Room with a View

After spending several hours driving into the mountains in the hot sun, we arrived at The Ahwahnee, a National Park Lodge that sits in the heart of the spectacular Yosemite Valley. We were so excited to arrive here that we were 2 hours early. Fortunately for us, our room was ready. Mind you, the drive here was stunning and had impressed us already, but this being our first visit, we had no idea what was in store. We walked inside the lodge, which had been built some 80+ years ago, and took in its rustic charm. By the time we peered out our window, we realized that this was not going to be an ordinary trip. I pulled out my ancient camera phone, and snapped the photograph above. 

We uncorked the bottle of Dom Perignon we had been saving, and several hours later (it was our anniversary after all), we decided to take in the great outdoors. I had been recovering from a minor leg injury, and knew that I couldn't hike too much. In fact, we had considered canceling the trip because of the injury, thinking it may be too much of a hindrance. Earlier, when we checked in, we noticed there were bicycle rentals, and thinking it might be a solution, we got the details from the concierge about how that might be accomplished. Now we wanted to figure out the location on foot so that we would know where to go in the a.m.  

We meandered along the river above and over a couple of bridges (one of them in the picture) to Curry Village, the location for bicycle and raft rentals. The leg was working great with a couple of layers of compression, not to mention a couple of glasses of bubbly (for medicinal purposes, of course). The rental place was easy to locate, and just as we went walking away, a hybrid shuttle bus pulled up nearby. We decided to get on the bus and ride it for awhile. About three stops later we discovered ourselves at Yosemite Falls deciding we absolutely HAD to get off. The splendor of Yosemite was simply too beautiful to look at through the windows of a bus. Our adventure had begun!