Golden Gate & Yosemite

Phil and I grew up on opposite sides of Glacier National Park in Montana (he spent his high school years in cloudy Columbia Falls, while I grew up on the east side of the park in sunny - but windy - Shelby).

We both have a great appreciation for the National Park system (pre-dating the Ken Burns PBS documentary by decades) and have been to many of the National Parks in the Western U.S.

For years I have wanted to visit Yosemite National Park. Yosemite, one of the first wilderness parks in the United States, is best known for its waterfalls, but within its nearly 1,200 square miles, you can find deep valleys, grand meadows, ancient giant sequoias, a vast wilderness area and much more. Although not the first designated national park, Yosemite was a focal point in the development of the national park idea, largely owing to the work of John Muir.

John Muir is a shirt-tail relative on my mom's side of the family, and I have read some of his writings about the Sierras and Yosemite.

Phil had a very brief drive-through visit to Yosemite in his late teens, but didn't have a chance to do much exploring.

Our friends Lowry & Colleen are back on the mainland (San Jose) after years in Hawaii (which was also a great place to visit, of course). They are two of our preferred adventure companions, and were itching for a reason to get out and play. San Jose is kind-of-sort-of-almost reasonably close to Yosemite . . . Further, one of Phil's college friends is an engineer for the Park Service, currently working in Yosemite.

Serendipity.

We spent the first day of our trip in the San Francisco area. We saw the King Tut exhibit at the De Young Museum.

Walking up to the museum in Golden Gate Park for the King Tut exhibit.

Looking toward the Bridge from Land's End as the fog lifted.

Then Lowry took us on a tour of his favorite mountain bike areas near the Golden Gate Bridge and Marin Headlands. To quote Arnold - "we'll be back" with our bikes, for sure. We also made a quick trip to the Muir Woods National Monument - we had quite an action-packed day!

At Fort Point, below the Golden Gate Bridge.

The next day we were on our way to Yosemite.

In the Merced Grove, just inside the Yosemite park boundary.

Half Dome and El Capitan - an iconic view.

Phil's friend Mike was a GREAT guide. From meeting us with a picnic to share at the base of El Cap on our first day, to guiding us on his double secret trail in bear country on the last day, it was an adventure through and through.

At Vernal Fall.

Before the rain - and the bears - and the scrambling across exposed talus slopes . . .

Bridal Veil Falls from a perspective few visitors to the park ever see.

Nature Boy on the super double secret trail (after chasing bears and stressing out Colleen!).

Phil, Mike, Colleen & Lowry.

We couldn't have had a better trip. Good weather, good food, good company . . . when can we go on another vacation?!

You can see more photos from our trip at the Facebook link below. I don't think you need to be a Facebook member to see them.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=4791&id=100000256124850&l=a4c56ff54f

Dinner and a Movie

The first cold weather of the season has been lingering since Saturday so I’ve been thinking of warm food! If I try a new “experimental” recipe that is a little iffy, I always make a batch of these scones. Phil loves them and I know he’ll at least eat the scones, even if he isn’t too thrilled with the rest of the meal.

Serve scones hot out of the oven with a big bowl of chili and honey to drizzle over the top.

The recipe makes a small batch. You may want to mix up 2 batches and bake them at the same time. If you have a Pampered Chef pizza stone use it – the bottom of the scones get nicely browned & crispy.

Dinner
Savory Chili Cornmeal Scones

Ingredients
2/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup yellow cornmeal
1 Tbsp. sugar
1/2 tsp. ground cumin
1/2 tsp. chili powder
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/8 tsp. salt
2 Tbsp. chilled stick butter or shortening, cut into small pieces
1/3 cup fat-free buttermilk
Cooking spray

Directions
Estimated Total Time: 35 minutes. Preheat oven to 400°.

Combine first 7 ingredients in a bowl; cut in butter with a pastry blender until mixture resembles coarse meal. Add buttermilk; stir just until moist. Pat dough into a 6-inch circle on a baking sheet coated with cooking spray, and cut into 4 wedges. Bake at 400° for 20 - 25 minutes or until golden. Serve warm.

Movie
Bicycle Dreams (2009) (run time 107 minutes) [We watched it July 23, 2009]

“Bicycle Dreams” captures the highs and lows of the 2005 edition of the Race Across America.

The Race Across America is an epic, 3000-mile bicycle race from the Pacific to the Atlantic. First held in 1982, RAAM is considered the most challenging sporting event in the world. Top riders, such as Jure Robic, finish in under 10 days, riding over 300 miles per day and sleeping only a few hours per night.

Amid the sleepless grind, riders must endure the searing heat of the Mojave Desert, the agonizing climbs and descents of the Rockies, the driving winds of the Great Plains, and the twisting switchbacks of the Appalachians before the final sprint to the finish line in Atlantic City. With little prize money at stake, the fundamental goal of the race is simply to finish, a challenge half of all riders fail to meet.

**Spoiler Alert** In the 2005 edition of RAAM, one of the most respected and loved ultra endurance cyclists in the US was killed. If you’d like more information on the rider and the accident, click on this link.




To quote another movie reviewer: “It's an impressive, inspirational, and yet also deeply sad film, and I'd happily sit a non-cyclist in front of this, although it might enforce the impression that we're all completely mad.”

Like Running on the Sun, the movie about the Badwater Ultra Marathon, Bicycle Dreams is inspiring. The mental toughness of the competitors is amazing.

However, if we ever start talking about doing this event, just shoot us.

Really.

Don’t ask any questions. Shoot first, and get us into intensive psychological counseling immediately!

4 stars (for cyclists)
3 stars (for rational people who will spend the entire movie saying “Why the heck would anyone do that??”)

Too Cold to Cowboy

Here's a photo of the newly refinished floors; a light stain with a satin finish - they really look nice. I didn't realize how beat up they had gotten until I saw the "after."

So . . . this is the temperature at 9 am - an hour after I should have been at the cyclocross race. (Top temp is outside; bottom is inside. Maybe Phil has a point about me keeping the house too cold . . .!)

We didn't get a lot of snow; just enough to make the roads icky so you needed plenty of window washer fluid if you ventured out.

But it was just too cold for me to compete in the cyclocross race today. Hopefully, it will be warmer in a couple weeks when the next race with a "beginner" category takes place.

Rex was glad I stayed home - he got some extra belly rubbing and ear scratching.