Impressions

The next day was a travel from Fresno, where we slept – a lot of motels (actually – too many to fill up…), to the North shore from San Francisco. We decided not to drive through the city – too slow, too much traffic, too much tension. So drove around the waters and bays on Rt 101 then Rt 37 to San Rafael and from there to the ocean, to Muir beach:

There were pretty many people on this windy evening on the beach and some were even splashing in the waves…An eagle or a hawk was circling over our heads all the time we stay there to be precise it was not circling. but hanging over our heads – flying towards the wind and to our eyes – standing still in the air:

Another wildlife showed itself to us:

And we finished the day by driving a little North to an overlook where they used to have some military outposts during the II World War:

San Francisco is seen in the far distance under a line of clouds which are usually coming precisely on the city, making it cool all year round.

As I am writing this blog already in autumn – two giant 1000 year old sequoias fell down literally on a trail in Giant Forest – the popular hiking part of Sequoia N.P. Just fell down in all their 100 m (App 300 feet) length for no particular reason…A ranger was saying – maybe the soil got too wet?.. Well, it wasn’t wet enough for such a fall for 1000 years. Interesting. Must be trees like people have their fates.

So as I mentioned in my previous blog – we slept a night at the foothills and again drove all the way up  to the Western Sierras to Kings Canyon which is connected to Sequoia NP.  For a long time I was curious to see it for Europeans used to mention it as a very spectacular hidden secret off the beaten path.  It was not disappointing at all:

But first of all we walked around some giant sequoias in General Grant Grove close to Kings canyon Visitor Center:

And I thought that I am tall…:-)

Yes, sequoias usually die by falling down because their root system is very shallow, and because their red wood is so resistant to elements – they lie their for everyone’s curiosity and enjoyment:

The trunk of this particular sequoia at different times was used as a shelter, as a bar and a souvenir shop.  Right now it is just an empty hollow trunk to pass through:

This following view is taken from Convict’s flat – convicts used to do lots of the works in the canyon while the road was being built:

The water in Kings river enchanted me – so fast, so clean, green and transparant:

Andrei even cooled his feet:

THere were enough waterfalls. This particular one is called Grizzly Falls:

Then we drove to the very end where the road ends and the river is even more amazing -the waters are calmer and deep and green with some signs of its not so calm character:

This picture is my favorite of Kings canyon…From there on – lots of long trails start and lots of backpackers are off to meet  their adventures and be more intimate with nature. Not us. We visited Boyden Cave on the way back, which is by that same Kings Canyon scenic byway:

For our guide there most of the formations looked like food – hamburgers, bacon, chicken leg.  But this particular one as if looked like a Christmas tree or a wedding cake.

With our eyes full with beauty – we called it a day/ Still had to drive around 2 hours till we reached Fresno, the orchard capital of CA, for a night. Fresno has too many motels-  hotels, not enough travelers to fill them.  So to find a place to stay – no problem.

Mid July this summer we at last visited the Giant Trees.  Sequoia Park and Kings Canyon are both connected, they are on the same entrance ticket, but you can’t see both of them in one day. So we had to land from the heights of the Sequoia Park at the end of the first day and go back up the next day to see Kings Canyon. The point is that it is hard to find a place to sleep in between them .  As I noticed visitors mostly camp there. There are  several lodges inside the parks, but to pay $350 for a night is not in our practice. And when you land from the Sierras there – there are maybe 2-3 motels on the way,  not good at all, therefore they have vacancies. And then nothing, a long stretch of driving with orchards, with towns who serve the orchards – and no motels hotels, very strange…the closest city came out to be Fresno, though with the help of people from supermarket we managed to find a Best Western somewhere in between those orchard – little town jungles. So this is my introduction to the Giant Tree impressions…Some facts impress more than others…:-)

But here is everything from the beginning. We drove through Las Vegas, then towards Bakersfield. California’s attention to renewable energy sources impresses:

After a night in Bakersfield we headed towards Sierra Nevada foothills  from the West side and started rising towards Sequoias on Rt.198 :

The mountains are in haze and they say that partially it is because of the smog that is brought by winds from San JoaquinValley and partially from the humidity in the air in summer. they sau to see clear views you have to come in early spring. The road up the mountains is narrow and winding which you can expect.  The views are beautiful Part of the road was being fixed, so we had to wait and meanwhile we thought that we already reached the Giant Tree grove:

But we haven’t. Those trees were something else, not sequoias yet. Sequoias grow very high – between 5000-7000 feet elevation, which is 1500-2100m in human language. They don’t grow  grow on sea level as their cousins Redwoods, as well as they have other differences with redwoods, which i didn’t know before going to the park. Redwoods are a little taller, their trunks are not so massive and they die by 1200 years younger. Whereas sequoias are much more massive, they reach 100 m in height (311 ft) and 14m in diameter (40 ft) and they live up to 3200 years old! That is something…

They outlive many forest fires because of the structure of their bark -  it is thick and feels like tissue paper, soft and airy, and though fires sometimes burn holes in them – the heat still doesn’t get the deeper layers.  Their wood and bark have some chemicals that make them resistant to fungi and bacteria. Luckily.

And when you think – there are some 75 groves left in all… and all of them are on the West slope of Sierras, where the moisture comes from far away ocean to humidify its branches and the streams of the mountains feed them with water of which they need a lot.

From the Giant Forest Museum we took a shuttle to Moro Rock. Again there was a confusion. The next stop was Crescent Meadow and we planned to see the views from there and return to Moro Rock and climb it/ No way. the shuttle takes you to the Rock, then to meadows and back to the museum…So we did two rounds until we managed to climb the Rock, but on the way we saw this creature:

I felt good we were in the bus not on our feet   – because mama bear could be close by.

Moro Rock was impressive, reminded me of Angel’s Landing in Zion NP, only more comfortable steps for climbing it. So the same as on Angel’s Landing I was scared to death to reach the top :

Thanks God Andrei reached the top and could enjoy the views of Sierra Nevada mountains:

Next stop was at Big Trees trail – sequoias grow usually around a little pond formed in a hollow of a big stone by some streams. they need water. Those ponds usually are not ponds any more, but a swamp or wet meadow. And therefore sequoia groves look like a circle:

The main cause of sequoias deaths is toppling. They have shallow root system and strong winds can uproot them:

The insides of the fallen trees are attractive:

Some more images of the Giant Trees. the biggest of them is General Sherman tree, but we saw it only from far away – too many people were crowding around it.

So much for this park, it took us a while to find a place to sleep that night as I have mentioned. Next Blog will be about Kings canyon.

We came to Montserat from Berga, from the Pyrenees side and the big strange mountain with sticking fingers from it opened in front of us still enveloped in clouds. Following the signs of parking we found ourselves at the bottom parking lot by a train  (in Spanish that train is called Cremallera – to me it sounds more like some desert than a train ) station:

- the train was taking tourists and pilgrims up to the outstanding monastery, the most sacred place for Catalonians.  The Black Mary (Mare De Deu) with her Baby Jesus in the main altar of the church are considered to have magical powers. Those trains leave every hour, not so convenient for us who like freedom, also the price is not very cheap. There are options – you can buy an excursion in the monastery and a meal together with the ticket, or just a ticket. But we chose to find a route up to the mountain ourselves. It was not hard, we drove steeply up over another nicely built town of Montserrat, tucked at the bottom of the mountain and then past some other picture perfect monastery:

And here we easily found parking but had to walk a little to reach the main square of the complex:

Crowds of God loving people were leaving the monastery, evidently the Mass just ended. So we came in time. The Basilica is tucked in the complex of buildings on the right.  One has to walk to the end of this street than turn sharply

right and walk up towards another square in front of the monastery:

And then again you enter another gate and get into the third cluster or inner garden with the Basilica in front:

The front of the Basilica is not as impressive as the whole cluster with its floors:

and lots of sculptures and frescoes  (themed with the same Virgin of Montserrat) all around there:

On the right side of this cluster by special doors  we saw a line of people standing and joined them.  We figured out that that was a line waiting to see and touch the Virgin:

It was not boring to stand in the line while admiring the decors of the Basilica:

There are little bronze bugs on this alabaster pole over there – kind of cute and funny for a Basilica decor – those Spaniards, they have their humor!

She was there, once we went up those steps decorated with different Virgins on the left and saint women on the right. We didn’t take her picture, I think it is not appropriate to do it, she is too sacred/ but we touched her globe she has in her right hand. Her and her baby Jesus are covered in plastic cover, only the globe sticking from it, where everyone is touching to get some sacred energy.  It was exciting! So many people come with their wishes, so many energies mingling in one spot. here is one of modern detail in this not very modern building (as I have mentioned they like mixing old and new and do it with success, I think):

The views from the monastery square and from its road:

And that was it. We ate in their cafeteria, the food was not tasty, and it was cold – try not to eat there. Paid as if 4 euros for the parking and left for the Barcelona airport. In its area we already had a reservation to this 4 star hotel:

The hotel was very good, it had a spa with lots of different underwater currencies in the pool, different massaging showers and saunas, a good place to relax before a long flight. There were only 2 problems waiting for us – to find a way to the Sixt – the car renting place…it was somewhere close, but so many wide one way roads so many highways going here and there, so many closed office buildings (it was Sunday) that we drove around for a while till managed to see Sixt…Another problem was in the terminal. From the car rental their shuttle took us to the terminal, where we had to wait for more than an hour for our shuttle to the hotel… But their shuttle early in the morning left in time and we were in the gate area in time, though the plane left later because of the fog.  And therefore we had to run like crazy in Paris to catch our plane.  This was it.  This is how we saw Spain.

It was the 12th of March and we were planning to see more of those wonderful Pyrenees, but the morning was not promising at all. It was raining cats and dogs…Non stop. The clouds low in the sky…So here we are in Balaguer, which we didn’t manage to see yesterday for it got dark, we saw only the river in front of our hotel:

We had to park the car on the other side of the bridge on a street and then come to this side and stay in a hotel here because there was the only hotel in sight. But it was literally in the old part of the town which is usually the place of interest. So in the morning, in the pouring rain we walked a little in the central square of the town:

The square was empty of cars for a reason it was Saturday – a farmers’ market for the town, so the cars had to leave the square for trade booths making it much more attractive. The traders were also not in a hurry – who is going to rush on such a morning…

Through the corner of the square we went up towards the wall that was seen from the central square (there over the square you can see a grey top line- that is a wall bordering maybe a monastery or a castle on top of the city) but I was scared to climb the stairs, them being so wet and also – very high…and so I didn’t see their big cathedral from close by, only from the bottom of the hill:

Another old bridge and church with a monastery were seen further, so this city could have been an interesting place to investigate if not for that rain and our crazy plans to see Pyrenees one more time… So we kept to our plan and drove through those low clouds in the mountains that started pretty soon after we left Balaguer. Lots of cars were returning back towards civilization form their ski resorts – skis on tops of the cars. But we didn’t accept it as a sign and diligently drove to La Seu d’Urgel where we met the nicest Spanish guy during the whole trip  – in a visitor’s center. He gave us maps and assured that we can cross some mountains towards Berga where we also very mistakenly made a reservation for that night…He said the mountain road is good and the views are perfect. Just as we needed…But this rain…So we walked a little in La Seu:

Found a library – a really impressively transformed old gothic church into a modern building:

And had lunch…That is it in La Seu, we rushed to manage to cross that part of the mountains, naive us…I remember asking the guy – won’t this rain turn into snow high up in the mountains. He said it is too late to snow over there in mid March. And here is what we got into:

Yes, the couple of towns we saw on the way were very picture perfect -on a sunny day,  of course.

Pubol, a vi;;age where Picaso painted for one summer was supposed to be on the way, that was the main incentive to drive on the crazy narrow, windy and wet road. I guess Pubol looks similar to this…But i can only guess because after struggling for 2 hours and making 40 km the snow was already dripping onto the car and road and it was not melting any more…Being completely alone on the road – it was not reasonable to continue…The only prize we got was this view:

This was the only town we saw past Tuxen and didn’t dare driving further. In Tuxen we still investigated if we could reach Berga on another mountain route. People in the only restaurant said we could, but after giving it a try we still had to turn around and return to La Seu and do all the round trip on better roads all the way to Berga…That was not a very good day, especially for Andrei, to do all that driving on those windy roads – it was not fun at all. But we figured out that it is an interesting and beautiful place to visit a little later in spring or  summer: