Sequoia National Park

Sequoia National Park~

June 21st

I’m lonely. It’s 7:30 pm. I am in my tent, which is surrounded by mosquitoes. I had some bug repellant with deet but it came open in my backpack and made a mess. Not only did it make a mess, it ate the lining off the bottom of my pack so now it’s an incredible sticky mess beyond messes! I’m lonely. The choices were to pay $20 to camp in an over crowded campground in the park, or camp for free in a beautiful quiet area of the national forest. Guess which I opted for? It wouldn’t be so bad if I could at least sit outside, but the damn mosquitoes are intolerable! And of course my cell phone doesn’t work here!

It’s been a good day. Sequoia National Park is beautiful. And OMG; the trees! I cried when I first saw them. Because they are so incredible and because I can’t believe I’m here! I can’t even take a picture of a whole tree because it doesn’t fit in the viewfinder. I love taking pictures. I think I’ve taken a couple thousand by now. But, the pictures just don’t do justice to what I’m seeing. Any of it…. The great sequoias, the mountain streams, the deserts, the flowers. This whole experience is magical. I still can’t believe I’m here. Mostly I just drove through Sequoia today, but I did do a little walking around, maybe two miles or so. You have to get out of the car to really experience any of these places. I saw a young bear on my walk. I don’t know where momma bear was. I also saw Tharpe’s Log. That’s a sequoia log that someone named Tharpe made into a little cabin. How cool! I wish I could camp in that tonight!

Tomorrow I’m going to hike early here in the national forest and then drive into Kings Canyon. From there I plan to drive to Fresno. I hope there’s an REI there so I can hopefully do something about my ruined backpack. Then on to Yosemite! Yosemite is the park I’m looking forward to the most. Although now I don’t know how anything could possibly top the great sequoias!