FABJ's birthday in Yosemite

Before you say it, no, we didn't start the wildfire in Yosemite with FABJ's birthday candles.  We left the candles at home (although we are sorry to read about all the wildfire's damage to places we just visited).

FABJ and ORBJ slept well (one benefit of yesterday's forced march), so they were ready to celebrate.

We had a lazy morning of balloons followed a junior ranger walk.  The girls (particularly FABJ) enjoyed the walk.  We learned about different bird calls, saw a couple different type birds, and the ranger spotted a type of red hawk that is rarely seen in the valley.  The girls got their badges, and then the real excitement occurred.

On the shuttle bus, heading to Yosemite Village for lunch, we saw a mama bear and two baby bears.  They were ambling down the road not too far from the Mirror Lake stop.  We stopped and watched them for a minute or two before they decided to head into the forest.  FABJ was very excited, as was I - first bear sighting for me in four trips to Yosemite.

Frankly, the rest of the day paled in comparison.  We visited the Yosemite museum before heading back for another swim (what else do you do when it's 93 degrees and you don't have A/C!).  FABJ was saying for weeks that she wanted a cheeseburger and chips (i.e. fries - she already talks like an Irishwoman), followed by ice cream.  So we decided that a banana split would be an appropriate birthday dessert for the family to share.

Enjoying a birthday dinner al fresco

REALLY enjoying a birthday dessert

We topped off the day with a ranger-led campfire.  The girls even got to roast marshmallows, although FABJ didn't like the texture.  We had tons of extra marshmallows - they don't seem to sell them in small packages - so we made some friends from Naples, Italy who were ecstatic to roast marshmallows.

Our little fawn enjoying the campfire

 We were very impressed with the kid-based activities at Yosemite.  I'm lobbying for a trip to Acadia next summer as our U.S. summer trip (combined with a visit to my family in Iowa).  LBJ is not objecting (so far).

On the way out of Yosemite the next morning, we stopped off for a hike to the sequoias in Tuolumne grove (as shown below).  It was a tough hike for FABJ - all uphill on the return, but we enjoyed seeing the tall trees.

ORBJ enjoyed riding in style  

One large tree and one fairly happy family

Enjoying a trip through the tree

It was a bit of a mad dash to get the rental returned on time.  LBJ dropped all of us in downtown SF before returning the car to Oakland.  Kudos to Enterprise rent-a-car for taking her to drop off the car seats and then dropping her at BART so she could meet up with us at our SF hosts for the weekend: LM, BM, and SM (i.e. the Ms).