Yosemite

[CaddyGrn]

Hi Airstream Community!

We are going to be in Yosemite from Sept 19 - 26. We have reservations at Upper Pines in site #79. So if any of you are in the area.... drop by!

Has anyone been to Yosemite with your trailer this year? We received a notice from the park that everyone needs to keep their food in the bear proof lockers rather than in their trailers.... are the bears getting really fiesty? We have been to Yosemite in the last few years, but we stayed in the Hotel.... been awhile since we camped there. Would be interested in a "report"!

Thanks!

Mrs. NorCal Bambi (traveling in S Tardis)

[jordandvm]

Claudia & Don

We went to Yosemite in January '06......and had a great time! Stayed in Lower Pines CG........Upper pines was closed. Only 6 other campers in the CG. Had dinner in the Lodge one night..........ran outa power after 3 nights.....didn't bring our generator! Took a couple of "ranger talk tours" ....only 6-8 people on the tours....GReat! Would love to go back.....maybe again this winter. Temps were in mid 50's during the day.....and 20's at night....wish we had our generator! Wanted to go on a "moonlight X-country ski trip.....but ran outa juice before we could go!
I'm sure you'll have a great trip!
BTW......be sure to visit the Ansel Adams photo Gallery in the Village!
Also.....we kept our food in the trailer...and everything was fine....no fiesty bears!

Here are a couple of pics (from our "Going to the Sun" trip from Oregon to Yosemite, Death Valley, Sequoia, a Redlands NP's)

See ya at BB!

[Uberlanders]

Bears were hybernating when you were there silly.

Kathleen

[jordandvm]

Originally Posted by Uberlanders

Bears were hybernating when you were there silly.

Kathleen

According to the Yosemite Rangers............some bears remain active during times in the winter and do frequent the valley floor in search of easy food! They still cautioned campers to keep food locked inside trailers. So I guess I'm not so silly after all!

BTW.....congrats on your acting role ......we'll miss you guys at BB tho !

And could you remove my extra post.......I didn't think it made it to the thread the first time.....so I resubmitted it!

[bobkelly]

Sounds like trailers have been added to THE LIST along with ice chests & cars. It's part of the park service bear management plan that allows bears and people to coexist in the same place. Bears have learned to recognize ice chests and cars as containers for food. On occasion, the bear opens the container for a meal. By removing all food from all cars and keeping all ice chests out of sight, the next car openings by the bear yields no food and the association of car & food is weakened. Ditto the travel trailers. Have a great trip.----Bob

[CaddyGrn]

Originally Posted by jordandvm

Claudia & Don

We went to Yosemite in January '06......and had a great time! Stayed in Lower Pines CG........Upper pines was closed. I'm sure you'll have a great trip! Also.....we kept our food in the trailer...and everything was fine....no fiesty bears!

Here are a couple of pics (from our "Going to the Sun" trip from Oregon to Yosemite, Death Valley, Sequoia, a Redlands NP's)

See ya at BB!

Hey, Great pics! Thanks for the update. Last time we were there we stayed at the Awhanee... but I am sure the Bambi will be much better! No free rubber duckys, however. (The bathrooms have little yellow rubber duckys for the guests...) Maybe I need to get a little rubber Airstream for my Bambi?

We are looking forward! Will see you at BB! Should be great fun!

Don & Claudia

[CaddyGrn]

Originally Posted by bobkelly

Sounds like trailers have been added to THE LIST along with ice chests & cars. It's part of the park service bear management plan that allows bears and people to coexist in the same place.

We had a friend once leave a loaf of bread in the backseat of a van he was driving in the Curry Village parking lot.... What was he thinking? He did get some great "after" bear pictures! I don't want the bears to think my Bambi is a BIG ice chest! So, we will probably use the storage lockers for most things.

Thanks! Any other Yosemite comments anyone?

Mrs. NorCal Bambi (traveling in S Tardis)

[68 Overlander]

Was just through there last month. What an amazing place.

[airdrmr]

We have traveled to Yosemite a few times this year, although not in our AS yet. My sister was the wildlife biologist for YNP for 11 years, until she left the park a couple of years ago to pursue her masters at Humbolt. She was back this summer to conduct research for her thesis on bear/human encounters in the park and invited us to stay with her.

I asked my sister about bears and trailers and she said trailer break-ins in the park are rare, but do happen. Yosemite bears are more likely to target cars that either look or smell like they may have food inside. Even a tube of toothpaste can entice them into opening your car like a can of sardines.

Her advice for us was, if you decide to leave food inside your trailer, make sure you close your trailer doors and windows when you're not home. And, if you have any outside storage compartments, don't store anything in them thay may be tempting to a bear. She also added that it's very rare for a bear to break into a trailer when someone is inside. The park takes these situations very seriously and the outcome is usually very sad for the bears

Posting a couple of pictures from last weekend in the park. It was beeeaaautiful! And, the only bears we saw were eating real bear food - apples in the old orchard and wild rasberries in the meadow!

[55inyo]

Kathleen,
You probability know very little about the sierra nevada
mountains. Since you live in Washington. But I do because I live
here and bears are active all year round even in September. You
should be ashamed of yourself calling somebody silly because they
asked a important question, and you are a moderator. Please
be alittle more understanding of people.

[NorCal Bambi]

I Love Yosemite. All together I have spent a little over 7 years collectively in Yosemite. I've seen a lot of changes. My own experience form white gas stoves and Army cots to Airstream. I saw the last Fire Fall. We had a "Metal Ice Chest" that a bear deciced to convert to two pieces of metal rather than one. In Yosemite I learned about the marvels of wild life and it's importants to all of us. I found a private place where I could go to in the mornings and sit just before the sun hit the valley. If I sat patiently for a while a whole herd of deer would come and sit around me and enjoy the morning sun as it popped up over the valley wall. I would sit quietly because this was really their space not mine. Then after their morning warm up time they would begin to move on to their next days activity. Soon I would be sitting there in the morning sun by my self. I would then get up and walk to my camp feeling that I had been given a special time. I also did a lot of rock climbing in the valley. Climbers had a saying you use to hear. " When you climb a rock the population of Yosemite declines at the square root of the distance from tha Valley Floor." A rock climbing story, I had been doing a very difficult climb for myself. I was working at the edge of my experience and ability. After some time I had reached a small ledge that was just above me, I streached as far as possible with one hand and then the other. At that moment I felt the most secure I had felt on the entire climb. I then did a pullup to get to the ledge. As my head and eyes moved to the level where I could just see over the ledge, I was eye to eye with a Blue Belly lizard. He looked at me. Tilted his head to the right a little. He seemed to be saying to me. " What are you doing here." Then to assure me that I was in his element and not mine, He proceeded to rap off about 10 plus Blue Belly lizard type pushups. He then scurried off. Oh, I also remember seeing a place called Mirror Lake. And it was an amazing water mirror reflecting Half Dome on It's surface.
I've only been to Yosemite a few times in the last several years. I've found several of its changes hard to take. Like so many things today, money and its influence has become too important. They are too many in and out tourists from all around the world that are makeing it hard to find the time or the space to be there. I know the "Wheel Turns" things change. But I wonder will it ever turn back around to a time when the National Parks were American National Parks and not World wide National Parks. We the American public pay for the parks. It's Americans who protect, work, and maintain the parks. Shouldn't we be given some kind of priority to the use and have time in OUR parks?
I'd like to end on a positive note. The 21st of this month my wonderful wife is taking me to Yosemite. I will love it. Because it one of my homes. I won't be climbing any rocks or going to the top of Half Dome or standing under the base of upper Yosemite falls. But I will be standing in the Valley of Wonder and smelling the trees, campfires, and the sounds of happy camper. And I will relive the love that has been such an important part of my live and who I am.
Don

[airdrmr]

Originally Posted by NorCal Bambi

...I will be standing in the Valley of Wonder and smelling the trees, campfires, and the sounds of happy camper. And I will relive the love that has been such an important part of my live and who I am.
Don

Don -

Your beautiful description of Yosemite and it's affect on us made me remember a passage by John Muir. It was read at our wedding when we were married in a Yosemite meadow near Superintendent's Bridge on a chilly October afternoon almost 10 years ago. It's called "The Incomparable Yosemite."

"...no temple made with hands can compare with the Yosemite. Every rock in its walls seems to glow with life. Some lean back in majestic repose; others, abolutely sheer or nearly so for thousands of feet, advance beyond their companions in thoughful attitudes, giving welcome to storms and calms alike, seemingly aware, yet heedless, of everything going on about them. Awful in stern, immovable majesty, how softly these rocks are adorned, and how fine and reassuring the company they keep: their feet among beautiful groves and meadows, their brows in the sky, a thousand flowers leaning confidingly against their feet, bathed in floods of water, floods of light, while the snow and waterfalls, the winds and avalanches and clouds shine and sing and wreathe about them as the years go by, and myriads of small winged creatures - birds, bees, butterflies - give glad amination and help to make all the air into music.

Down the middle of the Valley flows the crystal Merced, River of Mercy, peacefully quiet, reflecting lilies and trees and the onlooking rocks; things frail and fleeting and types of endurance meeting here and blending in countless forms, as if into this one mountain mansion Nature had gathered her choicest treasures, to draw her lovers into close and confiding communion with her."

[asta2]

Originally Posted by 55inyo

Kathleen,
You probability know very little about the sierra nevada
mountains. Since you live in Washington. But I do because I live
here and bears are active all year round even in September. You
should be ashamed of yourself calling somebody silly because they
asked a important question, and you are a moderator. Please
be alittle more understanding of people.

55, I think you missed the humor in her reponse, at least it was obvious to me

[Uberlanders]

Thanks asta2 for your comment, I was kidding with Jim. He is a personal friend of mine. We like to jab each other here, especially about sports. I take my moderating duties very seriously, especially the "be nice" rule, and I would never wish to offend any reader here. As for living in Washington and not having any knowledge of bears? 55inyo you are also wrong.

I used to mock those trailer campers; they who were to scared to sleep with bears. I have extensive experience in backcountry hiking/backpacking. I live at the feet of Cascades and have seen black bears on my jaunts through the mountains. I know the dangers and have been confronted with many grizzlies in both Glacier National Park and Alaska. I even had a run in with a griz in November when there was 3 feet of snow on the ground. I take the danger of bears seriously as well. I carry my canister of "bear spray" and in grizzly country I never hike alone to keep the noise level up. I never slept in the clothes I cooked in and I would hang them with my food store in designated areas.

I'm not calling anyone silly when it comes to bears, just jabbing a friend. Hope this clears things up.

Kathleen

[55inyo]

To Jim and Kathleen,
I really sincerity apologize for what I said.
I send a e-mail too the Jordans stating that. I had no idea that
all of you were old friends. I thought you were being mean to her,
but I was very wrong. I am new to this net and dont know
anybody, really.---Boy I wont do that again. Roger/55inyo.

[55inyo]

Kathleen,
I apologize I had no idea that all you guys were
old friends just having fun. I have done the same thing myself with
friends that I know. I had no idea that you-all knew each other. I am
sorry I reacted like that. I thought you were a bad person with no
compassion. Now I realize how wrong I was. I am a Dowist that
believes that the path to life is ones ability to obtain true or pure
divinity. Sorry about what I said roger/55inyo -kf6pld retired veteran.

[maxandgeorgia]

This thread is bookmarked for me because of its beautiful tributes to a park we have yet to see, but dream of enjoying some autumn time. Thanks for all the stories and points to remember about living in bear territory too. 55inyo, how nice of you to publish your apology We all stub our toes on the forum from time to time. After a while, you'll also be more familiar with "friends" and recognize the real from the play. Welcome to our forum, and we hope you'll continue to read, enjoy, and share. ~G

[Uberlanders]

Its all good. It is hard to know in this online village what things mean sometimes, especially when we don't have the benefit of body language and facial expressions. Thanks for your words.

Kathleen

[CaddyGrn]

Originally Posted by maxandgeorgia

This thread is bookmarked for me because of its beautiful tributes to a park we have yet to see, but dream of enjoying some autumn time. Thanks for all the stories and points to remember about living in bear territory too. 55inyo, how nice of you to publish your apology We all stub our toes on the forum from time to time. After a while, you'll also be more familiar with "friends" and recognize the real from the play. Welcome to our forum, and we hope you'll continue to read, enjoy, and share. ~G

Yosemite is extremely beautiful. I hope you have an opportunity to visit sometime soon! I suggest that when you do you try the spring or fall... the summer is pretty hectic and very crowded with people, huge tour busses lined up and kids everywhere! In the fall or spring ("off season") things are much quieter and you get a better chance to actually "see" nature. If it is early spring some things may not be open and the same is true of late fall.

Heading out to Yosemite in about a week! Goodie!

My next favorite park is Yellowstone! Wonderful place as well. Very different, but a real gem.

Mrs. NorCal Bambi (traveling in S Tardis)

[CaddyGrn]

Hey thanks everyone!

I appreciate the tolerance and patience! Besides, some folks might think I am a little weird about the "bear thing".... but I love my little Airstream and don't want bear claws coming through the aluminum!

For me it has always been snakes, bears, and some spiders....

But, back to the Yosemite ideas! Anyone have a favorite spot there? I used to love Happy Isle in the summer, we would take the kids there for ice cream... it disappeared in the flood a couple of years ago.... sure looks different now!

I hope to post some pics when we return!

Mrs. NorCal Bambi (traveling in S Tardis)