Travels with Edna and Papi: Yosemite Beauty and Tarantulas!

Monday, 10-24-16

We hitched up the fifth wheel with a little more ease and sense of relief as we left Chico towards our stay in Coarsegold. Before we left Chico, Perry, Brandon and I visited the Verizon store for our phone updates and to get answers as to why we "blew" through 40 gigs of data in less than two weeks! We had purchased a portable wifi for our trip and unfortunately used 30 gigs in a short amount of time. Our phones were automatically put on the "slow mode" by Verizon so we wouldn't have an exorbitant bill. Too late...slow mode, no data and desperately needing the GPS from the phone to navigate us to the foothills of Yosemite into Coarsegold. Today we were heading towards Park of the Sierras (SKP) which has a certain amount of spaces for vacationers with the majority of the park being full time residents. It should be a pretty direct route until we had to stop and gas up. Perry had studied the map and knew the route but wanted me to double check our directions via GPS since it had served us well up until this point. We were ready to change highways...easy no problem! According to GPS we were to take a certain street towards Yosemite but it was a confusing intersection and we took the wrong turn. We were rerouted through GPS which normally turns out okay but not this time, especially pulling a fifth wheel! It took us through an open area and the roads were so narrow with no place to turn around. Before long, there were no longer any signs of civilization except an occasional cow. We continue to follow the GPS which has never steered (no pun intended) us wrong before, and suddenly we are literally in the middle of nowhere, mile after mile of nothing but rough, narrow, windy roads. We felt EVERY bump along the way. Not confident in the GPS any longer and unsure whether we'd make it before dark, we figured we'd better call the office and let them know we'd be late. As we get a little closer to our destination there was cell service after not having it for miles. The friendly woman on the phone informed us that we might have to "dry camp" outside the gate because they were going home soon and to "please be careful"! We so far along our short journey have not "dry camped " and certainly didn't want to tonight after a long stressful drive. Dry Camping is camping with no hook-ups (mostly water and electricity). Thankfully, someone was willing to wait for us as long as it was by 5:00pm. We were greeted at the gate by "George" an older gentleman with a cowboy hat and southern accent. We followed him to our site and after a thirty minute attempt, he navigated us in and under the trees we were hoping not to clip. As we were setting up, another elderly gentleman (Bob) came up to us and engaged us in conversation about his time in the Navy as a cook. He served in WWII and the Korean war and was burned over 50% of his body on a Naval ship explosion in the kitchen. He was such a sweet man and finding out Perry had served in the Navy there were plenty of stories from our new friend.
Park of the Sierras was so different from our last destination of Almond Tree in Chico. Here it was so quiet with no trains running 24/7 and campers coming and going all hours of the day. What we encountered the next day were a lot of seniors (full timers) and they all owned golf carts to get them up and down the hilly neighborhood. The next day was kept low-key checking out the cute small town of Coarsegold and making plans for Yosemite over a cold beer and pizza . This would happen the following day since rain was predicted for two days following. Perry was hoping the rain would let up for Saturday for the much anticipated Coarsegold Tarantula Festival. I don't like BIG spiders and things that crawl, but he talked about this for days.....how could I NOT go?

Wednesday 10-26-16
Yosemite

Neither Perry nor I had been to Yosemite before so we were excited to make this trip. We anxiously packed the necessary dog items for the hour and a half drive up. Twenty minutes from Coarsegold and on the way to Yosemite is the town of Oak Hurst, a much larger town of about 10,000 people. After passing through the town and starting the ascent up towards Yosemite, we noticed thousands of diseased and dead pine trees. We read there were over thousands of acres of bark beetle ridden trees in Yosemite and because of this a lot of trees along the road were being chopped down which slowed traffic nearing the entrance to the park. However, the higher we climbed, the trees were bigger and much greener. Our first stop.....Glacier Point!
There are NO words to describe the majestic beauty of the rock formations and several waterfalls that you see from Glacier Point and today being clear, the views are exceptional! Our oldest son had hiked from this point several years ago for 37 miles and told us of half dome. It is an enormous sheered off rock smoothed by a glacier millions of years ago. We could have stayed here for hours admiring its beauty but there is so much to see......time to move on! Today we were supposed to board the dogs so we could get some serious hiking in, but after checking their vaccination records the day before we found Gracie needed the bortadella vaccine. Too late to find a vet so our little canine companions joined us on our Yosemite adventure. It was a blessing in disguise since we couldn't hike as much, but in driving we saw a lot more of Yosemite. The crazy, windy drive down took us to Tuolumne meadow. The fall colors were amazing and we had a great vantage point of Bridal Falls and El Capitan. It makes me realize how much beauty is in California . This indescribable beauty moved me emotionally and spiritually!
We had lunch at the visitors center and ate turkey sandwiches that tasted three days old! In an odd way as fearful as I am of bears, I was hoping to catch a glimpse of one. Just the same I made sure my whistle was secured in my pocket and all leftover food thrown away in the bear proofed trash cans. Beginning our way out of the park, we passed by Curry Village a camping spot of about 100 makeshift tents. Kaylyn and her friends stayed here for a week for their senior trip. I wondered how I was so brave as to let my 18 year old daughter go to a place on a scary mountain drive, no service and bears! As we headed back to Coarsegold up and down the windy road, I again leaned to the left near Perry and chose not to look over the edge. It was definitely worth the nerve wracking drive!

The rain came the next day as predicted but just after we took the dogs to the dog run. We planned on going into town to get diesel and get Gracie her bortadella vaccine but no sooner did we get into the truck, the rain started coming down. I love this place and its' sweet seniors that live here. They all smile and wave as we head into town. We get to the small vet hospital where Gracie and I waited for an hour but not before meeting an older man with long hair and a beard. His 16 year old cat was not eating and had lost a lot of weight. The vet met him in the lobby and said his cat needed to go on medication. The kindness and warmth of this hospital was unbelievable because they knew the owner was on a fixed income, had his own health issues and told him they wouldn't charge him for the tests. The rain was really coming down hard now and Gracie was loved by all the vet techs. We were enjoying the beautiful and much needed rain!

Saturday, October 29, 2016

This was the day! The day of the Annual Tarantula Festival in Coarsegold. It was smaller than we expected but Perry found his tarantulas to hold. They had a kids screaming contest, hairy leg contest and tricycle race. It was a fun small town Halloween event where we met nice people, bought locally made honey and our dogs got a lot of attention.
The next day we checked out the church in Oak Hurst. It's a beautiful church with large open windows that give you a view of all the pine trees behind it. We risked leaving the dogs behind in the fifth wheel for an hour and a half and to our surprise they did great. We didn't want to risk leaving them again so we took them with us while we got a bite of lunch. They made sure they had us in view too as they watched us from the front seat.

We had such an amazing stay but it was time to head towards Kings Canyon and the Sequoia National Park!