Wes' Travels to America's National Parks: 2020

Located in north central California in the Sierra Nevada Mountains lies this very scenic and majestic park. Yosemite is the first National Park I have visited. Since we live near Sacramento and within a couple hours drive from this amazing and beautiful place we have visited Yosemite National Park at least a half dozen times throughout the years. I have personally hiked to the top of Half Dome in September 1999 with a good friend of mine, Jeff Pace. It was a full day and very long and physically demanding hike, but so worth every minute of it. The last extremely steep ascend to the top of this granite marvel is the scariest. On other trips to Yosemite National Park we visited not only the Valley Floor but also the back country along Highway 120 / Tioga Road and the Tuolumne Meadows area. I have only camped in this Park once during my visit in September 1999 when we stayed in Camp Curry in a wood floor tent cabin. A rockfall in 2008 damaged a number of structures, and about one third of visitor units were closed of risk of the instability of future rock falls in the area. One of the things that I have experienced a couple of times is visiting the Ahwanhee Lodge and having dinner in the main dining room on the valley floor. The views are spectacular from the grounds of this historic lodge. Since I also have a blog on visiting California Lakes, I have visited several beautiful lakes in Yosemite National Park and just outside the park's boundaries. Some of my favorite lakes located in the area are: Hetch Hetchy Reservior; Cherry Lake; Tioga Lake; Saddlebag Lake; Tenaya Lake and Ellery Lake.