We had planned day 5 to have a late start, and after the excitement of the lake the day before, that was a good thing. The plan was to hike the Mariposa Grove of Sequoias in the afternoon, and then have a BBQ dinner and ride the Sugar Pine Railroad in the evening. Similar to the day before, we started by hanging out at the cabin all morning. The boys explored the area on their scooters, I worked on a blog post, and Karen sat outside amongst nature.
After lunch, we headed to the Mariposa Grove. I had read some reviews where people had to park away from the grove (because the lot was full) and be bused in. Since we had a sorta set timeline for the day, I was hopeful that we would be able to park in the lot, and not only were we able to, the spot I found was right at the trailhead. Dylan went and bought a map of the Grove while we geared up for our hike.
Similar to my misinformation regarding the Vernal Falls hike two days earlier, I was under the impression that this hike would be relatively flat and, again, I shared that with the family, and again I was totally wrong. I’d like to digress here temporarily… no one in my family has ever complained about hiking… it is an activity we all enjoy. There have a been a couple occasions when a hike was steeper, warmer, longer that expected and that led to some comments. The only reason I was compelled to share my thoughts about the length/steepness of the hikes ahead of time was to try and set realistic expectations.
We began our hike, and the lower portion of the trail was very busy with a lot of people. Based on how most people were dressed, I was sure the number of people on the trail would diminish the further we got. There were a number of notable trees pointed out along the trail with the standard signs and placards. It really is impressive how HUGE these trees are. Here is a picture of us standing under the California Tunnel Tree:
Near this point of our hike, Aidan decided he needed to have a map of his own to “plan” our hike, because there were a number of places where trails diverged and decisions would need to be made. Well needless to say Dylan was not interested in relinquishing his map… he has always been a map kid and has always wanted to have and hold the map. He will share, but he is the “keeper” if you will. This started to become an “issue” and Aidan began to make a dramatic stink about it. Karen solved the problem :-). How you ask? She took a picture of the map with her phone, made the picture her phone’s lock screen and gave her phone to Aidan. While he did grumble slightly, this diffused the situation and allowed our hike to continue sans drama.
Bear