Now to Sequoia National Park which was a natural jewel of a surprise. Dave said that had he known the extent of the beauty and the variety of wilderness experiences available, he might have booked us a longer stay in this park. That is, if it weren’t for the road construction…more about that in a minute.
Our campsite was one of the best in the park. And, the family voted it the best on our trip so far. The facilities were pretty poorly maintained. I only know this because Dave actually made me sit in there while he did his business. I guess this is only fair considering how many times he’s seen me do mine.When we first arrived we were a bit surprised to find a little tiny parking space that would barely fit our camper, let alone our car too. But, once we parked the camper we realized that this was only a small portion of our site. It also included a palazzo if you will, an elevated courtyard. It would be where we spend most of our time. It included a fire-pit that was framed by large boulders on one side. In fact, there was a field of large boulders that extended up the hill from the site for almost one hundred yards. Caleb and Anika made many a fort in these rocks. It is also in these rocks that we would find this mule dear and a mate grazing for most of the first evening we were there.
I will admit I had a weird reaction to this deer, perhaps latently and belatedly instinctual. This buck had been grazing some 30 yards from our fire where we cooked dinner for most of the evening. And then when darkness fell, we found it nestled in a group of rocks about 50 yards away and there we thought it would stay. For the 3 or so hours of its local grazing I ignored it. I might have glanced in its general direction a couple of times. But, it received nary a bark nor even a sniff while it was in my neighborhood. That was until later when Kirsten would hear it munching. She shown her light on it and found it about 10 yards away from where we all sat. And still, I ignored it. The moment struck me almost ½ an hour after that when Dave had decided to loosely tether me. I was swift upon my attack. But alas I listened to the shouts of commands from Dave and Kirsten when they advised me to stand down. I did give that young buck a good scare though.
Oh yeah, and Dave wanted me to mention there were the big trees in the park:
Here Caleb attempts the assent of one of the largest trees in the world as Anika takes the low road.
Here is the largest tree in the world.
Dave on the other hand decides to insult this giant sequoia. This will teach Dave for giving Caleb a camera.
Anika takes over the camera for this beauty shot of D ‘n K.
Caleb was the brave one of the bunch (or craziest). He decided to jump right into the river right near the campsite. This is a river that is fed by melting snow from the surrounding mountains. And this year they had record snow fall in the area. So this water was still being fed by snow we could see on the mountains. The family reported that it hurt to stand in. It was definitely below 40 degrees. But, there goes Caleb…
If it weren’t for the very poorly managed road construction that seemed to be everywhere in the park and ended up re-routing our attempted arrival by an hour and a half, and the fact that they woke us all up at 6:30 AM paving a parking lot in the campground that would probably be unused by the public; well then perhaps we would have sought out a longer stay in these beautiful surroundings. I certainly would have enjoyed the time to chase more deer.
Big wet kisses, Mookie, “The Bloggin’ Dog”
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