Yosemite in winter - a different world

We've been to Yosemite NP two and a half years ago in July and it was a completely different experience. We followed the weather forecast and planned our visit to a 5 days window between 2 storms, so we had a nice sunny weather. The nights though, were very very cold. The only campground that is open this time of year is Upper Pines in the valley. This is the entrance to the park, coming from El Portal:
El Capitan:
Yosemite valley:

On our first day we walked around Mirror Lake, a 9.6Km round trip. Most of the trail was flat and covered with snow and ice.
Mirror lake was half frozen and half not

The kids had to collect one bag of trash as part of their junior ranger program
On the next day, we went to see the lower yosemite falls.
Waiting for the shuttle...
Half dome
At the visitor center, the kids completed their junior ranger program and received a badge and a patch (for the last time in this trip).
A jay on the way
After having lunch in the sun, we joined Ranger Dean for a walk. He explained about the trees of the park. Since we were the only ones to attend the walk, it was a private one

We spent 2 more days at the park but since it's getting late and since we don't want this blog to ever end up, we will write about them on another day.

take a walk on the white side

After a day in Monterey aquarium, we drove up to Sequoia National Park today.
"Do you have any ranger led programs today?"
"Oh sure", says the ranger in the visitor center. "We have a snowshoe walk at 2. Just that it's for children 10 and up, so... I don't know... Why don't you go to the Giant Forest museum and talk to the ranger over there. The snowshoes might be too big for your young son."
With little hope and big desire we continued to the museum.

We started to go higher and higher in elevation and the snow became thicker and thicker. The road was icy but we didn't need chains. Snow tires were enough.
And then we arrived to the museum and to the big sequoia trees near by. Those trees are BIG!

At the museum Adi tried on the shoes that were about his height and somehow they fit! What a relief, we can join the hike! We got an old fashioned snowshoes (Maine style) that look like tennis rackets and off we went
We explored animal footprints and learned how they survive in the winter low temperatures.


By the end of the walk we were very cold, unable to feel our toes.
They have a strange habit to name the sequoias after generals. We went to see the biggest tree in the world (we believed), named General Sherman(-:
On the way out of the park we saw this beautiful coyote

Hwy 1

Hwy 1 is always spectacular and breathtaking. At Morro Bay, we camped in the same campground as our very first night of the trip in July, when we met Stacey. We liked climbing the rocks in the playground


and the small botanical garden near by
After 2 relaxing days we continued on hwy 1 until we saw this:
Hundreds of elephant seals lying on the beach! As we got closer we could see (and smell) the moms and babies. They keep covering themselves with sand to protect from the sun. They're very noisy - they scream, burp, snarl and sneeze while sand is blowing out of their mouth.
The elephant seals come here every year to have their babies and mate. They will leave in March and come back next January. The males (bulls) have a funny snout
They fight among themselves on territory. They fight so hard that they bleed and have many scars on their necks.


Some more pictures from the way

Pismo Beach

Along the coast we stopped for the night at Pismo Beach. Dagan and I spent here a night maybe 10 years ago and we wanted to stay here again.
In the state park campground we saw signs of butterflies along the road so we took our bikes and went to check what it's all about. We arrived to a place called monarch butterfly grove. We saw three telescopes pointed at eucalyptus trees and few butterflies in the air. When we approached closer and looked through the telescope we saw thousands of butterflied arranged in clusters up on the trees.

More and more people gathered to see this wonder and then we heard a short talk about the monarchs. They travel all the way from south Canada to mate and lay eggs in warm California. There are about 23,000 butterflies visiting this year.

We have a new embellishment for the rv - a "for sale" sign. Isn't it sad...?