Forest giants

So there is something about the Pacific coast of north America that makes it uniquely suited to conifers it seems. Anywhere you go on the western slopes of the Sierra Nevadas, there are conifers... and lots of conifers... and gigantic conifers.

Nowhere is this more apparent than at Sequoia National Park where one can walk between Giant Redwoods, the largest trees on earth. The redwood, however, is but one species that grows in a forest of giants and there are some gargantuan Sugar Pines, Red Firs and Ponderosa Pines to name some.

It's a wonderland in which to walk around and the constant smell of Firs, Pines, Spruces and specifically Incence Cedars is delightful. Eventually though, your visit will culminate in a view of the General Sherman tree, a singular behemoth in the middle of the Giant Forest. This tree towers 84m above the forest floor but, more impressively, boasts a trunk diameter of 7.7m. Such a height multiplied by such a cross section makes it the largest known tree, and indeed, the largest known living organism on the planet.

I've tried photographing it from the base, I've tried photographing it from some distance away along the slope. I've tried panoramic composites but no picture really captures the colossal size of this tree.

Enjoying some fusion cuisine in San Francisco with Becky

Once we had our fill and washed the grime of Las Vegas out of our hair with some wholesome foresty goodness, we headed back to San Francisco to close the loop. We arrived here yesterday afternoon and managed to meet up with Becky, a good friend of ours who used to live in San Francisco and happens to be here now for a friend's wedding. Excellent timing! She took us around the streets of her old neighbourhood and we had some great food which we would never have known to order if we were alone. What a splendid way to close the loop and bring the trip to a close.

Right now we're busy packing our bags and getting everything airline-proof so I really shouldn't be sitting here writing up blog entries.

Signing off for now.

What happens in Vegas...

OK, short blog entry because, well, Las Vegas sucks! I bet you don't often read blog posts or reviews starting with that phrase but it's true, it sucks.

I've been to Las Vegas before and it sucked then and somehow we decided that it seemed like a logical stopover en route from Arizona back to San Francisco but, you guessed it, it still sucks.

Sure, the glitz and glamour do dazzle you for a while but it doesn't take very long before the true character of Vegas shines glaringly though; The city caters for three types of people:
1. Those with an interest in gambling
2. Those with an interest in drinking themselves into a stupor
3. Those with an interest in strip shows / prostitutes

Of course, many of the revellers of the city have an interest in a combination of the above but, truthfully, we don't have an interest in any of it and are glad that we can move on today. Let's hope the next blog entry, on Sequoia National Park, is more enjoyable.

Leaving Arizona

Getting our kicks on Route 66

Route 66 was once a famous US highway, running all the way from Chicago to Los Angeles but has since been rendered redundant by much more convenient interstate highways. It lives on only in the sentimental memories of song writers and in small sections of it that still remains such as at Williams, AZ. Sadly, along with the demise of Route 66 also came the demise of many towns that were located on it and relied on the through traffic for survival. Some of these towns fell off the map entirely while others, such as Williams, still ekes out a living by selling fridge magnets and coffee mugs.

It is also conveniently located for exploring the Grand Canyon and that is where we based ourselves. But once the Grand Canyon was explored  and photographed, we got back in the car and made our way to Las Vegas. I'll leave Las Vegas for a next blog entry because it's getting late and we need to get out of this hotel room and paint the town.

En route here, we did make a slight detour though to first pass through Sedona. I remember Sedona from earlier visits to Arizona as a quaint little town, nestled between gorgeous Mesas and Buttes in the red rocks of the Verde Valley. When we got there this time I quickly realised that it's nothing as small as I remember it but it still is as quaint as I remember it and the stunning landscape has not gone anywhere.

As stunning as the setting of this town is, as weird its people are; They all seem to be crystal obsessed, earth worshipping, dreamy hippies. But I'll tell you this, these hippies can make a mean sandwich and after we bought a lovely vegetarian sandwich with every dressing known to the Vegan world, we were off west and eventually crossed the Hoover dam to find ourselves in Nevada and reach Las Vegas in time to hit up the night scene.

360° Panorama of the Sedona landscape

Grand Canyon

Nothing prepares you for the Grand Canyon, not even having seen the canyon twice before. This epic gash in the face of the northern Arizona landscape takes your breath away every time you round a corner and see a new panorama.

And it is truly truly massive. You will drive a car between various parking lots along the rim of the canyon, you will take shuttle buses to take you between sections of the canyon and you will walk yourself silly but still you will not see a fraction of this enormous feature, 29 km across, 1.8 km deep and 450 km long.

There's been a lot of talk in recent years about "New Seven Wonders of the World" and the Capetonians feel very pleased with themselves that their mountain won a spot in this silly popularity contest but let me tell you, the Grand Canyon is a true Wonder of the World.

A major downside of having such a roaring time at such a magnificent place, is that you get to bed very late and your blog entries are short.

So I'll leave you with a panoramic picture, taken from Powell Point on the south rim.

Late afternoon view over a section of the Grand Canyon with Battleship Rock visible in foreground

The road to Arizona

The main attraction on today's programme was Zion National Park, our final attempt to get a feel for southern Utah before we head into Arizona.

The Three Patriarchs at Zion National PArk

A recurring theme on this road trip, and an unavoidable frustration if you're trying to cover this much distance, is that we never really get to spend as much time in one location as we would have liked to. Nowhere would this be more true than at Zion National Park where we basically had half a day to do what other people do in a long weekend. The main reason one would go to Zion National Park is to hike the numerous trails that criss-cross the canyon and we only got to hike one of these.

But let it be noted for the record that Zion is truly a sight to behold. Where, at places like Bryce or Grand Canyon, you stand on the rim of the canyon looking down, at Zion you stand at the bottom of the canyon looking up. Seeing as we still had a fair amount of distance to cover we had to cut our oohing and aahing short and head further south.

Shortly after crossing over the Arizona state line, once again adjusting our watches, we found the landscape changing to a more western movie kind of landscape. Just outside of the northern city of Page, AZ, we found the trailhead for a short walk that takes you to Horseshoe Bend. I've always seen postcards of this dramatic feature in the Colorado river but never had the opportunity to see it for myself. So naturally we made a stop, did the hike and enjoyed the magnificent sight of the beginnings of the Grand Canyon, our target location for tomorrow.

Horseshoe Bend in the Colorado River

Bryce Canyon National Park

So Salt Lake City was a conveniently placed stopover for our southward journey through Utah. If we had more time we would probably have liked to see some of the sights and the nearby great salt lake. If we happened to be there on a Thursday we would certainly have liked to attend a rehearsal of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

The city is quite a sight where it sits nestled between the Wasatch and Oquirrh mountains but as far as we're concerned the greatest feature of Salt Lake City was the great Peruvian restaurant that we found not too far from our motel.

Hoodoos in Bryce Canyon National Park

Our schedule didn't allow for any more though and early this morning we hit the road for southern Utah.

Southern Utah is known for it's variety of parks with a variety of weird landscapes. Bryce Canyon must surely rank fairly high on that weirdness scale. It is not so much a canyon as the name would suggest but more a natural amphitheatre formed through a process called "headward erosion". The erosion revealed thousands of geological structures called hoodoos which are probably the key feature of Bryce Canyon.

But let's not get into the technicalities of geological shaping of the Paunsagunt Plateau. Suffice it to say that the vistas you are confronted with when standing at the rim are pretty awesome.

The route to Bryce Canyon took us through the rather oddball town of Panguitch where the people seem to have a bizarre obsession with quilts. Quilts are draped from antique farm implements on every street corner. The decrepitude of the farm implements is overshadowed only by the horrific quilts. And I dread to think what it would be like in two weeks time when they have their annual quilt festival which the whole town seems to be getting ready for.

So tonight we're sleeping over in Cedar City, Utah, and tomorrow morning we're headed to Zion National Park and Arizona, possibly my favourite state of the ones I've had the privilege to see.

Panoramic view of Bryce Canyon

Wyoming

So today was spent mostly just gunning it through eastern Wyoming and northern Utah to get from Yellowstone National Park to Salt Lake City. The journey would take us through the Grand Teton National Park and my only real aim for this stretch was to ogle out the Tetons and maybe get a decent picture of it.

In fact, I had mentioned before that the picture by Ansel Adams that has for so long inspired me might have been a factor in the deciding of a route for the road trip. So through the Grand Teton National Park it was but what a disappointment. No, it's not that the Tetons and the Snake river aren't as magnificent as the books claim and no, it's not that Ansel Adams fudged his photo to make it look like something it wasn't.

I don't know, maybe it's the fact that the skies were pregnant with snow clouds, to the extent that virtually none of the mountains were visible. Maybe it's the fact that the trees has grown quite significantly since Messr Adams took his picture in 1942. Maybe it's the fact that I am not half the photographer that he was. Or maybe it's a generous serving of all the above. Here follows his picture with mine directly beneath it. I'll let you decide which is the better one :-)

The Tetons and the Snake River (1942) Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming
Ansel Adams

The Tetons and the Snake River (2012) Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming
Déwald Swanepoel

Oh well, we enjoyed what could be seen of the lovely scenery. At least the mountains aren't the only scenic elements of the area and we had seen the Tetons earlier, but from the other side as we drove through Idaho. We passed through the delightful town of Jackson, Wyoming. A pity we couldn't sleep over a night as it really is a charming little spot.

Smoot, WY

The rest of the day was spent driving through eastern Wyoming, encountering all sorts of tiny little towns like Smoot, Wyoming, with its population of 100 and total area of 1.7 square miles. Don't bother looking for it on Google Earth, it's probably hidden under a tree.

Wyoming, very much a mountain state, is a quite a pleasant state to drive through and, while the scenery changed rather abrubtly as we left Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks, it remained very scenic throughout.

We're now in Salt Lake City, UT. We hadn't planned on spending any real time here and will head off towards Bryce Canyon National Park and Cedar City tomorrow.

Yellowstone National Park

Lower Yellowstone Falls

Arguably the biggest draw card and most iconic sight of Yellowstone National Park would be the Old Faithful geyser but this is only one of the countless geysers that the park has on display. Geysers in turn is but one of many types of geothermal features that the park has on display. Of course, the park's attractions doesn't stop with geothermal features either; The wonderful scenery and beautiful wildlife would have been enough already to inspire awe and justify a visit.

Yellowstone certainly packs a complete wallop on the senses and it's all jammed into a relatively small area. We used three days for exploring the park and, while one could undoubtedly spend a month and not see everything, I do think that we did a pretty good job of it. We stayed at the very charming Old Faithful Inn, a log hotel built in 1903, from where we explored the park.

Old Faithful, blowing its load

As I'm sure you've guessed, the Old Faithful Inn is located right next to the Old Faithful geyser, perhaps the most predictable geyser with an eruption sequence of 91 minutes. This means that every hour and a half you're treated to a 50m tall eruption of steaming hot water, right on the hotel's doorstep.

Truth be told though, we didn't witness as many of these eruptions as the previous paragraph suggests as we spent a good amount of time exploring the rest of the park. There are numerous hot springs, prismatic pools, fumaroles, mud volcanoes and what-nots to marvel at. Apart from these, there are also plenty of waterfalls, meandering rivers, mountains, valleys, forests and meadows.

Bull Elk, growing a new set of antlers

But what would a National Park be without wildlife? And Yellowstone has it. We did some homework before we came and established that the "big six" could be considered to be the Grey Wolf, Elk, Moose, Bison, Black Bear and Grizzly Bear. We thought it'd be cool to see some of these... we saw all of them, and some. Bison were everywhere and Elk were nearly everywhere. We saw two Meese (that's my plural for Moose), no less than 6 sightings of Grizzly Bear, some with cubs, and a single Black Bear (which is supposed to be the more common species of bear in the park).

Black Bear

The thrill of thrill however was getting some good, albeit distant, views of two Grey Wolves. We used the first two days to find out where the best spots would be to look for Wolves and on the third day we left the lodge at 04:00 so that we could be on site at 06:00. We happened to be exactly at the right time at the right place when another car also stopped, pulling out their spotting scopes and two way radios. It turns out there is a network of dedicated wolf watchers that trawl the park and circulate the information on sightings. No sooner had we spotted the two wolves when a cavalcade of cars, upwards of 30 in number, rocked up at the spot and we all stood watching the wolves as they made their way across the hillside - a right and proper twitch and a moment etched in memory.
 

This morning early saw us get up to make the long journey south towards Salt Lake City - only to discover that an inch of snow had covered the area and turned it into a winter wonderland. Real pretty but real daunting considering that we had to drive through all of that, and over Craig Pass at 2500m above sea level. But with painstaking caution, we made it over the pass and out of the park, ready for the next chapter of the adventure.

Old Faitful Inn under an inch of snow

Whoah, Idaho!

Leaving Twin Falls, ID, we saw what a pretty little city it actually is. The northern limit of the city is defined by the Snake River Canyon. Now the Snake River is perhaps better known from that most breathtaking picture that Ansel Adams took againt the backdrop of the Grand Tetons in Wyoming but it has carved a pretty scenic canyon for itself through the southern Idaho countryside and you are treated to a lovely view of it as you leave Twin Falls.

Snake River Canyon, on the northern limits of Twin Falls, ID

We will revisit this river in a few days as we exit Yellowstone National Park and drive through Grand Teton National Park, and I will certainly make a stop at Ansel Adams' spot in the hopes of getting a picture even just half as good as his. If you still don't know which picture I'm talking about, get with the program please and educate yourself here:
---> Clickety <---

View over Yellowstone National Park from our motel room.

For now though, it is north we head and the day was spent driving through Idaho towards the very charming town of West Yellowstone, Montana. The town sits right on the western boundary of Yellowstone National Park and the view over the park we have from our motel room is in fact a very juicy appetizer of where, tomorrow, we will boldly go where the Lewis and Clark expedition has boldly gone before.

Legging it through Nevada

Our next major stop would be Yellowstone National Park. Unfortunately getting there would require a couple of days of driving and today saw the first stretch of that. From Topaz Lake we had most of the length of Nevada to cover in order to get to Twin Falls, Idaho. This stretch of driving started off as being quite interesting with the scenery resembling something you might find in the Klein Karoo but after enough time became skull-numbingly monotonous.

Not long after we crossed the state line with Idaho, the scenery changed to a flatter but more agriculturally vegetated variety and a pleasant surprise was when we thought we had an hour more of driving ahead of us, only to realise that we had crossed into the Mountain Time Zone and had in fact, completed the day's driving.

Really, there is only one thing I find more idiotic than time zones, and that is Daylight Saving Time. On this road trip, we'll be passing through 6 states: California, Nevada, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Arizona, back through Nevada and finally back to California.

California is 10 hours ahead of South Africa, and by "ahead", of course I mean "behind". But then again, it's not really 10 hours but rather 9 hours because Daylight Saving Time is in effect. Nevada uses, for the most part, the same clock as California. Notice that I say "for the most part" because this is not true for the city of West Wendover, which is an hour behind the rest of the state, and by "behind", of course I mean "ahead".

Idaho is an hour behind Nevada and California, and by now you know what I mean by "behind", but only if you're south of Salmon River. Montana is in the same time zone as that part of Idaho that matters, as are Wyoming and Utah.

Arizona is also in this same time zone, only it isn't. Seeing as Arizona does not employ Daylight Saving Time, it now falls in the same time zone as California and Nevada (well most of it anyway). Of course, the Navajo region of Arizona does employ Daylight Saving Time and therefore does fall in the same time zone as Utah, Wyoming, Montana and the part of Idaho that matters.

If by now you're not thoroughly confused, you're just not paying attention.

Tomorrow we'll be making the trip from Twin Falls, Idaho to West Yellowstone, Montana. The stretch is somewhat shorter than today's and will not be crossing any time zone boundaries which means that tomorrow's blog posting promises to be less vitriolic.

Yosemite National Park

Today provided one of the treats that will surely be remembered as a highlight of the trip - Yosemite National Park. The main attraction of this park is surely the Yosemite Valley, straddled between monumental cliff faces, the likes of El Capitan and Half Dome with numerous waterfalls hurtling over the 1000m precipice. We're talking Drakensberg escarpment scale cliff faces here and it really is a sight to behold.

Yosemite Valley bordered by El Capitan on the left, Bridal Veil Falls on the right and the iconic Half Dome in the distance.

Peaks of the Sierra Nevada as seen from the
eastern section of Yosemite National Park.

Like I said, the valley must surely be the main attraction of the park and, indeed, while it was still relatively quiet when we arrived in the morning, the throng of crowds became almost unbearable towards the afternoon and our departure was probably well timed. The upper section of the park, along the Tioga Pass road was much less crowded and again we could enjoy the sights in relative solitude. The vistas are no less breathtaking though and with the winter snow only just melting now, the scenic beauty takes one's breath away - OK, the cold probably contributed to a small extent as well.

The added benefit was that, exiting the park on the Tioga Pass side put us within 2 hours drive of our next overnight spot, Topaz Lake, a bona fide, good old fashioned, quintessential One Horse Town™.

Leaving San Francisco

Not having nearly done San Francisco justice, we rented a car and set off... on the wrong side of the road.

Our destination was a small mining town, Mariposa, a little under an hour's drive west of Yosemite National Park. The town is quaint, not entirely unlike Pilgrim's Rest but not quite as tacky and doesn't really offer an awful lot in terms of entertainment. Of course at this point we were not looking for entertainment as much as we were looking for a place to have a decent meal, which we found in Castillo's Mexican Restaurant, and a place to sleep off the day's driving, which we found in the Yosemite Miner's Inn.

Street scene in Mariposa, CA

So here we are...

Having arrived in San Francisco we are pretty knackered. Not only is it truly a long haul but the time zone difference of 9 hours meant that our body clocks were properly out of tune. That's how you know that you're about to have a great holiday!

The hotel at which the conference was to be held turned out to be near, let me see, other hotels. Yes, that's about it. If you were interested in seeing other hotels, you were in the right place. If you were interested in seeing San Francisco however, you'd need to make a 45 minute commute by train. So that's what we opted for.

Powell - Hyde cable car with Alcatraz in the background

The train took us into down town San Francisco where we got on a cable car to get to Fisherman's Wharf. San Francisco must have the coolest public transport system this side of the 50's. Cable cars, the kind that run on rails down the middle of the street, deriving propulsion from a cable under the street will carry you over the steep hills of the city. A very cool Art Deco era tram will carry you around the piers on the north-eastern side of the peninsula and the municipal bus network that criss cross the city are all low emission or electric buses.

Victorian houses, these ones known as the "Painted Ladies"
set against a backdrop of down town San Francisco

So we spent the day exploring the city by public transport and by the various routes of the hop-on hop-off bus service which gave us a pretty decent overview of the 49 square miles that is San Francisco; From Fisherman's Wharf to Japantown, from the financial district to the Presidio, from the Tenderloin to Sausalito.

Over the next few days, Déwald would be attending the AnDevCon III conference while Heidi would be exploring the city in more depth, scouting out the hotspots so that Déwald can join her again in the evening.

This blog post would turn into a short story if San Francisco were to be described in all its glory but suffice it to say that we had a blast and would have loved to be able to spend more than just a week on this magnificent peninsula.

We never really got any good pictures of the Golden Gate Bridge
but hey, this is a post about San Francisco...