Vacation 2009 Day 1 - Prepare & Go!

Vacation Preparation

Last year was the first vacation that Zoe (my 12 year old daughter going on 30) and I took a road trip together. A safe trip visiting family in Palm Springs and then to Disneyland via Hollywood to see Eddie Murphy - but that's another story!

Disneyland is easy (if you don't mind the crowds and last year, around Fathers Day, the temperatures in the 100's!!) because you arrive and around each corner is something to do, eat, see or try. Simply walk and choose from the buffet it offers.

This year my attempt at putting together a vacation that was more natural, thoughtful, and educational, as well as fun, provided me with a more challenging task! For weeks I collected my thoughts and asked other parents for suggestions. Finally, I came up with an itinerary of Yosemite, Mono Lake, the ghost town of Bodie, and Lake Tahoe. Yosemite and Lake Tahoe were part of my childhood, having gone there with my parents and to this day, I love my memories from both locations. Mono Lake and Bodie were adult pleasures experienced through my photography and mentor Morley Baer on photographic workshops. Because these locations were on the way from Yosemite to Lake Tahoe, they became part of the itinerary with the hope they would be interesting to Zoe as well.

So with this basic itinerary I called Yosemite to reserve a room at Yosemite Lodge. I didn't ask for my first choice of Camp Curry, where I went with my family as a child, feeling that if I wanted to stay at Camp Curry, everyone who comes to the park wants to stay there as well and therefore would be completely sold out. Just goes to show you how much fun I had at Camp Curry when I was a kid!!! But when I called I was promptly informed that there were no rooms available at Yosemite Lodge. The defeated silence coming from my end of the line, prompted the man on the other end of the line to see if there were any other rooms available in the park and so he put me on hold. Figuring that the next offering would be the Ahwanee Hotel and it's exorbitant nightly rates, I was deflated and not hopeful while listening to the perky “on-hold” jingle.

When the reservationist returned, he told me that they had a tent/cabin at Camp Curry available. Through my slack-jaw amazement, I booked immediately! Yahoo!!!!!

Fortified with my good luck I got reservations in Lee Vining immediately but had to do some research of Lake Tahoe.

As a child we spent one week at the beginning of the summer and one at the end in Tahoe City. The hotel we use to stay at had been turned into a large condo complex and the subsequent lodge we had stayed at had transitioned through an “adult themed” motel but was now a “regular” hotel. They had photographs of a representative room on the web, so I took a look... Okay, the colors weren’t as garish as they once were (yes, I had visited it once while it was in it’s “adult themed” phase - disturbing my childhood memories but it was right on the lake so...) but the remaining in-room glass blocked jacuzzi tub was entirely inappropriate!

Tahoe wasn’t going to follow the example set by Yosemite!

But after just about one hour of searching the web, I found a motel in Tahoe Vista that had individual cabins on the lake side of the highway. Photographs of the interiors were rustic and charming. I booked it immediately! The first phase was now complete!

Day 1 - Sunday, June, 14, 2009

The night before trips, excitement and a bit of anxiety usually keeps me from getting a good nights sleep. This trip wasn’t an exception. So when I found myself completely awake at 6:00 am, it took a few cups of coffee to get me solidly ready to go. Loading the car with everything I thought would be useful was a spacial challenge (you might even say a “special challenge” - but lets leave that for now...), I closed the door to my home, seat-belted the goldfish bowl - with goldfish in it - in the passengers seat and was off to collect Zoe!

The exchange of goldfish for Zoe with Mary Kay, Zoe's Mother, was timely and efficient though it required some adjustment to my well packed car. But as long as the door latches held and I didn’t have to make an emergency stop, all would be fine! So with Zoe’s iPod plugged into the car stereo playing... well... I don’t know what... oh yeah... Taylor Swift, we were off at 10:45 am.

When we are together, I do my best to talk with Zoe about the things that she’s interested in and take in what’s going on in the moment to engage in conversation with her but the need to share my past with my daughter has the same unconscious imperative as salmon going upstream each year to spawn! I’ve complained about this in other writings regarding my Father's same need - I guess the apple doesn’t fall... well I’ll try to keep repeating the stories to a minimum. Maybe annually, like the salmon, might be a good example I should emulate... except their subsequent demise might be part of the example I’ll ignore for a while.

When I travel with Zoe, I like to provide her with some little, nik-nak/momentos that will be useful and remind her of the trip in the future... so the bandana, camp whistle and carabiner belt clip were just the start. What I really wanted to find was the perfect flashlight! Definitely a male thing but useful to get from the tent/cabin to the bathroom in the middle of the night and illuminate the current book in the Twilight saga she was reading. Finding this perfect flashlight didn’t happen till we landed in Manteca and stopped at the Bass Pro Shop. 

Okay, this isn’t Mel Cottons! Our local stalwart of a sporting goods store that I prefer frequenting to REI or Sports Authority. This store crosses the line into a theme park experience!! From the big sky country of the Central Valley, accentuated by the huge parking lot surrounding the store, you enter via a portal through a 3 story redwood tree into a cool earth-tone forest glen retail world filled with fishing rod cat tails, fake animals of every description (some that I believe aren’t even indigenous to the area...) ready to come to life at any minute. 

A cascading stream built around the stair well ending in a 10’ glass walled fish tank with multi pound trout and bass that I’m glad, on so many levels, my gold fish didn’t see! Fishing boats, guns and bows, camouflage gear on mannequins aiming binoculars or in stalking poses that made you fear for the fake animals!! Imagine a retail version of “Night at the Museum” and you will understand the “awwwww..... woooowwwwww...” that came out of Zoe’s and my mouths as we wandered in amazement!

Everything was so well defined and placed, that I thought to look for fire-fly’s to find the location of the flashlights! No such luck... but I’ll put it in their suggestion box next time I’m there... When we did find it, after asking directions and made our way to the camping section on the the second floor right next to the waterfall, 6 foot inclined rock surface testing area for hiking shoes, tents galore, and every conceivable item for camping... Zoe finally dragged me away from whatever useless item I was wowing about, to the “Mother-Load” of flashlights!

Everything from million candle power “burn-a-hole-in-your-tent-wall-if-your-not-careful” flashlights, to itsy-bitsy bug-light LED’s was offered to choose from! Have you ever been in a situation where selection overload froze you? That’s where we found ourselves but in two corners Zoe and I found our flashlights - a small hand held and a clip on LED. Grabbing them and working our way to the check-out we “had to get” a shirt, bag of rock candy and batteries (duh!) and exited, like squinty eyed forest moles, into the sunlight.

After a quick lunch we were on our way into the Sierras!

In middle school I remember a field-trip to the Gold Country. Columbia, the historic and picturesque mining town, was our destination to learn about the life of the 49er’s. The most memorable thing for me wasn't the history but buying a tin of snuff. A scandalous purchase shared between us on the bus back. To this day I don’t understood why forcing yourself to sneeze repeatedly was something you wanted to do!

On the way home the bus stopped at Knights Ferry and we all piled out. On Zoe’s and my trip, it was the first stop! The covered bridge and mill are always interesting and a great excuse to stretch our legs after an hours drive or so. I really can’t say if the experience at The Bass Pro Shop or Knights Ferry were the start of the educational part of the trip but reading placards about the history of the area did feel more... enlightening.

From here the trip to Yosemite had it’s points of interest... Priests Grade and the rotten egg smell of the sulfur springs at the top, Groveland and it’s Iron Door Saloon, the burn area before entering Yosemite from a couple of years ago, the ranger at the gates of Yosemite telling us to hurry into the valley before they turned off the waterfalls for the night and finally the first glimpse of Half Dome before actually entering the valley. The Yosemite Valley will always take my breath away! The majesty of the rocks, cliffs and the early summer waterfalls are inspiring.

Slowly we made our way through the valley. Vistas of Bridal Veil Falls, El Capitan, flowered meadows, Yosemite Falls, finally the looming hulks of Half Dome and Glacier Point announced our arrival at Camp Curry. In line at the trailer, that is the temporary registration desk these days, we couldn’t help but look up at Glacier Point and feel very small!

Standing in line, you feel a sense of camaraderie, a pioneer spirit with the rest waiting to pay to sleep in a tent, that is more wood than canvas, has beds with sheets and a propane heater to keep you warm... but no matter, it’s still an adventure! We heard English and Australian accents along with more languages than we could recognize. Speaking with our immediate line-mates we discovered a Mother and Daughter, who came from Boston, were there just for the night and were abundantly aware that one night and half a day wasn’t enough! We also met a family who’s 11 year old son had just asked them if there were cars when they were his age. The tears of laughter from the Mother alone were so contagious that our bandanas got their first use of the trip!

Becoming “Bear Aware” is a serious concern in the park. Watching a video once you get into the registration trailer of bears destroying car doors to get some tasty morsel of food, is both hilarious (an episode of America’s Funnies Video’s has nothing on this tape at times!) and frightening! This wasn’t Yogi saying “Hey hey Booboo, how about a pick-i-nick!” Zoe and I knew that there wouldn’t be so much as a gum wrapper in the car before we left it in the parking lot! The subsequent release agreements that needed to be signed and initialed signifying that we were “Bear Aware,” made me wish I had brought along a vacuum and a pine scented cleaner to finish the job of getting rid of any food smell in the car interior! 

“Your tent is nine-eleven.” The man at the check-in told us. Zoe and I looked at each other with concern and then nervously laughed the coincidence off. I really started giggle though when I visualized an emergency phone call that might rival Abbott and Costello’s “Who’s on First” routine.... There was no way I’d be able to explain that one to Zoe... didn’t anticipate “educational” might mean teaching her about classic comedy routines!

With our luggage in the tent and all of our food items and toiletries in the “Bear Box”, we walked to the general store to replace the tooth brushes we’d used to clean out the car. A small sacrifice for our piece of mind! But as soon as we reached the amphitheater, at the heart of Camp Curry, the call “BEAR!!!” echoed around us. Following the arms pointing in the same direction, we saw a small bear wandering among the tents. The confusion of people walking backwards calling out “Bear!” with those moving forward vying to get a better photograph of it, was comical down to the uniformed hotelier whistling at the bear to get lost! I could see Zoe’s face turn serious as the thought of bears invading the camp during the night, wrecking havoc! Putting my arm around her and leading her to the cafeteria, all thoughts of a bear invasion were erased as we tried to understand the food offerings at the steam tables. I truly believe that my eating the fish-n-chips and Zoe having the pasta, made us less appetizing to any beast we might encounter!

With our adventure full day behind us and our bear repellant inside us, we returned to our tent, via the parking lot. Well, we went through the parking lot to add to the list of different state license plates and, okay, check on our car to make sure that it was still intact!

Time for beddy-by...