really refreshing. Although it was hazy outside, the trees really did absorbed all those smoke. This time around I passed on climbing all the way up to the falls. Left the rest to do it. Too lazy to do a detour as I went up the short cut which apparently cut short my hike due to a huge rock blocking the way.

Isn't the water amazingly clear?

Stopped by Yosemite Village for lunch a before heading off to the Toulene Meadows. This place turned out to be my favorite stop. Its really beautiful. Green green grass, bright blue sky, clean clear river with lots of wlidflowers around. Really seems like I'm in those gardens in movies.

Reminds me of some ads in magazines

The beautiful day does not stop there are we move on the Olmsted Point. The view from the vista point is simply enchanting. Borrowed the graduation gown from Alex to take photo there. Lol. Almost everybody did that. So guess i can say I went through my commencement here at Yosemite National Park. Haha.

We finally reached our pit stop at a ski resort at Mammoth Mountain. The elevation was so high that I feel so chilly. As we entered the house, we were greeted by the sight of the wonderful hotel. It is really like a vacation house. Complete with a living room, dinning room, kitchen, 3 full baths, 2 bedrooms and a cute attic with 4 beds. Could really have a party there in the room man. Feel like I wanna stay here for the rest of the Vacation man.

Goldilocks and the 3 Bears?

Here Comes Everybody

Today marks the end of our SF trip. The past 2 days has been so much fun. Wanted to stay longer in The City but we've got plans ahead. So reluctant to leave the place. We left SF for San Jose where we are supposed to meet up with the rest. The whole ride on the Caltrain was spent recollecting about our fun filled weekend in SF. Wonder whether we will get the chance to do that again. Its already been 2 months that I'm here in US. Time really flies.

Drove off from SJ to this small little town called Chowcilla. Found out from Ben and gang that they got a speeding ticket. Gosh, that's horrible. Still remember my horrible incident with the highway patrol 2 years ago. That thought me not to speed or at least watch my ass if I intend to speed. Lol.

Love the whole natural feel

Can you find me?

The drive to Yosemite seems neverending. Upon entering the park, we were told that there is a huge forest fire a couple days before. Bummer. Not only we cannot get a good view of the place, the air smell so hazy. As bad as the time when home was affected by the Indo forest fire. Now where is my breath of fresh air. Argh! There goes the beautiful view at glacier point :(

What we see and supposed to have seen. Argh!

Next stop was Bridalveil Fall. We kinda got lost as I drove to the Bridalveil Campsite instead. The other car waited for us quite long. Sorry. But it was fun getting lost somehow. Haha. We were lucky that the part where the fall is situated is clear from the fog. So we finally get a good view and a little fresh air. The climbing on rocks to the top was really fun! The water is crystal clear. Reminds me of the stream back in Korea. This is better though as there is very few ppl around. Hence we get a lot more peace and quiet.

After seeing the wonderful sunset, we checked out a hotel near the place. Pretty nice and decent but too bad we are not stayin there. It is so high class that their dining place requires proper dress code. Bleh.

Our drive to the cabin was very 'interesting' too. Apparently they were doin road works and we had to follow a pilot car for a long long time. Super slow man. The best part is actually when we reached the place, we found out that our other car is missing. Everybody was like :o We waited for a while and the are still not appearing and decided to drive back to search for them. The worries finally end when we found them. Not! We found out that the cabin we booked does not have cooking facilities and they banned campfire on the site. After some negotiation with the front desk, they decided to let us use the kitchen. Thank goodness. If not I think we would need to hunt for a deer and eat it sashimi style.

The cabin room was pretty small. Toilet was not adjacent. Really back to nature right. Too bad I am not such a nature lover. All these unfortunate events was quickly forgotten when I stare into the sky. I see such a wonderful constellation of tiny stars shinning brightly above me. Magnificent.