2012 USA Trip - Day 6
Sep. 12th, 2021 09:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
waitingmanLeaving San Francisco & heading to Yosemite Valley
Sept. 16. Sunday - San Francisco to Yosemite
Awake about 9ish & a bit more packing, then thank god for our new Nespresso machine, as it gave us the strength to go out for breakfast. Just before we left, Chris called, wondering what our plans were. They were as follows: Breakfast at the Bitter End, then a load of laundry, then final room cleaning & more packing, then get out of town & head for Yosemite
The Bitter End was only just opening as we arrived, the cook hadn’t turned up yet & the inside looked more like an Irish theme pub than an iconic Folk Music venue, so we took a walk up the road looking for alternatives. Along the way, we stopped at the Toy Boat Café for our first halfway decent coffee on American soil (2021 update: the place was closed & sold by its original owners, but has re-opened under new management & menu). Further along was an anonymous diner offering straightforward breakfasts of eggs, bacon, toast & hash browns, nothing exotic, but sometimes basic is good. And it was.
Afterwards, we walked back down Clement St window-shopping ‘til we arrived outside a Laundromat conveniently located near where the car was parked. So we said farewell to Chris & Jo & went to our first Laundromat, not just in the USA, but anywhere. In just over an hour all was washed, dried & done & had cost us less than $5... Why would anyone own a washing machine?? Back to the apartment, packing the car, final cleaning & vacuuming of our lodgings, then off we went... straight into a traffic jam 3 miles from the freeway entrance. Once on the freeway though, it was plain sailing at speed & trying to keep up with the signs telling us which exits to take. Let’s just say we do know the way to San Jose... in fact we know a couple, after missing three turns in various places & every wrong road seemed to lead there
As we began to leave the city behind, the scenery turned from grey streets to yellow grassland & the roads began to wind a bit more... then a lot more as we climbed three thousand feet into the ‘foothills’. Then the wildlife started showing up. A few miles from the Yosemite Rose, where we are staying for two nights, I slammed on the brakes & everything on the back seat went flying, because a deer had appeared on the roadside. As a veteran of Australian country drives where the kangaroos & emus at dusk can kill a car, my caution only cost us a little re-organising of stuff & some palpitations for Julia. The deer, of course, just stood still & watched as we drove off, not having moved since I saw him. Score one for American wildlife over Australia’s
Yosemite Rose is a classic guesthouse – early 1900s, white picket fences, cat asleep on a car rooftop & a note on the front door addressed to me, explaining that our hosts had gone into town for dinner & we were to make ourselves at home. We encountered some other guests as we came in the door, who wanted to know if we were the Australians they had been told to expect. At least there would be no mistaken English accent here. George & Sue were particularly friendly & chatty before we all made our separate ways into town for dinner – we’d been told about the "quick way” back to town only after having driven the long way out of there... of course. Our room – the ‘Brenda’ room was pretty impressive... four-poster bed (& quite a high bed too, you have to climb onto it, unlike our bed in San Francisco which you could fall onto from a standing position), heavy curtains with window sashes, with a matching one on the bath/shower (??!!), antique wooden furniture, a huge bathroom basin & something I’ve never seen before but I now want for my next home – a toilet roll dispenser stand on little wheels!!
Dinner at the Iron Door Saloon, where the Bistro staff didn’t like to be disturbed & the Barman turned out to be gruffly friendly, but some kind of Utopian idealist, if his conversation with a drinker at the bar was anything to go on. But my pasta was good, Julia’s nachos was too & even the Californian red wine I had wasn’t as watery & insipid as some I’ve endured. Back to the Rose on pitch-black roads, with only a grey fox to interrupt the journey & four deer in the front yard when we got back. More conversation with George & Sue, with useful tips on how best to get around Yosemite tomorrow
Breakfast is served between 8-8.30am; then we’ll answer the call of the wild
Plenty of photos on day 7... I promise!!
Sept. 16. Sunday - San Francisco to Yosemite
Awake about 9ish & a bit more packing, then thank god for our new Nespresso machine, as it gave us the strength to go out for breakfast. Just before we left, Chris called, wondering what our plans were. They were as follows: Breakfast at the Bitter End, then a load of laundry, then final room cleaning & more packing, then get out of town & head for Yosemite
The Bitter End was only just opening as we arrived, the cook hadn’t turned up yet & the inside looked more like an Irish theme pub than an iconic Folk Music venue, so we took a walk up the road looking for alternatives. Along the way, we stopped at the Toy Boat Café for our first halfway decent coffee on American soil (2021 update: the place was closed & sold by its original owners, but has re-opened under new management & menu). Further along was an anonymous diner offering straightforward breakfasts of eggs, bacon, toast & hash browns, nothing exotic, but sometimes basic is good. And it was.
Afterwards, we walked back down Clement St window-shopping ‘til we arrived outside a Laundromat conveniently located near where the car was parked. So we said farewell to Chris & Jo & went to our first Laundromat, not just in the USA, but anywhere. In just over an hour all was washed, dried & done & had cost us less than $5... Why would anyone own a washing machine?? Back to the apartment, packing the car, final cleaning & vacuuming of our lodgings, then off we went... straight into a traffic jam 3 miles from the freeway entrance. Once on the freeway though, it was plain sailing at speed & trying to keep up with the signs telling us which exits to take. Let’s just say we do know the way to San Jose... in fact we know a couple, after missing three turns in various places & every wrong road seemed to lead there
As we began to leave the city behind, the scenery turned from grey streets to yellow grassland & the roads began to wind a bit more... then a lot more as we climbed three thousand feet into the ‘foothills’. Then the wildlife started showing up. A few miles from the Yosemite Rose, where we are staying for two nights, I slammed on the brakes & everything on the back seat went flying, because a deer had appeared on the roadside. As a veteran of Australian country drives where the kangaroos & emus at dusk can kill a car, my caution only cost us a little re-organising of stuff & some palpitations for Julia. The deer, of course, just stood still & watched as we drove off, not having moved since I saw him. Score one for American wildlife over Australia’s
Yosemite Rose is a classic guesthouse – early 1900s, white picket fences, cat asleep on a car rooftop & a note on the front door addressed to me, explaining that our hosts had gone into town for dinner & we were to make ourselves at home. We encountered some other guests as we came in the door, who wanted to know if we were the Australians they had been told to expect. At least there would be no mistaken English accent here. George & Sue were particularly friendly & chatty before we all made our separate ways into town for dinner – we’d been told about the "quick way” back to town only after having driven the long way out of there... of course. Our room – the ‘Brenda’ room was pretty impressive... four-poster bed (& quite a high bed too, you have to climb onto it, unlike our bed in San Francisco which you could fall onto from a standing position), heavy curtains with window sashes, with a matching one on the bath/shower (??!!), antique wooden furniture, a huge bathroom basin & something I’ve never seen before but I now want for my next home – a toilet roll dispenser stand on little wheels!!
Dinner at the Iron Door Saloon, where the Bistro staff didn’t like to be disturbed & the Barman turned out to be gruffly friendly, but some kind of Utopian idealist, if his conversation with a drinker at the bar was anything to go on. But my pasta was good, Julia’s nachos was too & even the Californian red wine I had wasn’t as watery & insipid as some I’ve endured. Back to the Rose on pitch-black roads, with only a grey fox to interrupt the journey & four deer in the front yard when we got back. More conversation with George & Sue, with useful tips on how best to get around Yosemite tomorrow
Breakfast is served between 8-8.30am; then we’ll answer the call of the wild
Plenty of photos on day 7... I promise!!
