We took the boys to Sequoia to see the General Grant Tree and Hume Lake. It is unbelievably beautiful in the forest surrounded by the giant trees. Gavin loves the “big trees” and asks to go see them almost everyday. Every time we go it is so hard to leave.
Having driven to Bakersfield the day before, we spent the morning visiting with my Grandma. Then we drove up to Sequoia in the afternoon, checked into the Waksachi Lodge, and at dinner there after unloading our stuff.
After dinner, we went to the Giant Forest to visit General Sherman, the largest living tree by volume. We pretty much had the whole place to ourselves. Once the sun went down, we headed a little further up the mountain to Wolverton, to look at the stars.
We spent most of today in Grant Grove, visiting the General Grant tree and hiking around the trails in the grove. The boys also had fun playing in the little bit of snow still on the ground.
We spent the entire day hiking, first heading up to Moro Rock, a giant dome-shaped granite formation above the Giant Forest. We stopped along the way to eat lunch by Hanging Rock, hanging out on the side of a granite cliff with some lizards.
Once we got up to Moro Rock, we still had to climb the 600 steps that were carved into the granite, to get to the very top. A first Connor acted scared, but then it was like a switch flipped, and he became a little dare devil, practically running up the steps.
After enjoying the breath-taking views and getting back down to the ground, we went on a long hike through the giant trees in Crescent Meadows. We were all completely exhausted by the time we got back to our car. All-in-all, we at least hiked 9 miles this day.
Beetle Rock is a fun place to climb around on and enjoy the views. Gavin loved coming here when he was a toddler. We even threw around the baseball a little bit.
Earlier in the day, we went for a hike in the snow. The boys had run throwing chunks of it into a creek:
It snowed more than an inch overnight! So, we decided to go have fun in the snow. We had snowball fights and built the first snowman the boys or I had ever built. I named him “Snowy McSnowface”.
After our fun in the snow, we went for a hike around Round Meadow. Then we headed to Congress Trail, visiting trees like McKinley, The President, and the House and Senate groups.
We even saw some animal tracks on the various trails we hiked down. It was freezing out, but a beautiful winter wonderland we will remember for a long time to come.
After 5 nights in Sequoia, it was time to say goodbye. We drove down to the Foothills area of the park on our way out. We had lunch by Hospital Rock and then viewed the pictographs created by the local Potwisha Native-Americans.
We stopped by the Foothills Visitor Center so the boys could turn in their Junior Ranger workbooks. The boys also begged me to take a picture of “Woody”, a stick they insisted on bringing home as a souvenir. Then it was time to hit the road for a very long drive back home to San Diego.
