Smoky Sequoia National Park

     Many adventures today. We drove on California freeways during the week and found there to be pretty polite drivers and lots of truck traffic, but overall OK. By the time we got through Fresno and back off the freeway Rick was tired. Then the road started climbing and climbing. From under 1000’ up 7000’. Part of it was so steep and continuous we needed to pull over and let the transmission fluid cool. Many steep drop-offs and no guard rails. The last part of the drive was in Sequoia National park and I noticed that we were driving into the clouds – only the clouds were smoke! We saw a lot of forest fire trucks and such and believed that it was a fire set to manage the undergrowth. However when we got to the Visitor Center we found out that it is a fire that has been burning in the park for about 10 days and is about 90 percent contained and should be out by Tuesday.
     Fortunately after driving through very smoky conditions, it cleared up and there is very little smoke in the campground. There are huge Sequoias everywhere, which is quite cool. Even a large one in our campsite. I love big trees. The campground is almost empty, but I got the dates wrong and we have only two nights at this spot. We will work on getting a site for the third night tomorrow. I was sure THEY were wrong until I actually found the reservation. Pooh.

     There are signs about being careful about bears everywhere. The brown box in the picture is a place to store food rather than in your car. We are supposed to close all windows in the RV and pull the blinds when we leave so the bears can't see in and try to get food. We are NEVER supposed to have food in the car and folks with baby car seats need to take them out at night and store them in the bear box.

     No electricity or water, no TV and music. But we can hear the wind in the pines and the creek trickling behind our camper. It is great. Also at 6500 feet it was cooler this afternoon and very cool tonight so we won’t miss our air conditioning.