Ravleen's Belated Account of Yosemite

July 2nd - I'm using the entire backseat of the dented old Chrysler, as I have a pounding headache and a queasy stomach. I am irritable, throwing biting retorts at my sister and seeking quiet. But face it, as much as I enjoy travelling, long car rides do not sit well with me. Well, on occasion the vibrations lull me to sleep quite nicely; and looking out at the ranging scenery with earphones on is like floating in the realest of dreams but after a while the hills get monotonous and I become hard to live with. In particular for this car ride to Yosemite, my mood was quite different than it was back at Ramandeep's house, where we had made the decision to go an hour before departing, and the hurry-scurry spur-of-the-moment trip filled me with giddy frenzy. I had stuffed clothes into a bag, books under the carseat, and now, driving through the sunkissed hills of California, images of Yosemite flashed in my mind. I thought of a grassy, vast forest with towering, stately trees. I thought we'd stay in a small, carpeted room of sorts.

I was wrong on both counts. It was worse and yet much, much better than anything I had imagined. As we approached our destination, driving up dangerously steep mountains sent shivers up our spines, but our trepidation didn't prevent us from drinking in the dome-like cliffs, wild under the perfectly-blue sky. Descending down into Yosemite Valley, the landscape slowly changed, from misty patches of meadow to forests quite like the one in the park near our home in Oregon, but much more grand. There were flashes of a river and I saw a fawn for a fraction of a second. Then the trees grew closer to the road as we approached our campgrounds - Curry Village. My first impression was that it was very plain, very woodsy and undecorated - and our "cabin" was nothing to cheer at either, though the sight of a clean bed did brighten my mood (if you could call it a bed - it seemed a piece of canvas covered with a sheet). The fact that the room wasn't very nice was probably a good thing, as we could focus on what we came to see - the gem that is Yosemite, instead of caving up, watching tv as we would in a hotel room. It was pitch-dark already, and so we couldn't roam the valley just that day. However, our stomachs did rumble and we found that Curry Village had some of the best pizza we've ever tasted (I'd go back just for it, really), with a perfectly crisped crust topped with sauce and fresh, stringy cheese - perfectly spicy and flavorful vegetables to top. Even as we sat in the dark, there was a complete sense of relaxation and excitement at the same time as Ramandeep, my sister, my parents and I devoured the food and laughed, dreaming of what we could do the following day. But as we arrived back at our cabin, we discovered a new fear that Ramandeep was holding.

Bears.

That's right, as he posted in his account, the park rangers had made it clear that we were in Bear Country, so absolutely no food or scented items were allowed in the cabin. We were all a little nervous, but Ramandeep was the one who didn't want to sleep on the bed by the door because bears could come and eat him. I told him "Ramandeep, the bear isn't going to open the door! If anything, the bed by the window is more dangerous". Luckily for him, we saw not one bear during our entire trip, and so we all had a safe sleep after all.

It took a while, the next morning, for everyone to shower, breakfast and get ready. As everyone did so, I strolled the campgrounds, observing the countless chipmunks scuttering here and there. We were to be out of the cabin by 11am, so we had to pack our luggage before going sightseeing, or anything similar. But my sister and I were overcome with an urge to go biking, but as my dad and Ramandeep didn't want to, they stayed behind to pack while my mom, sister and I went over to the bike-rental shack to pick out the cycle best suited for us. After doing so, the ride down the path was quite soothing, with the ice-pure Yosemite breeze laughing and the gentle sunlight filtering through the trees overhead. We went down a paved sidewalk, and on our way back up, saw that same river that we passed by on our drive to the campgrounds. It glittered in the sunlight, and when we waded our feet in the waters we found them pure, ice-cold yet calm. I went further in, as there was nothing quite as exhilarating a sensation as the mountain waters between my toes. Soon, I was knee-deep, my jeans soaked. My mom and sister preferred caution, but I shrugged at that, and went in deeper, seeing if I count walk across the river. But alas, it began to grow too deep, so I made my way to a log that floated by the shore. I waded my toes there for a while, and when it was time to dead back, there was a clear problem as I was soaking wet, a rather difficult state to be in if one intends to bike half a mile in public. I suppose it was my natural consequence, so I rolled my pants up and biked rather uncomfortably back up to the cabin.

My dad was furious. He got over it, though. Sort of.

I now had to take a shower and change, which would waste time, according to him. I managed to do so quickly, and I changed into clean sweatpants and a comfortable black shirt. After washing up, my dad informed us we were to go river-rafting, which sounded interesting, but I had no idea how fun (and tiring) it would really be. After renting the raft and dragging it into the opening of the river, we realized we were faced with a challenge. How the heck were we supposed to steer this thing? As we sat contemplating this mystery (and managing to spin the raft in circles with the oars) several others got far ahead of us. For about ten minutes we attempted to push the oars in many combinations, finally landing upon one that moved us forward, albeit a bit slowly. Now we started to let our muscles loosen and were absolutely astounded by the beauty of the river. It wound through gentle meadows, surrounded by leaning trees. When we first saw it driving up to campgrounds, we watched it from afar, as if were some strange, beautiful alien thing. But now, it felt as if the river were part of us, like our bloodstream, as we rowed through it. We were minuscule and insignificant compared to it and at the same time it was our kin. The Half-Dome towered above us, but more enchanting were the billows and shapes the water made, rippling as our oars cut through it, pushing it according to my mom's knowledge of physics - Newtons 2nd law, I even knew (actually I don't remember whether it was the 1st or 2nd or 3rd law, but it had to do with old Isaac anyway). It was a gentle and exhilarating thing at once, indescribable. We all had our turns at rowing the boat, occasionally bumping into large boulder or tree-branches than skimmed the water. The water was deep at some parts, but when it grew shallow we let our feet cool in it, which relaxed us despite the ever-glowing sun.

Soon, though, the sun began swelling and even the water could not relieve the heat. The raft grew sandy and wet, rather uncomfortable to sit in, but we were forced to as my dad didn't allow us to sit on the edge in fear we might topple over. I was overcome with a great desire to jump into the water and hold onto the edge, but as I was wearing sweatpants, and didn't have any extra clothes (my jeans were wet from my previous run with the river), I didn't take the risk and managed to keep my clothes dry. Now we were growing tired and desperate longed to get back to camp. We didn't bring water and the fun was wearing off. The river never seemed to end and in annoyance I got off and walked in the blistering sand while the rest of the party remained in the raft. I was sure we were near the end, but alas, I was wrong so I was forced to return to the raft. We reached a bridge under which people swam and jumped into the water, and I pined to do the same but lack of extra clothed pulled me back. After a few more minutes of torture we reached the shore, where we had to wait, in extreme thirst, for a shuttle to come and pick us up. By this time we were nearly dying, and the first thing we did when we came back was gorge down a few bottles of water. After a bit of thing I was definitely ready to go home but my mother was nauseated with a huge headache, and my dad didn't think it advisable for her health to drive down the steep hills in such a state. Anyway, it was nearing dark so we decided on staying another night, and I was getting a little sick of the place at this point. After my mom felt better, we decided upon taking the tram to have a calm view of Yosemite. The driver was hilarious, and soon we stopped at a sight where a crowd huddled around a grazing stag, snapping pictures with their obnoxious cameras (of course, I did as well). Now it was truly dark, so we had more of that irresistible pizza. and hit the hay soon afterwards. It was too late to leave, even though my mom was fine now.

The next morning saw us quickly eating breakfast, purchasing souvenirs from the gift shop (including identical '4th of July in Yosemite' shirts) and leaving soon as everything was ready. I observed the pesky chipmunks (or were they squirrels, I don't know the difference) once more. Usually they ran as I approached them, but one seemed to be basking in the sun, unaware of me and I got almost close enough to touch when I heard a shrill noise, and it ran away. The noise continued to ring, and when I followed the source of it I found another squirrel/chipmunk, hiding in the bushes, watching his friend carefully. Apparently he had made the noise to warn him of my presence.

On the drive back, I was, I admit, grumpier than ever. Car drives get me annoyed. But I collected funny town names ("Twain Harte") and watched the animals we passed by (including parking next to a bored horse in a strange town when my dad went to ask for directions.

We arrived at, I believe Manjot's house soon, and were greeted by kind faces and the ever-adorable little Meher. We feasted upon good ol' Taco Bell (though the orders got mixed up), and relaxed, watching the fireworks from the master bedroom.