Our Last Adventures in California

As basically none of you know, we're moving! Our family will be relocating to Salt Lake City at the beginning of June. It's not that I meant to keep it a secret or anything, I just hate talking about it. In my many moves, I have gotten some weird responses and comments from people and I just don't want to deal with that. While we are excited about this change, we're not unaware of how fortunate we've been to live in Torrance for the past year. As such, we've tried to squeeze as much as possible into our last couple of months here.

We spent time with cousins on Easter. We dyed eggs and had a very fun egg hunt, I think all the eggs were found...only time will tell! We have also revisited some of our favorite haunts: the beach, the aquarium, theme parks...

Definitely more grimace than smile.

Sorry you aren't tall enough to ride anything.

We got kites for Easter, but it took us a couple weeks to try them out. Very cheap "pocket kites" that fold up and fit in their own bags. I knew of one place that was always windy and a fun place to hang out...beaches are a great place for flying kites.

The kites basically fly themselves.

Laszlo climbed up all by himself!

Most recently we got to go with our family to an open house day at JPL in Pasadena. For those not into tech and aerospace, that would be NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. There were displays, movies, you could walk through and look into actual labs where work is done; it's like going to space camp if space camp were as crowded as Disneyland and all the camp counselors were actual rocket scientists. The kids liked seeing the different vehicles--or getting run over by them. A few of those science people took the time to explain and answer our kids' questions, which was pretty cool of them considering how much was going on. It would be easy to overlook a few pre-schoolers who were staring uncomprehending at a rover that is exactly like one wandering Mars right now.

This miniature prototype is testing itself on interesting new terrain.

I will say, this activity was not a winner with my children. Even though they got a really big cool sticker of Europa, they were all too happy to leave. My nephew Kaden on the other hand had so many questions, maybe he's the future aerospace engineer in the family.

We still have a couple weeks before our move, so we'll continue to try to fit all the places (and food) we love from around south bay before we leave. If I don't eat Korean BBQ tacos again before we move, I will have all the regrets.

Awesome Yosemite

Immediately after our cousins came for their spring break it was Paul's first official spring break. Guess where we went?

Welcome to Yosemite valley: El Capitan on your left,
Bridalveil Falls on your right, Half Dome off in the distance.

Things I love about visiting National Parks with my family:

1. Watching my kids grow to enjoy them, even if they aren't as enthusiastic about it as I am.
2. Hearing a dozen different languages spoken every day. It tells me that people from all over the world recognize these places as treasures.
3. There are so many things to see and do and all for a very minimal admission fee, especially if you can camp!

If I could do this trip again, this is what I'd do differently:

1. Bikes. I would bring bikes. There are terrific bike paths all around Yosemite Valley and it is pretty darn flat. It never occurred to me before going, but take it from me: you want to see Yosemite Valley by bike.
2. Winter storms downed trees in Half Dome Village, the tent-cabin we booked damaged and our reservation got cancelled shortly before our trip. I had to re-book at various hotels to make up the difference. It was a wonderful trip, but I'd like to give Half Dome Village another try someday.

Photo by Paul. He said silly faces, but Laszlo missed the memo.

Yosemite Falls: The tallest waterfall in North America.

The best photo you can get in Yosemite is at Mirror Lake in the spring. Closely followed by Tunnel View (check out the photo at the top of this post!)

Mirror Lake is seasonal, so you can only snap a photo like this is the spring!

We drove up to Hetch Hetchy to give Laszlo a chance to nap. The views were well worth it. There are some more challenging hikes up there that our kids were not going to be able to do, so we contented ourselves with a scenic drive and walking across the damn.

Three waterfalls flowing into the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir

The Damn at the Hetch Hetchy Reservoir. 

We take in the view, including our little adventure-mobile.

Shortly before this photo was taken, Paul said, "Best. Day. Ever!" Shortly after this photo was taken, Paul said, "Worse. Day. EVER!" And we though the trail had unexpected ups and downs...

Cutest Paul moment: Singing the Wheels on the Bus while we were on the bus. The driver joined in singing with him, including honking the horn for the "horn on the bus" verse.
Cutest Laszlo minute: All of them. When someone asked the bus driver to open the back door, Laszlo said, "thank you, bus!" very loudly.

Bridal Veil Falls, close enough for the water to dot the camera lens.

El Capitan. Paul refused to get out of the car for this stop.

Paul and Laszlo meet John Muir.

We took our ease at the Big Trees Lodge in Wawona, Paul enjoyed playing "chest" and we hiked around the Sequoias at Mariposa grove. There were some lovely trees, but they were younger and far fewer than you find in Sequoia National Park, so that park still ranks as my favorite.

If Yosemite is on your bucket list, here is some information that might be useful to you: Yosemite gets 5 million visitors annually. Most of them come in the Summertime. Many of the incredible waterfalls that Yosemite is known for dry up by July or August. Many of the higher elevation roads (Tioga Pass, Glacier Point) do not open until May when the snow melts. April worked out great for us, but it seems like May is probably the perfect month to visit. 

There was a pioneer village in Wawona so we stuck our kids in jail, like they deserve.

Lastly, the photos of animals we spotted. I could have gotten closer to the blue jay if Laszlo hadn't been so determined to chase it away.

Two of the many deer we saw.

This coyote was not at all scared of people and we saw him scavenging in several places around the Yosemite Valley Lodge. I think he just liked the attention lavished on him by humans with cameras.

It was an adventure, and I hope we can do as well on future spring breaks as we did this time around. The beauty of Yosemite was worth listening to Paul and Laszlo say "are we there yet?" over and over.