Daily Didactic
Any day that starts at Lake Tahoe and ends in Yosemite has to be a win.

We woke at the beautiful Nevada Beach campground and Theresa jogged on down the road while Brian headed to the beach and took a few photos. The view was awesome and Nevada Beach itself seems to be a nice little oasis in some pretty high test country. We'd guess real estate around here is not inexpensive and we realized on the way out that we were only a few miles north of the Mecca that is South Lake Tahoe. Half in Nevada and half in California, the enormous casinos disappear mid-town. We slowed down long enough on the Nevada side for a 3.99 breakfast recommended by the gal working at the campground. It was fine, but even at 3.99 we don't think they are losing any money on it (even without us gambling). After the sustenance we headed on through town, stopping long enough in a parking lot to upload some pages. It appears wireless has indeed become ubiquitous.

Our GPS software suggested Carson Pass as the fastest route to Yosemite National Park, so we went along with the recommendation. It was another beautiful 8000+ foot pass and we enjoyed it. We dropped back down to the valley floor on the other side and headed south through Calaveras County, where if we are not mistaken Mark Twain wrote a story about their frog jumping championships. They seem to have really held onto this distinction and run with it.

We climbed back up toward Yosemite Valley and the Big Oak Meadow entrance. Theresa had managed to snag us a last minute reservation at the Hodgdon Meadow campground for the night. We registered and then headed the 45 minutes up to Yosemite Village to poke around. We got some advice from the very nice but reluctant Ranger Paul ("I've only been here a week", "You want to make this your trip, not Ranger Paul's"), bought a hiking book, and hit the store for some groceries and firewood. We tooled on back to the campground and had a campfire and dinner before calling it a great day.

Morning at the Nevada Beach campground		The sand is a little coarse, but the setting is awesome
The beach towards South Lake Tahoe		Benches with views
The park ranger recommended this for breakfast, it worked		California welcomes us
We chose Carson		Another wonderful no shoulders and windy road
A little road repair at the top of Carson Pass		The view while we waited
Cool bridge		Calaveras countryside
A town whose identity seems pretty shaped by Mark Twain		Frog statue
The awesome climb up to Yosemite		Tie Dye Jerky?
Perhaps the third time we drove through the same cute little town		Yosemite National Park
The beautiful road toward Yosemite Valley		El Capitan, look up to the right
There you go		Yosemite Falls
The makings		The product

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