June 11 -- Bear Necessities

Note: We did not have Internet/cell access the entire time we were in the Kings Canyon/Sequoia area; thus, we are just now getting around to posting everything we wrote over the course of the week. Also, please excuse the horrendous black spots on many of the photos. There was dust on our camera's sensor, and we hope we have now taken care of the problem before entering Yosemite tomorrow.

We saw two bears today! And, no, they were not in our campsite, trying to attack us while we slept in the van. We saw the mama bear and her cub while hiking the 3.6-mile Tokopah Falls Trail. Jarrett commented that this might possibly be the prettiest trail he has ever hiked, and I think I would have to concur. The trail had a little bit of everything. A good bit of it is hiked along beautiful Kaweah River, and then through firs and pines, opening up to small meadows interspersed throughout. There were creek and tributary crossings, both by bridge and by stones. It was sandy; it was rocky. We saw marmots. We saw bears.




Not too far into the hike, a fellow hiker, who was headed in the opposite direction, told us there were two bears in a meadow about 15 minutes up the trail. I got both excited and nervous -- excited because this was exactly how I wanted to view a bear, and nervous because of my fear that they were going to want to eat us. I was looking and looking as intently as possible, until I eventually spotted the cub to our left in a small meadow. Jarrett, with Elsa on his back, had already passed it without notice, so I had to call to him, trying not to do it so loudly as to scare the bear away. I had my camera at the ready, but unfortunately had not had the foresight to change my lens, so I was stuck with the wide angle and could not get in very closely. The cub did not pay us much attention -- he/she was busy foraging. We kept looking around, trying to spot the mama and make sure we had not positioned ourselves between them, but she was nowhere in sight. I kept my eyes out as we continued up the trail, and finally spotted her, again to our left, further up in the woods. She was too far away to get a picture, but it was cool to see her all the same. I would not say my fear of them has diminished, but my awe of them has probably grown.




The end of the trail culminated in a wondrous view of the falls and its surrounding powerful granite cliffs, including the Watchtower, the large pointed granite monolith on the south wall of the valley. Tokopah Valley was formed by a glacier in much the same way as Yosemite Valley and the Cedar Grove area of Kings Canyon were. The Watchtower was apparently too solid to be ground down by the ice sheet.













Speaking of ice, it is downright cold here. The low was 34 degrees last night, and I ended up moving down and sleeping with Elsa when she awoke in the middle of the night. Even though I wore several layers to bed, my lower extremities were cold. Jarrett threw two big blankets over me and Elsa, and eventually I warmed back up and we were all able to sleep the rest of the night. We were in no hurry to emerge from our bags this morning either. In fact, I think we waited too long, as Elsa was in another state as I was trying to cook our pancake and turkey sausage breakfast. Once she got her pancake, though, things were much better, and she did really well most of the day.

Tonight, even after the short sleet downpour we had this afternoon, it is supposed to be two degrees warmer. I don't know that we will be able to feel that difference, but I certainly would not complain if we did. We have two back-to-back hikes planned for tomorrow, and then we are planning to pack up and move on down to Fresno a day early and actually spend a night there in a hotel before heading into Yosemite on Sunday. This idea was discussed earlier in our planning stages, but we had decided to do without the extra night's expense. But now with the cold, we have changed our minds. It will also make a slightly more leisurely grocery shopping experience on Sunday as well. I am having a great time, but I have to admit that I am really looking forward to tomorrow night. Today was supposed to be shower and laundry day. I did the laundry, but we decided to hold off one more day on the shower and save the $6.00 and have a more enjoyable cleansing experience in the hotel. It will be nice to actually bathe Elsa too. None of us have bathed (besides minor washings of the face and hands) since we were in Cedar Grove on Tuesday. Jarrett was not kidding about the hippy factor.

And then, after that -- on to Yosemite! I cannot wait to see it in person.