Yosemite National Park - A Possible Move?

Trip Dates: November 14-16, 2014

A company flew Scott & me out to California in November for us to check out the possibility of moving there for Scott to have a job INSIDE Yosemite National Park. Yes, we would be living INSIDE Yosemite National Park. It was a very quick trip, we flew out on a Friday morning and back on Sunday night. The entire time we were just amazed that we were back inside Yosemite National Park a month after we left from our fall hiking trip! The emotions of the possible move plus my dad just having surgery made everything seem very surreal.

We stayed in the Yosemite Lodge at the Falls during this trip. We drove straight to the park after we landed on Friday and met with his potential co-workers for his interview. On Saturday we had breakfast with another potential co-worker and even sat at the "Queen's table" in the Ahwahnee Hotel! The hotel was decorated so beautiful for Thanksgiving - I would love to see it at Christmas!

After breakfast we headed out for a hike. We did a quick hike to Panorama Dome and then went back and did the Mist Trail. We did a portion of the Mist Trail last time on our way down from Half Dome but we didn't do the entire trail so I'm glad we were able to do the entire Mist Trail this time! It was pretty difficult - it's like a StairClimber the whole way up! After our day filled with hikes we headed back to the hotel for dinner and sleep!

We woke up early Sunday morning to make the drive back to Fresno to catch our plane but we, of course, had to make time for another short hike! We hiked to the Grizzly Giant in the Mariposa Grove of Redwoods as we were leaving the park.

I said I would never climb Half Dome again but I actually really wanted to do it! We couldn't though because it was closed for the season so the cables were down. We were able to get a few awesome pictures of it though! I still can't believe we climbed this!

Yosemite is a very, very beautiful place and we were so lucky to be able to visit again. This was one of the toughest decisions of our life so far...there were many "pros" of making the move but also some very big "cons". Ultimately it was up to Scott to make the decision since he was the one that would be changing jobs (I can do mine anywhere!). A few of the pros were living in a small house (it was employee housing we would be living in), Scott walking about 300 feet to work, obviously living INSIDE Yosemite National Park, etc. However, we are very lucky with the job Scott has now. He works about 8 minutes from our house, he has a fall break (the reason why we take a trip each fall), and he has three weeks off at Christmas (the reason we just took another trip out west). A move across the country, giving up Scott's current work/life balance, and leaving our family and friends were the reasons that we decided to decline the job offer. There are things that money can't buy and time off is one of them! I'm still sad we aren't moving and even cried a little bit but I know it was the best decision for us at this time. Ultimately, I feel like we will end up out west but just not right now. :-) For now, we plan on trying to sell our home, buy land around here and build our "tiny home".

"Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wildness is necessity; that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as fountains of life." -John Muir

Tallulah Gorge Sliding Rock Trail (Tallulah Gorge State Park - GA)

Hike Date: 07/28/2013

On Sunday, July 28th, we went hiking (Paige, Ashley, and I).  Scott was out of town for work and we wanted to do something outside so we decided we would go on a hike.  We went to Tallulah Gorge State Park (in NE GA) to do the Sliding Rock Trail.  They only give out 100 passes per day starting at 8 AM and they do not give out passes if there is a chance of rain.  There was only a 20% chance of rain when we woke up so we went ahead and made the hour drive and luckily they still had passes left!  We were on our way after a quick overview and safety class.  Yes, they tried to scare us away in the safety class!

The first adventure is going down 600+ stairs to get to the gorge floor and then you have to jump or climb across giant boulders to get to the other side.  I bruised up my arm pretty bad on one jump but we all three made it to the other side.  There was definitely strategy involved in making it, as you can see below.

There really is NO trail and there is no room for a trail because you are basically just beside the water and making your own way down.  We all brought tennis shoes (actually hiking/trail shoes) and water shoes.  We quickly changed into the water shoes in the beginning because most of the trail was wading through the water.  We all had packs on and fell or slid into the water a few times.  It was rough!  There was even a section where you literally had to crab crawl across a giant rock to get to the other side BUT it wasn’t that easy because it was slippery so it kept pushing us down towards the water so we were constantly trying to crab crawl and avoid being pushed into the water!

We finally made it to the sliding rock and had to make silly faces, of course!

The sliding rock was a blast (video below) but it was a pain to get back out of the water.  Our video didn’t take the first time so we had to go down twice.  It was so slippery I think we probably burned 200 calories swimming and sliding and climbing rocks to get back out!

After we finished swimming we had to make our way back out of the gorge.  That meant go back the way we came (no thank you!) or take another route which consisted of climbing rocks at a steep incline.  All I can say is that I am glad that my choice of cardio is walking at a 15 incline!  It was a blast!

We had a great girls hiking trip and burned over 1,000 calories!

Have you ever done the Sliding Rock Trail at Tallulah Gorge?

Zion National Park & Bryce Canyon National Park

Trip Date: September 2012

Ever since our trip to Rocky Mountain National Park we have been so excited to go to more National Parks!  This was a very fast-paced trip from Vegas to Utah.  We woke up early each day to start hiking so we could see as much of each park as possible since we only had one day in each park.  It would have been perfect if we would have been able to spend two days in each park but we still had a blast!

We hiked a total of 30 miles in two days (after spending three days in Vegas) so we were pretty exhausted when we got home!

I had my own heart rate monitor for this trip so I was able to track our calories.  However, this hiking was a little different than what we are used to so I don’t know how accurate it was going down hill (because my heart rate was low but it was still very difficult).  Our hikes are normally hiking straight up a mountain but this was a lot of up and down.

Note: A lot of people have been asking me about my heart rate monitor (watch)…here is a link to it.  I purchased mine on Amazon (this is an affiliate link).  There are a lot of monitors out there but I chose this one because it was affordable and does exactly what I need (monitors my heart rate and calories)…oh, and it was available in pink.  

Zion National Park

Saturday

We woke up around 6 AM, took the shuttle to the Vegas airport, picked up the rental car and headed to Zion.  We forgot to plan for the time change so we actually starting hiking an hour later than we had planned.

We did three different hikes in Zion (Observation Point, hiked to the Narrows, and Emerald Pools).  We really wanted to actually hike the Narrows but we didn’t have time.  I definitely want to go back just to hike the Narrows.  Everything we saw in Zion was beautiful except for the tarantula!  Yuck – It reminded me of Home Alone!

We hiked a total of 14 miles and burned 2,523 calories in Zion!

After hiking all day in Zion we drove towards Bryce Canyon.  We stayed in a small motel in a VERY small town called Hatch (population 127).  There is literally NOTHING on the way to Bryce Canyon from Zion but it is absolutely beautiful!

Bryce Canyon National Park

Sunday

We woke up around 6:30 AM and drove to Bryce Canyon.  We also did three hikes in Bryce (Figure 8 Loop (plus some), Fairyland, and Sunset Point into the canyon to watch the sunset and full moon rise).  There are no words to describe Bryce Canyon.  It is truly breathtaking.  I literally kept telling Scott “I don’t know what to say about this place.”  If you have never been, you MUST go there!  The hikes we did in Bryce were KILLER!  Strenuous is an understatement!

We hiked a total of 16 miles and burned over 2,672 calories!

After watching the full moon rise we drove 2.5 hours to St. George (back through Zion) so that we wouldn’t have too far to drive to the airport on Monday morning.

Monday

We were going to get up early and drive through Valley of Fire State Park on the way to the airport but we were exhausted and slept in instead.  We will hit that one next time!  We got to the airport and flew to our first stop, Phoenix.  While waiting to board the plane to Atlanta we were told the flight was overbooked and they were looking for volunteers to take a flight home the next day.  They were offering to pay us via an airline voucher and cover our lodging in Phoenix (my favorite city), so needless to say, we were the first in line to sign up!  We were both looking forward to staying in Phoenix for the night and driving out to Scottsdale to hike Camelback.  However, at the last minute two passengers didn’t show up so we had to get on our original flight and go back home as planned.  We got home very late but thankfully we both had the next day off!

NUTRITION:

Since we were literally running from one hike to the next and trying to squeeze in as many hikes as possible we didn’t have much time to actually eat real meals.  We ate protein bars, granola, trail mix, nuts, etc on our hikes.  We ate two real meals: dinner at Zion Pizza & Noodle (delicious!) and lunch at Bryce Canyon Lodge (not recommended).

Which National Parks have you visited?  What was your favorite hike?