Captain Billy’s Whiz Bang
Like General Electric, Progress Is Our Most Important Product. Therefore, in addition to the usual wonderful photo accompanying our column, we have provided you with a fine new slide show, the better to see beautiful Yosemite. To see enlarged photos, simply place the cursor over any of the Images of Yosemite and click. An enlarged photo will appear, with left and right arrows above. Depending on the order of the photo in the sequence of five, you will have to click either the left or right arrow to see them all. Now, isn’t that nice? Thank you, Aunt Siobhan for enhancing our lives.
We Like Gainesville, But This Is Ridiculous!
And speaking of Aunt Siobhan, she had a rough day Tuesday so let’s all be sympathetic. We live about 25 miles from Gainesville and we knew that we’d be there and back twice on Tuesday for yoga and basketball. We didn’t reckon with FOUR round trips.
Around one-thirty, however, Siobhan had some irritation in her right eye.
“Do you see anything?” she asked. “My vision is messed up. I feel like I’ve got a praying mantis in my eye.”
“Oooh, that’s novel. But no, I don’t see anything. Both your eyes look the same from here.”
Soon the praying mantis began moving around. We called the ophthalmologist, who, of course, was out of the area that day.
“I think I might have a detached retina,” Siobhan decided. She called her brother, Stuart, an anesthesiologist in Chattanooga, and he told her to get to the ER. Then, she started feeling pressure behind her ear and a slight numbing in her right hand, possible precursors to a stroke, so we increased our driving speed to about 80. After a CAT scan, the emergency room doctors decided she was not having a stroke, that the problem was limited to her eye. I returned home to feed the horses. They were grumpy because it was late. After I explained about Siobhan’s dilemma, however, they (being, after all, reasonable horses) became more sympathetic and asked me to pass on their best wishes. Once more, to Gainesville.
I arrived simultaneous with the eye expert, who seemed in a jaunty mood. Siobhan regarded his merriment with her usual suspicion.
“I wouldn’t be so exuberant,” he assured her, “if I was worried about your condition.” She told him that he was allowed to go on and explain all the details as long as, every ten sentences or so, he would say “You are not losing your vision.” Once, he got to about fifteen sentences and Siobhan arced an eyebrow. “….and no, you are not losing your vision,” he quickly reassured. Turned out to be a tear in the vitreous of the eye, a factor of age. Anybody can get one. The doctor said it could hang around for up to three months or be done within a couple of weeks. Meanwhile, Siobhan will have to contend with a constant array of praying mantises, smudges, black dots, color dimming, etc. It’s not that much different from taking LSD, sounds like. Except that usually goes away quicker. We’re real excited to get the bill for all this.
Sedona Redux
Irana recounts her Sedona experience:
It had been pitch black when I checked into my hotel and I closed the curtains before I went to bed. Next morning, when I opened the door to make a mad dash for my coffee (none in the room), the colors of Sedona were like an explosion. The red rock and the turquoise sky reminded of the scene in the Wizard of Oz when Dorothy’s house lands in Oz and it goes from black and white to color.
See. We told you we weren’t making this stuff up.
Only 46 Days ‘Til Spring
We need to keep reminding our northern friends of this, particularly that person in Yarmouth, Maine, who keeps reading our little column each week. Yes, we know you’re there. We have ways of finding out these things. Anyway, with all-time records for snow falling daily up North, it does the heart good to realize that it will end someday. And, how better to bring that day closer than by returning to our Vacation Planning Guide? This week: Yosemite National Park, via Las Vegas and Death Valley….a review of our trip of 2000. We might change but the national parks seldom do.
How Green Is My Valley? Not So Very.
Every July, the financial gods willing, is vacation time for Siobhan and Bill and this year’s exciting episode finds our heroes deplaning into 110-degree midafternoon heat in Las Vegas, comparatively polar conditions to what they would run into in a couple of days, but hot enough. All of Siobhan’s luggage made it for the first time in her travelling history and the lucky couple embarked on their journey in a spankin’ new Ford Taurus with only one—count ‘em, ONE—mile on the odometer.
First night featured dinner at Wolfgang Puck’s brand-new Postrio restaurant in the recently-opened Venetian Hotel. Bill’s old friend, Stuart Bentler, was the company, arriving unfashionably late with some phoney-baloney story about losing his shirt at his mother’s house. Stuart’s always in some kind of muddle, so none of this was entirely unexpected. Long story short, great restaurant, particularly great desserts (ask Siobhan, who tried everybody’s).
The Venetian, by the way, is so big it has CANALS running through it, with goddam gondoliers boating people to and fro. Alas and alack, there is no singing of O Sole Mio or such.
Next night was the Blue Man Show at the Luxor, which is that big pyramid you always see when you’re watching CSI. The ticket man asked Bill if he wanted tickets in the Poncho Section, but Bill has been to Sea World and he knows better. We’re not exactly sure what the Blue Men are doing, but the show was sort of a riotous mix of percussion, wacky comic bits and 500 tons of crepe paper, if that clears it up. You have to be there. Just stay out of the Poncho Section.
Third day of vacation means on to Death Valley. Where does one start when describing this place? Well, for one thing, it’s beautiful, in its own peculiar way. You can’t just call it hot or even HOT, because that doesn’t begin to explain 123 in the shade.
We entered Death Valley from the East, taking Nevada 373 out of the Amargosa Valley. The road turned into Rte. 127 when we hit California. Then, we turned West on 190. The first significant spot visited was Zabriskie Point, a spectacular panorama of multicolored rock, mostly soft yellows, unlike any place else you’re likely to see. Furnace Creek, five miles further down the road, is a true oasis, with several of Death Valley’s rare trees, a date grove, two or three places you can eat or stay, and, somehow, a golf course. A few miles outside Furnace Creek is Mustard Canyon, with dark yellow canyon walls on both sides of the drive.
On the Badwater road, outside Furnace Creek in the other direction, is a turnoff called Artist’s Drive, a one-way loop through painted canyons (about 9 miles) where the high canyon walls are often only a few feet from both sides of the car.
On the return trip from Yosemite, we stayed at the posh—and we’re not kidding—Furnace Creek Inn, along with a bunch of suspicious, overly-protective-of-their-environs guys who were testing cars in the desert. Turns out there aren’t many places in the country that are below sea level and feature temperatures that reach 134 degrees. Who knew? We had dinner and, after dark, went to the giant pool for a very surreal experience. In the pool, just the two of us, winds gusting up to 70 miles an hour—hot winds—thrashing through the palm trees, a million stars in the sky. It felt like we were a hundred miles from anywhere. Which, of course, we were.
Visit Beautiful Bishop
If you are going to Yosemite, when you emerge from Death Valley you turn North on US 395, travelling through several towns in the internationally-renowned Owens Valley. Places like Lone Pine, Independence, Big Pine and then Bishop. Mount Whitney, the highest peak in California, is near Lone Pine. Driving North, the Sierra Nevada range, with snow still visible at the higher altitudes even in late July, sits to your left and the Inyo range is to the right (and thus not Inyo face). (The word police have just arrested your author.)
Bishop, though a small town, is the largest in the area and plays host to all sorts of outdoorsy pursuits. Trailheads dot the area and hikers challenging the Sierras abound. It being Friday, Bill and Siobhan adhered to their traditional formula and went to the movies (What Lies Beneath, if you care—it’s not like we had lots of choices) in the quaint old Bishop moviehouse. There would be no arena seating.
On To Yosemite
Saturday morning, and the drive to Yosemite begins through escalating forested land, culminating at Tioga Pass (elev. 9945 ft.), the park’s eastern entry. A long and spectacular drive through gigantic rocks and grassy meadows, past picture-postcard lakes and scenic vistas delivers one to a T in the road, one way to Yosemite Valley, the other to Groveland, about an hour and ten minutes West. The Groveland Hotel (quaint isn’t the word) would be home for the next three nights. There aren’t many left like this one. The place was next to death when the current owners bought and renovated the hotel, established a terrific restaurant and began filling the place up (we got the last room). Naturally, some of the rooms have resident ghosts (and why does everybody want to stay in the room with the ghost?). No television in any of the rooms (I thought the ghosts came in through the televisions). The dearth of TVs may account for the five bars in a three-block town. And the owners sit around and schmooze with you in the evening, while offering gratis wine, which they never do at the Motel 6. On a negative note, Siobhan did get a little tired of unloading the 25 teddy-bears off the bed every night.
Saturday afternoon involved general park reconnaissance and a trip around the valley floor, whence back to Groveland for a band concert in the park, dinner and early-to-bed in preparation for early hiking.
The Sunday itinerary was to climb Yosemite’s famous Mist Trail to the top of Vernal Falls, proceed further on to Nevada Falls and return, a warm-up trek of five miles to prepare for the Big One to Half Dome the next day. It was an ideal distance and all went well. You get a little wet on the old Mist Trail, but it’s worth it. I’m not so sure it’s worth it in the Spring, when temperatures are much lower and the water from the melting snows pours over the falls in greater volume, soaking you to the skin, not unlike a natural Poncho Section, but who knows?
The afternoon drive on hairpin-turn roads to Glacier Point was beautiful but unnerving to Siobhan, who always feels she will fall off the edge. Often, we let her drive so that the responsibility for her death will be her own. We got to see a wolf at the side of the road (no hitchhikers, we told him) and proceeded on to the historic Wewona Hotel for dinner.
The Wewona is an old Victorian place, very large, with an enormous dining room which sprawls out onto an expansive porch. Fans everywhere, no AC anywhere in the hotel (historic building, you know—inappropriate). Full of older people, but older people having fun. There is a large grove of giant sequoias nearby worth visiting.
The Trek To Half Dome
Monday was the big day. Now we would see if all of Bill’s hours in the gym and dietary restrictions pay off. The hike to Half Dome and back is 16.5 miles and the climb the last 400 feet up the rock can only be made by pulling oneself up cables attached to iron poles anchored in the rock. There is a large pile of gloves at the base of the rock to assist hikers in gripping the cables without tearing up their hands. I was a little surprised that Half Dome was almost straight up, expecting a little more curvature, which only occurs near the top. Apparently several others had similar notions—they were bailing out and coming back. Siobhan, of course, had no intention of messing with any of this business, so I was on my own.
About one-third of the way up I met, Steffi, a twentyish girl from Germany who was nervously considering turning around. The rest of her group remained at the base, disinclined to kill themselves. Though an athlete, Steffi was scared and losing confidence. I passed her and gave her a pep talk. One step below Steffi was Miyo, a track athlete from San Diego. Her boyfriend remained below and she was also on the verge of defeat. Altruistic as always, I convinced everyone to just take it one rung at a time, pausing a few seconds on each and waiting for one another. This was fine until, about halfway up, I began to wonder if I could finish. The enforced rests the ascending group had to make to allow descending climbers to pass proved a boon, however, and we continued edging upward. Just when the muscles were quivering most, the slope of the hill bent inward and the end was in sight. Triumphantly, the gallant trio made its way to the summit and celebrated with now-hot beverages and snapshots of one another. I might mention here, if I were not so modest, that everyone else on top of Half Dome was under 35. Also, it’s unexpectedly rocky up there (see the slide show from the summit, the Yosemite Valley below). And there’s not much time to enjoy the sights if you want to get back home before dark.
All that was left to do now was get back down. Bill and Steffi chose the traditional method, while Miyo preferred the more conservative ass-sliding option, which is very hard on thin pants.
Finally at the bottom, I was greeted by a relieved Siobhan.
“Damn,” I said, wearily, “that was the hardest thing I ever did in my life.”
“So far,” she replied in her usual cheerful manner. “Now all you have to do is hike eight miles back to the base.”
That’s all, folks….
