We're Back!!

Hi! We're back from our trek thru middle California. We started out with a visit to Fairytale Town in Sacramento, this funky little park built to a child's scale with buildings and structures out of various fairy tales. Think of a slide built into a giant bean stalk (Jack and the Beanstalk) or into a hillside a la Alice in Wonderland. From there it was onto gold rush country in the foothills at Colombia and Sonora, where we panned for gold and watched the stage coach roll thru town. We checked out Railtown, railroad backdrop to such films as Back to the Future III and Unforgiven. Rode the steam engine out to the quarry and back, then as we were on the last train of the day we got to watch them turn the engine on the turn table and put it into the roundhouse for the night. Very exciting.

Then it was onto to camping at Yosemite and June Lake. Did the usual sightseeing- Half Dome, Glacier Point, the valley floor, the Awahnee Hotel. Lots of fun, can't wait to go back. On the last day we drove out thru Tioga pass and camped at June Lake for the night. Very pretty area.

From June lake it was up Highway 395 past Mono Lake, to Carson City and the train museum and then into Reno for the night where Papa joined us. As luck would have it, the Reno balloon races were going on at the same time, so we got up before sunrise and headed out to watch 100 balloons head out. The object of the day's race was to chase the bumble bee balloons (there were 2) and land as closely to the spot where the bee landed before heading back up to the next bee landing. An incredible morning! I highly recommend making the trip to Reno to see this!! Oh, and for an idea of the size of these balloons- the Energizer bunny balloon is taller than the Statue of Liberty, and its ears are as big as the faces on Mt. Rushmore. BIG!!

After the balloon races it was onto Virginia City to ride yet another train (!) and check out the silver mining town. Virginia City was the town in the TV show Bonanza, among many other westerns. From there is was back to the road to Nana & Papa's house for a couple of days and then home to rest!