California, here we come!

The drive from Carson City, Nevada, on the plains, to Lake Tahoe, in the Sierra Ranges of California, is only a few kilometres, but is almost mind-blowing in geographical contrast. We wound our way up the range, through a forest of pine trees, and there was a bright blue lake, the second deepest in the United States, surrounded by forests and edged with granite boulders. We were fascinated! We stopped at a public access point for photographs, and detailed investigation, then travelled on again, planning to stop frequently to view the lake from other viewpoints. Oh, how wrong we were ... this is the USA, not Australia, and almost all of our 66 miles journey around the lake displayed only the backs of houses, each of which had their own personal, wonderful view of the lake, but which totally obscured the view for lesser souls who hadn't purchased land.
Fortunately, we managed to view from two or three public access points, as we dodged the Sunday traffic (what MUST it be like in the summer, or in the middle of ski season?), but the best view of all was as we came out of the forest, along a steep downwards spur, with no protection on either side of the road ... never mind viewing the lake, it was hard enough looking at the roads to drive, as every inclination was to shut our eyes in terror! We agree that Lake Tahoe must be a wonderful place to stay for a vacation ... the anbience left us somewhat underwhelmed ... and the decidedly 1950s style motel (by age, not modern reproduction!) which we had booked into, added to our jaundiced viewpoint. We cancelled our reservation, and drove another 100kilometres downhill to Placerville, an old gold town.
However, the next day exceeded our expectations for enjoyment. Still under brilliant blue Californian skies, we ambled through the El Dorado area of the Sierra foothills, not a long way inland from San Francisco, surrounded by beautiful views, green trees, and lots of wildflowers. It was like every dream holiday one has heard about ... and hardly another tourist in sight!
Later in the day we headed up above the snowline again, so as to be as close to Yosemite National Park as possible for the next day ... and what a day it was!
Yosemite is all they say it is ... huge mountains, beautiful vistas, immense waterfalls, gushing with fresh snow-melt, wildflowers, birds, deer ... no bears, though, as presumably it's still too early for them to come out of hibernation. We estimate that we drove around more than 500 bends, each of them on the outside of the road, with no barrier between our narrow strip of bitumen and the 4000ft drop beside us ... but it was worth it! This is a beautiful place, and we were grateful to see it on a non-busy day when there were only about 1000 other people to share it with. It must be incredibly awful in summer, but we loved it!
Yesterday, as we drove westward towards the coast, with the snow still visible in our rear-vision mirror, the temperature rose and rose, until it reached 100F - it was SO hot, as we travelled through miles of Californian fig and almond trees. What changes in weather we've experienced! Now we're at the coast - the first time we've seen the sea in a month - and enjoying a visit with friends Bill and Anni. Tomorrow we beging the trip back to LA, and then back to Australia. We're not signing off yet, though - watch for another blog next week, reviwing our trip.
We've enjoyed jour company along the way!
Frances & John