14) Yosemite NP California

This National Park was amazing! It’s so gorgeous and there is so much to do and see! We barely scratched the surface of what you can do in this park. We had only 2 days and we made the most of it.

El Capitan! Wow this park is so beautiful and the iconic cliffs and mountains are gorgeous! It just doesn’t look the same in photos you have to come here to really see how gorgeous it is.
Our first hike in Yosemite was the Mist trail to the John Muir trail. This was 8.5 miles and difficult but so worth it. The view of Vernal Falls and Nevada Falls are amazing! It’s up very steep hills and then once you complete the hills you climb up about 600 steps going straight up the cliff side to the top of the falls. The falls blow and pour water on trail so it’s very wet going up the steps and sometimes as you walk your breathing in water that’s being blown in the wind!
We were so close to Half Dome! Kaleigh’s gonna be hiking up to the top one day!
The top of the falls is so relaxing. We cooled off by walking in the water right before the falls cascade hundreds of feet down a cliff. It was so beautiful<3. This trail is not for the weak but the pay off at the falls is amazing!

Our next hike was Upper Yosemite Falls. The girls had the choice to take a day and relax with a float trip or hike the upper Yosemite falls… they chose this amazing hike. It leads to the tallest waterfall in all of North America! It was another steep uphill hike. Climbing those mountains will get your calves burning! From this hike you can see Half Dome and half way into it you come to the bottom of the tallest waterfall – there are smaller ones down below, but you can only see them from another lookout.

There were several small falls down from the largest but you can only see them from a lookout further down from the main trail.
We had a surprise guest when we stopped for a snack break! We got up pretty quick, but that wasn’t the only snake we saw…Daddy almost got bit by a rattle snake 😳
We had a picnic lunch at the top of the falls and hung out there for a while by the water before heading back down.
We camped in a TT campground outside of the park and cooked some hotdogs and s’mores over the fire before the girls left to go hangout with some other kids in the campground.
On our way out of Yosemite we drove Tioga road to Tenaya Lake and Tuolumne meadow. It was a pretty scenic drive and on the way to our next stop. It’s still shocking to see snow on the mountains!