The Will's California trek 2001,

(or "Do you know the way to San Jose?")

This was Ruth and Matthew's first commercial plane ride.  They were so excited.  Mom and Dad were more worried with all the security check in procedures and all the gear needed for two weeks of camping.  We must have had over 200 pounds of gear.  Two huge duffel bags, a trunk, suitcases for each one of us, and of course our own carry on bag.  We also had to switch airports because Washington National airport was closed since the terrorist attacks of Sep 11.

Ruth had her studies to do while we were on "vacation"  (Good girl!)

Some awesome views from the airplane.  Matt and I loved to study the terrain.  Our flight was from Baltimore to Las Vegas, NV.

We finally arrived late to our campsite.  We drove all over Las Vegas trying to find a camping store that sold butane for our Primus stove and lantern.  Then we drove for several hours to get near Los Angles so we could get to the ferry next day.

This was the ferry to Santa Catalina island.  See how much gear we had!  Another big surprise when we boarded.  No butane or camping gas allowed!!  And after all the trouble we went to in Vegas   We were assured that we could buy butane and gas on the island.  It was ironic that the one and only little store in Two Harbors had more fuel options than we were able to find in all of Los Vegas.

Matthew really liked the ferry.  He found a spot where he could really experience the wind.  We were surprised to see a seal right in Los Angels harbor.

There were some beautiful woment on the cruise.  This one is Tina.  Later on the ferry ride Ruth and I saw dolphins jumping out of the water.  When the ferry landed the camp crew picked up our luggage and took it to our campsite.

This is our camp site on Catalina Island.  Beautiful view of the harbor.

We rented kayaks and paddled along the coastline.  The water was a beautiful blue and crystal clear.  This is a picture of a heron just to the left of Matthew's shoulder.

This is the heron again letting us know that we were getting too close.

Ruth and Tina were strong paddlers.  Matt and I had a hard time keeping up with them.

We beached our kayaks to go swimming.

Later that day we rented snorkeling equipment and went snorkeling after lunch.  Saw some amazing things.  Kelp forests, big orange fish (Geribaldi), long spined urchins, snails, and schools of fish that were dazzling.  We took pictures with an underwater disposable camera.  Hope the pictures turn out because we still have not received them. "Lookit lookit! That's me!"-- Jesse the yodelin cowgirl (says Ruth)

That night we feasted on roasted marshmallows after dinner.  It was a beautiful moon, just visible in the picture.

Ruthie doing the dishes.  We cooked over two camping stoves.  This night we had linguine with clam sauce, fresh green beans, garlic bread and salad.

This palm tree near our camp site reminded us all of a pineapple.  Don't eat it Matthew!

After Catalina island, we drove up the coast.  I'm sure it was beautiful behind all that fog.  To the left is a photo of a little bit of the coast that we saw for a moment when the fog lifted.

At point Lobo, near Monterey, we had a picnic lunch and investigated some of the tidal pools.  We found some really cool critters.  Many that we have never seen in the Atlantic.

Here are some pretty purple sea urchins, and some anemone.

Here is a close up of one of those pretty sea urchins, top and bottom.

And Chitons.  We don't have chitons on the east coast.

Our camp that night was at Henry Crowell Redwoods State Park, near San Francisco.  The camp site was not in the redwoods, like I had envisioned, but was surrounded by live oaks and California Bay, and Madrone.  Before we turned in for the night Tina noticed some raccoons in a tree and we expected to be raided by raccoons so we carefully put everything away.  That night there was a terrific racket.  First, what sounded like a raccoon fight.  That was followed by the rattling of trash cans that lasted all night.

In the morning we discovered who was making all that noise in the trash cans, and why it was all night long!   A raccoon had fallen into a 55 gal drum used as a plastic and glass recycling bin.  We let him out after Matthew and Ruth were done cooing over him, and watched him scamper up a tree.

Ruth Matt and I hiked the two mile trail to the Redwoods visitor center.  Tina's recovering ankle prevented her from hiking with us.  We found some incredibly grand trees, and some even bigger stumps!  This portion of the park had been logged.  Around every big stump there were several large trees.  They obviously grew up as shoots, but were now big trees on their own.

We met Tina at the nature center and walked around the loop of virgin, giant redwood trees.  They were truly grand, yet somehow not as impressive as they should have been.  Tina said it was like seeing them in a zoo.

We spent a day in San Francisco.  One of the things we wanted to see was the golden gate bridge, the #2 engineering construction achievement of the century.  But several unique events made it impossible.  First, the pedestrian crossing was banned after the Sep 11th terrorist attack, so we couldn't walk on it.  Then, about an hour before we were going to see it, a large, 600 ton, construction panel fell on a car, crushing it and killing the driver.  This stopped all but one lane of traffic which made it impossible to drive near it, so we couldn't drive across it.  And the police barricaded off all points under the bridge so we couldn't near it on foot!!

We rode the cable cars.  Some of the streets were really steep as you can see from the picture.  We also visited China town.  I found it interesting that stores were selling cheap trinkets out front (bamboo back scratchers and plastic dragons) and selling fine art in the back of the store (antique Buddha for $4000.00)

Next stop on the tour was Sequoia National Park.  We toured Grant grove first.  That first tree is the General Grant.  Those little white dots at the base are Ruth and I.

Ruth and Tina in a hollow sequoia log.  It was so big it could have been used for a house.  Matter of fact it was used as a house.  It was also used as the stables for the 31st calvary (the first protectors of the park)

We had to get gas while in Sequoia park.  The closest gas was in Kings Canyon National Park about 15 miles or 45 minutes away (it was a slow twisty road).  I was amazed to see antique pumps in operation.  "How much der yer wahnt?"  "about 10 gallons please."  He pumped the gas into the glass container on top until it got to the "10" line, then let it gravity feed through the hose into the tank.  It was worth the price of $2.50 per gallon!  (for comparison gas was $1.15 in Fredericksburg at that time)

The biggest tree in the world, the General Sherman.  Why General Sherman?  These trees were discovered just after the civil war, by a northerner I guess!  If we were permitted to stand right at the base of the tree you would have a much better sense of the scale, but the fence kept us about 15 feet away from the tree.  It was truly huge!

While we were admiring General Sherman, a black bear came along.  Bears are everywhere in the park and the campground had very strict instructions on putting all food in the steel bear boxes at each campsite.  Food in the cars, in a visible spot, was highly discouraged.  In the summer, the park averaged two cars per day broken into by bears to get food.

These big trees were everywhere.  Here the park cut a tunnel through one of the fallen giant sequoia logs.

We climbed Moro rock, a spectacular outcropping of rock.  I was most impressed with the craftsmanship of the stairs going up the shear rock face.  They cunningly used cracks, ledges and chimneys in the rock to wind the stairs all the way to the top.

The view from the top of Moro rock.

More giant fallen logs.  This log had a driveway on top so one could drive on it.  But Tina didn't feel like it.

From the General Sherman grove, we drove to the most remote part of the Squoia National Park accessible by car, Mineral King.  We had to drive all the way down into the valley (1000 ft elev.) and all the way back up to 7000 feet.  The road was incredibly steep, incredibly windey, incredibly narrow, with out curbs or railing on the edges that dropped straight down hundreds of feet.   It was only 25 miles, but it took us more than an hour because we averaged 15-20 mph.  It was amazing how the vegetation changed.  At the bottom it was nothing but sage brush, dry grass, and an occasional live oak tree.  At about 5000 ft elevation we entered the sequoia forest.  Tina remarked that driving through the giant trees was like "something out of another world".

Our campsite at Mineral King (Cold Springs Campground).  The picture was from the edge of a talus slope that went right up the mountain.

We took a hike up into the high sierras.  Tina started out with us, but because her ankle was not fully recovered from being broken two months ago, she had to turn back after a couple of miles.

We saw a lot of animals.  Deer, coyote, squirrel, chipmunks, black bear,

There were huge trees even high on the mountain.  Matt kept us all in touch with the walkie talkies.

Break time.  We just crested a ridge at about 9500 feet.

Several places we found these balanced rock sculptures.  Seems to be a "thing" in California.  We saw them on Catalina Island and several places in Sequoia NP.

There were pretty little flowers along the trail once we got above tree line.  Yellow, purple, and red.

Crystal lake.  10,800 feet elevation.  Whew that's high!  We could feel the lack of oxygen.  Matt hiked all 5 miles of the way with a bad case of ingrown toenails.  The water was beautifully clear, with rainbow trout clearly visible.  There was still some snow on the sides of the bowel nestling the lake.

Lee climbed up to the ridge of the bowel, an honest 11,000 feet.  This is a picture of Crystal lake and another smaller unnamed (at least on my map) lake next to it.

From Sequoia NP we drove to Death Valley NP.  Seems like we drove for hours along narrow asphalt and dirt roads with out seeing anyone.

These are charcoal kilns along side the road to our campsite in the panamint mountains.  It is amazing to see them here, it doesn't seem like there is enough wood around to make any charcoal.  These date from 1877.  The charcoal was used by a mine on the other side of the panamint valley to smelt gold.

Our campsite in the Panamint mountains, Death Valley NP.  (Mahogany flat camp ground) Elevation was 8,100 feet  Located at the end of a 25 mile long jeep trail.

We had a beautiful view of Death Valley, and the campground all to ourselves.  Boy did we feel like we were away from it all.  That night Matthew and I went searching for scorpions using a UV lamp.  Didn't find any scorpions but we did find some fluorescent rocks.

Beautiful sunrise the next morning.  Since Matt and I slept out under the stars we had no problem getting up because of the light.

On the road from our campground.  Not much around, no?

Plenty of dust.

We took a side trip in Death Valley NP to see a "ghost town" of Skidoo.  Wasn't anything  of a town left.  The only thing we could find were a bunch of tin cans and broken bottles.

The side trip to Skidoo wasn't a total disappointment because we found a tarantula!  That is a quarter in the picture for size comparison.  It didn't like to be touched.  Matthew wanted to keep him as a pet.  Tina wanted to keep him wild.

The bottom of Death Valley is covered with salt.  The salt expands and contracts and forms big blister pots a foot high in an area called "devils golf course".  Here Matthew is holding up a sample that he collected.

The lowest spot (accessible by car) in north america. There was water here with little brine shrimp, worms, and water bugs.  Amazing.

After driving for hours through Death Valley, and then for more hours through the desert south west (every bit as desolate as Death Valley) we finally got to Los Vegas.  We toured Hoover Dam, ranked #8 on the bworld's greatest engineering construction achievements.

All inside tours of the dam were canceled on account of the threat of terrorist attack.  We had to settle for outside views and the visitor's center.  Very impressive accomplishment made the more so by it's location (at the time of construction in the 1930's) in the middle of nowhere.  From here we hurried back to the airport to catch an afternoon flight back to Baltimore.  Other than the long lines at the airport (out the door of the airport), and extensive questioning about what all we had in our two large duffel bags and big black trunk, check in was uneventful.  We are glad to be back home!