Monday, June 27

We had a wonderful full-day tour of Yosemite today. Our diver/guide, Karen, was excellent ... lots of information about almost anything, and a wry sense of humor. (The bus was very comfortable too; it has a restroom that was a lot larger than the one on the train, complete with a window!)

Our first stop was at the base of El Capitan where we spotted several rock climbers. Karen calls them "walnuts" because they must be nuts to be on that wall. Then we went up to Glacier Point with its fabulous view of Half Dome, Clark's Peak, Nevada Falls and Vernal Falls as seen in this photo. The waterfalls are in top form since the region had twice their usual snowfall last winter and even significant snowfall just a few weeks ago. But the weather was really fine today. The photo below is Bridal Veil Falls.

Yosemite really does have some of the most awe-inspiring scenery in the world. I won't say it's at the tip top of the list because I haven't been everywhere yet, but it certainly deserves its World Heritage Site status.

After dinner at the Lodge, I fought several rounds with this silly Android tablet trying to either upload all this to my blog, and/or to save the file to a thumb drive so I could upload it via Margaret's laptop. No luck on either plan. I guess it will have to wait until I can find an Android guru when I get to Portland.

Tuesday, June 28

Margaret and I greatly appreciate all the concern expressed by our friends and colleagues even though it has taken several days for people to catch up with us and for us to catch up with our e-mail.


We had a leisurely morning getting ready to check out of Yosemite Lodge which we did a little before 11:00 leaving our bags in their care. We then took the shuttle bus with Margaret getting off at the Village to shop while I went on to the Ahwahnee Hotel which is the old super hotel in the valley -- lots of dark wood paneling and trim along with a decor in the "Rustic Elegance" style. Gigantic lobby and dining room with huge rough beam ceiling in the dining room and beams decorated with Indian motifs in the lobby. At each end of the lobby is a fireplace that an average person can stand up in. Everywhere are both Indian and oriental rugs and textiles.

We have a reservation here for a late lunch, because we hit the rails again this evening at about 6:00 p.m. The lunch was excellent, elegantly served, and expensive. Well worthwhile.

Now at 9:20 p.m. we are on a train headed back from Merced to Sacramento. Blessedly it is within a couple of minutes of on time since our connection to the Coast Starlight is very close and at midnight. I, personally, will probably fall onto my berth just as fast as possible.

Wednesday, June 29

We didn't need to worry about the Starlight. It was only a few minutes late, but when we boarded, we learned that we would sit in Sacramento for 2 hours waiting for the Zephyr. That meant that the Zephyr was running 11 hours late.

It is now mid-morning and we are into Oregon. The early morning was spent winding through northern California. Winding was the operative word as we often saw the morning sun through our window on the west side of the train. The scenery is lovely if not actually spectacular. In some areas we are way up looking down into misty, foggy valleys. Other times we are next to rocky hillsides covered in a botanist's dream of wildflowers. Yet other times we run between spruce, pine and hemlock forests that are all but impenetrable.