Zion and Grand Canyon, May 2008

We spent 10 days in Utah and Arizona for our 30th anniversary. (We took hundreds of pictures; here are just a few. Remember to click on the pictures to enlarge them, and then click "back" to get back to the blog. Some of them look better when enlarged.)

We got to Zion at sunset on a stormy Thursday evening:




The next day, Friday, we hiked in the rain. Eventually, the sun came out on the wildflowers:




On Saturday, we were off to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon on a showery and snowy day:







After spending Saturday night in an RV park in Jacob Lake, we found an isolated boondocking site near the East Rim:





How isolated? This is a view of the trailer from halfway down our quarter- mile "driveway," which branched off of a remote dirt road:




On a blustery Sunday evening, we took a sunset bike ride from our campsite to the East Rim Viewpoint:




On Monday, we hiked a couple of miles down into the canyon on the Kaibab Trail to a natural tunnel:





On Tuesday, we hiked the Widforss Trail, 10 miles long but not too hilly:




On Wednesday, we moved the trailer about 25 miles to the west on the Rainbow Rim at Locust Point:






If you click on that picture to enlarge it, you can see daylight under the trailer hitch. That's the rim itself. Here is the view from the door of the trailer:




We set up our lounge chairs on a windy ledge next to the trailer:







Our campsite was on Locust Point, in a lush Ponderosa pine forest. There were one or two other groups camping in the area; for some of the time, we were the only people within 20 miles:





Since we were spending several days away from civilization, we had no place to put our trash. We had to hang it up in a tree to keep the animals away:




For the next two days (Thursday and Friday), we rode the Rainbow Rim trail, which follows the rim around five points that resemble five fingers of the plateau overlooking the canyon. The trail meanders in and out of the forest:





Because it was only late May, the wildflowers were not yet in full bloom , but almost all of the snow had melted and the meadows were green:



We got up at 5 a.m. one morning to watch the sunrise:


This is almost the same shot, edited five years later in Lightroom:

The rides (over 18 miles each day) were challenging but exhilarating:





On Saturday, we headed back toward home through Zion and stopped to ride to the end of the canyon and back. This is one of our favorite road rides, since there is no traffic, the road is great, and the scenery can't be beat:

Big Sur, April 2008

In April of 2008, we camped at a very pleasant RV Park and campground in Big Sur, among the redwoods. Our first outing was a mountain bike ride to Andrew Molera State Park. During the winter and spring months, there is no bridge over the Big Sur River, so I had to carry the bikes across:



But the absence of a bridge kept the crowds down. We first rode out to the coast:



We then took a very challenging ridge trail, climbing almost 2000 feet:





On another day, we hiked up into the hills above the coastline. The cliffs were lined with flowers:





The views from Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park were lovely:



I couldn't resist this cliché shot of McWay Falls:

Montecito Sequoia, February 2008

We took a quick trip up to Montecito to see Matt, who had been working there for about a year. As it turned out, we got to stay an extra day or two because of a big snowstorm. Felice and Shelley threw themselves into tubing:





Matt took us backcountry skiing, which is like Alpine skiing on cross-country skis (fun but very arduous):



One morning, before Matt woke up, we decided to dig out his car:

Giant Sequoia National Monument, October 2007

In October, 2007, we took the trailer up to the Giant Sequoia National Monument in the Sequoia National Forest, above Porterville in the southern Sierra. The road was very twisty but not impossible. Snow flurries were predicted. We stayed at Quaking Aspen Campground at 7000 feet, which was practically deserted. After a very cold and dark night (no problem, with lots of blankets!), we awoke to find that there had been more than just flurries:



But the snow really added to the experience of hiking in the Sequoias, especially in this seldom-visited area. Freeman Grove was very impressive:



The aspens were particularly striking during the snow flurries:



Even the oak leaves were turning yellow:



After a couple of days, the sun came out and lit up the snowy aspens:



The cold nights made the aspens change color every day, going from pale yellow to gold to red:



On our way back down the hill in Camp Nelson, we came across a New England-style maple:

Tuolumne Meadows, September 2007

We camped for a week at Tuolumne Meadows on the east side of Yosemite, in the Tioga Pass area at about 8600 feet. The nights were very cold -- lots of blankets. One of our first hikes was right nearby, at Lembert Dome, a big granite knob:



Although the trail wasn't steep, the sheer granite face was intimidating:



On another memorable hike, we went out to North Dome, which overlooks Yosemite Valley and Half Dome:



On the way back from North Dome, we climbed up to Indian Arch:



The landscape of the high country was stark, inspiring me to imitate Ansel Adam in black-and-white:









Toward the end of the trip, the weather started to get stormy:



On our way home, we stopped off at Parker Lake, north of June Mountain:



We hiked up to Fern Lake, where the aspens were starting to turn: