Young World Travellers: Day Seventeen and Eighteen - Yosemite National Park and San Francisco

We needed a lie-in yesterday after such a long day on Friday and it was nice to have an extra hour or two in bed. At around 12 noon we made the two and a half hour journey to Yosemite National Park. It's a pretty big place (1200 sq miles) and it was absolutely packed with people enjoying what the park has to offer. Four million visitors descend on the place every year which is around 11,000 people a day and we think we saw most of them. We headed for Yosemite Valley, the main tourist spot and after a quick lunch we had a short hike to the Lower Falls and then on to Bridal Veil Fall. We got a few nice pictures before heading for the main Yosemite Falls - one of the top twenty tallest waterfalls in the world, though being in the middle of a very dry Summer, it wasn't as impressive as it could have been.

Tunnel View was our next stop and the views of the valley were amazing. There was so much going on in every corner you could see but it was nothing compared to our view from Glacier Point and Washburn Point. We had to drive for a good half hour up some steep mountain roads but it was well worth it as you looked down upon the entire valley in all it's glory. On the descent, the sun was beginning to go down and we made one final stop for a quick moment to enjoy the sunset before heading back to our hotel. On the drive back, we decided to put the roof down and enjoy the stars as we were going along as we were in the middle of nowhere and it was a really dark sky. At 9pm it was still 33 degrees and driving around twisting, turning roads with a warm breeze in the pitch black was a really nice way to end the day.

This morning we had breakfast at the hotel - waffles with loads of syrup and cinnamon rolls before packing up our things and heading for San Francisco. We dropped off our Mustang which had been a pleasure to drive, to read on the onboard trip recorder that we had covered almost 2000 miles in a space of 40 hours driving, all in six days. Our epic road trip across Western America was at an end but it had been a brilliant adventure. We arrived at 3pm and after a quick lunch just down the road we are having a quiet Sunday evening planning what we are going to do over the next couple of days. Our bank balances are taking quite a hammering but it's all for a good cause!

For those interested, there is a great video about the Yosemite National Park here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fJEFi3ccwI

Day Seventeen Highlight - Driving in the 33 degree heat at 9pm with the roof down