First of all a Happy Easter to all our readers.
Well today we decided to visit the top of Mount Whitney, 14502 mtrs, only to find that it was closed at the the half way mark due to heavy snow falls. Anyway we spent the day exploring the area and taking some great photographs of the mountains. We still cannot upload the pictures to the Journal as the Internet line speed is still far to slow.
The mountains looked wonderfull and this area has been used by many film directors to make films such as Gunga Din, Tremors, Lives of a Bengal Lancer, How The West Was Won and finally, The Lone Ranger to name but a few. Also Rawhide!!! I forgot to mention, after driving all this distance I know how they must have felt.
There is actually a road called Movie Road where many of the films were made.
I have finally confirmed that this was the Motel that I stayed in during my photo shoot in February 1982 however the Motel has grown in size from around 18 rooms to 80 plus. It brought back many good memories.
During the afternoon our drive took us through an area where you could see the mountains on both sides of the road but they must have been between 80 and 100 miles apart in places and with the clear air it was an amazing sight to behold and made you feel quite small.
We went back to the restaurant that we went to last night called Seasons which is excellent and should you ever visit Lone Pine this is the place to eat
We spent a couple of hours planning the next few days, booking hotels etc, as we want to visit Yosemite National Park but discovered that one of the roads we were planning to take is closed due to late snow and so we have had to reorganise our travel plans. So tomorrow morning after breakfast we leave for Lake Tahoe where we will spend two nights before moving on to a town called Sonora which is as close to Yosemite Park as we can afford to get. The closer you get to the park the room rates escalate dramatically from say USD 65.00 per room night to more than double that and so we will stay a little outside the park and drive in. After Yosemite we will then do a very, very long drive of perhaps 750 miles or so to Bryce Canyon and then on to The Grand Canyon - the big one.
So, still many things to see and do and a long way to go before we end up back at Las Vegas Airport in early May in readiness for the next stage of this trip.
One final comment is that we have been away from home for over three weeks and somehow do not find time to read the books we brought with us
