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| Trying to unstick the beast |
We had about a 4 1/2 hour drive to get from Lake Tahoe to Yosemite today. Considering it was already 10 AM, I knew we weren’t going to get to see much of the park today, so my goal was to get to our campground, get settled and get some rest, as we were going to pack in quite a bit the following day.
Although it was a slightly longer drive, Max and Caroline both suggested we take the route around Lake Tahoe, as it’s a much prettier than taking Interstate 80 to the I-5. I was all for it, but once I mapped it out later on, I realized that route would take us into the Nevada side of Lake Tahoe. Rather than have to go back to air traffic control in L.A. to get clearance, I decided to stick to our California Only trip.
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| The little terror sleeps |
Because we have a puppy who likes to pee on comforters that are bunched up at the bottom of the bed, we had gone through all of our bedding at this point. So, I had started a mission of washing three of our comforters to ensure we were covered for the remainder of the trip. As I went up stairs to retrieve the last of the three comforters in the dryer, Jasper followed me upstairs. As I pulled the comforter from the dryer, out of the corner of my eye I saw Jasper wander into the room next to the laundry closet. I sat the comforter down on top of the drier to see what he was up to.
At the base of the bed in the bedroom was the comforter from Max and Caroline's oldest son's bed. And guess who was squatting on top of it...? OMG. I had just washed three of our comforters that he had peed on, and now I was about to wash one more. I know, I know. I signed up for this. Sigh.
I put their comforter in the washing machine and went back downstairs to let Caroline know what had happened. Max and Caroline are two of the kindest people I know, so it wasn't a problem at all. Nevertheless, I walked back to Rolling Thunder with my tail between my legs. Jasper would have too, but he doesn't even have a tail, and seemed to be proud of his work...
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| Rolling Thunder not rolling |
I continued to pack everything up, and before the kids were awake, we were ready to roll! Max guided me down the driveway as I backed down, so I didn't clip the tree above, or anything behind me. I got to the bottom of the driveway and the back end scraping pads began to scrape the asphalt. And then we came to a stop. I tried to roll forward, and the rear tire just spun. The same thing would hap
pen when I tried to back up. We were stuck, high centered on the driveway. Seriously?
Max and I wedged some chunks of wood under the rear tires. But, once I'd give it some gas, the wheel would just spin on the wood. Now, if you've been following this blog, you may have an idea where I'm going next with this situation... Bingo! The hydraulic levelers! First I chocked all the wheels for safety. After all the driveway is pretty steep. Then I began to slowly raise the rig
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| See you back in L.A.! |
Back in the driver's seat, I said a little prayer, put Rolling Thunder in reverse and gave it some gas. Thump, scrape, scrape, vroom... YES! We were free! Max and I high fived, with our elbows of course, and had a good laugh. It's never a dull moment when the Donaldson and Gutierrez families get together...!
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| Still Sleeping... |
Now, the only thing that could possibly make this story even better is that the kids both slept through this whole misadventure! Not joking. They were still fast asleep as I said my goodbyes to Max. Maxie did sneak in to say bye to Mazzy, Jaden and Jasper, but the best he got was a half asleep wave from Mazzy and a groggy "bye Maxie," from Jaden. Jasper, on the other hand, was happy to give him a few licks on his face before we departed. With the kids now fully back to sleep, and Jasper in my lap, we drove off down the road. Huge thanks to our lovely hosts! You really made our trip spectacular. In fact, Mazzy said that tubing on Lake Tahoe was her favorite thing we did on this trip!
As I mentioned earlier, I decided to take the I-80 to the I-5. The I-80 is mountainous and lined with trees, so not a terrible drive. We then hopped on the I-5 and headed towards Sacramento. Now, here's where the writer (me) gets to take a little creative license. In one of the previous blog posts, I had written that we took a side trip to see the state capitol. Clearly I was tired when I wrote it, because we did not go to Sacramento before Lake Tahoe. So, since I would rather write about this journey in proper story order, and because what I wrote about the capitol was pretty good... I'm going to remove it from the other post, and insert it here:
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| California State Capitol |
Because we were going through Sacramento, I thought it would be good to take a quick side trip to see the California state capitol building. It's currently closed to the public due to the pandemic, but I think it's important for the kids to see the center of our state government in person. After all, California's economy is (2019 pre-covid) ranked 5th in the world. We're wedged between Germany and the UK, so if California was it's own country, this part of Sacramento would be our Capitol Hill. That is if it was actually on a hill... Setting all that aside, the building itself is impressive, so a flyby had to be done! I pulled Rolling Thunder right up to the walkway leading up to capitol building. Mazzy jumped out and snapped a few pics.
And just like that, we were back on the road to Yosemite. Once we hit Stockton CA, we hung a left and headed East to Copperopolis, in Calaveras County. This is an interesting area. It's both rustic, and yet you can see that there is some big bucks being put into the development of the town. There are some really nice houses on the lake.
I guess you could say we were heading into Yosemite the back way. The switchbacks on the treacherous mountain road were exciting to say the least. The kids noticed that there were many places where there were no guard rails. I noticed it too... Especially with the 1000 foot drop into the canyon bellow. Rolling Thunder handled the steep mountain road like a beast!
Our destination for the night was Yosemite Pines RV Resort. I thought it was actually within the park boundaries, but when we arrived, the English gentleman at checkin explained that all of the campgrounds with Yosemite were currently closed due to Covid. He asked if we had made a reservation to get into Yosemite. I said we did, and that it starts today. He explained that you have to checkin at the park entrance on the day that your pass starts. He looked at his watch and said, "You better get going." Once you check in, your pass is good for seven days.
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| Dad is finally winning |
He gave us a map of where our campsite was, but instead of heading to our campsite, we headed towards the gate to Yosemite to get our pass validated! It took us about 30 minutes to get to the gate. We got there right when they were closing. The ranger handed me an "after hours" entry pass and said fill this out. We then made a U-turn and headed back to our campsite.
Since this was our last night, I had picked up a steak for us to BBQ. We had a nice lantern lit dinner outside on our picnic table by the campfire. By the way, our campfire was good tonight, so the kids made s'mores. I didn't wan't to stay up too late tonight, as tomorrow was to be a rather ambitious day. But, tonight I was on fire at poker. I think I took back all the chips my little freaks had won over the course of the whole trip, all in one night! Now we're even, I told the kids, so let's go to bed!
Day 10 – August 3, 2020
Start: Truckee CA
Destination: Yosemite CA
Where we stayed: Yosemite Pines RV Resort
Mileage: 226 Miles
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