Yosemite

Half Dome, originally uploaded by Robbi Baba.

Last week I took Eden up to Yosemite for four days of nature classes. This was arranged by some local homeschoolers with the Yosemite Institute.
We camped in the Upper Pines campground from Sunday afternoon to Saturday morning. It was incredibly cold in the mornings, especially the first few days. I'd never camped in the cold before. We had extra sleeping bags and wore lots of clothing to bed.
And there were bears. The first night, some idiots next to us kept a box of food in their tent! A bear ripped right through and dragged it out. Rangers came and there was a big commotion (about 2am).
In fact there were bears around every night and we were very careful not to have any food outside the 'bear box'.
During the day we had ground squirrels, jays, black birds and ravens all after our food. We had to be pretty careful! No bugs though.
For me, it was a rare opportunity to be off on my own, all the time while Eden was away with her group. I loved it!
We had been encouraged to bring our bikes and I was so grateful. Yosemite has awesome bike paths, though you want to stop every twenty feet to gape at the views.
There were 13 homeschooling families, with a whole passel of kids. Eden and Aja were in the younger group, which was good. The teen group did some very strenuous hikes! At night we'd have sing-a-longs around the campfire and it was really fun.
After a few days I felt part of this group of very warm, welcoming folks and their interesting kids.
I even got to do a little EFT, helping a little girl and one of the moms with height phobias. I'll tell you, Yosemite is a great place to work on height phobias.
We ran into Meredith and Steve, and Meredith's folks on our last day and got to hang out with them a bit.
I also met a number of really nice international travelers, out there on the trails. I met folks from France, Turkey, South Korea, Denmark, Germany, Australia and Belgium. This helped me appreciate what a jewel we have here in our own backyard.
Eden did not want to come home! But I'm planning a trip back in the Spring, and this time we may even take Krista and India with us.

ps, of course I have lots more photos on Flickr.