Before I get to the end of our trip, I have to share what is possibly the funniest story of CARV21. Toward the end of the whale watching cruise, Ron mistook a woman on the boat for Casey and jokingly moved her out of the way. And I mean like pushed her aside. In his defense, she was wearing a hoodie as was Casey. However, it was not the same color and she was not a 13-year-old boy. I do not think that his heartfelt apology really convinced the woman he was sorry. Nor do I think it helped when he said he mistook her for HIS SON.

OK, back to Wednesday. With a day of Type 2 fun under our belts, we went looking for some Type 1 fun that involved no hills. We found it by renting bikes to explore the valley of Yosemite (read: flat). The bikes are in high demand because the shuttle buses are not running in Yosemite because of Covid. Also, the horseback riding that we had planned are also not running (Covid) and the backup idea of a Jeep tour of Yosemite also not an option (Covid) so bikes it is!

The bike stand opened at 8 a.m. and bikes are in high demand so we were there shortly afterward. We picked out our rides, reminded the kids how to use pedal brakes and we were off. To where we didn’t really know. We somewhat aimlessly followed the bike paths and ended at Yosemite Lodge. I was again on a quest for WiFi for work and had read that Yosemite Lodge had it. However, the somewhat snooty clerk informed me it was for paying guests only. It’s as though me sitting on the floor of the lobby with my laptop plugged into an outlet wasn’t the aesthetic he was looking for. Whatever, dude.

So we pedaled onward and landed at Yosemite Falls. The kids say we have seen way too many waterfalls on this trip (six by Mallory’s count), but can you really ever seen too many? It’s not like we can just stick to the rivers and lakes that we’re used to. The bottom of the falls was full of giant rocks that had once been higher up on the mountain but had come down in a rockfall at some point in history and made for excellent climbing. We lounged there for a bit and then eventually found the free WiFi. I worked while Ron and the kids used their spidey sense to find some ice cream.

We rode around most of the afternoon, taking in the sights and taking lots of pictures. For every picture I took, I think Ron took 4. I have no idea what we’ll do with all these pictures or if they’ll ever even see life off of our iPhones but it seems rude not to take them when the trees, mountains and waterfalls are all just sitting there for us.

We returned the bikes at the end of the day and the sad realization that we had one more night at Yosemite hit. More river time and then we tried to go to sleep. The RV was hot though (no AC because we were at a no hookup campground) so the windows were wide open. I eventually got used to the house music that our campground neighbors were playing and then they abruptly switched to “Ice, Ice Baby.” They also were playing some game that required them to scream something every few minutes. It sounded a lot like they were yelling “Alvin!” like from “Alvin and the Chipmunks” but I can’t be sure.

Thursday morning we started the four-hour drive back to the San Francisco area. Our travel company booked us into a regional park called Anthony Chabot. Let me say this about Anthony Chabot Regional Park: It’s beautiful and I’m sure we would have had a lovely day there. However, we were on day 13 of our trip and this park had nothing on the national parks we had just been in. We pulled in to our campsite, got out of the RV, looked around and an hour later we were in a hotel. A hotel suite with two bedrooms, a TV and a pool. Dear reader, it’s important to know your limits.

The only hitch was that the hotel didn’t have a parking spot for the RV so we had to return it. By 4:30 and it was 4 p.m. and we were 15 minutes away. Cue an incredibly crazy 15 minutes of throwing our clothes into suitcases, cleaning out the pantry and the fridge and making sure the RV was in returnable condition.

We left the kids in the hotel room, filled up the RV with gas (it costs so much that it requires two transactions as it hits the one transaction limit) and got to Road Bear RV. Of course, there was a bunch of random stuff in the RV that hadn’t made it out so I was like Steve Martin in “The Jerk”: This football, these posters, this garbage bag of Trulys and Miller Lite. This is all I need.

We Ubered to North Oakland and had dinner at a Peruvian restaurant, followed by ice cream. The next day we had to switch hotels and spent our day walking to Barnes and Noble and otherwise doing a whole lot of nothing. We capped off the trip with CARV21 trivia. Want to see how you’d do? Here are the questions:

1. How many wardens did Alcatraz have?
2. What is the nickname for the isolation area of Alcatraz?
3. How many books did the average Alcatraz prisoner read in one year?
4. What year did Alcatraz close?
5. What did Alcatraz serve as before it was a prison?
6. What did the Monterey Aquarium building function as before it was an aquarium?
7. How long can a sea otter hold its breath for?
8. Name a cousin to the sea otter.
9. True or false: General Sherman is the largest living thing on Earth?
10. True or false: All forest fires are bad for the environment?
11. How tall is Yosemite Falls?
12. Name all the national parks we visited on this trip.
13. A parking lot at Yosemite was once used for a) swimming pool b) trash dump for bear watching c) bike rentals
14. The gray water tank on an RV is for what?
15. True or false? Elephant seals are cute.
16. What are the Painted Ladies?
17. What is the name of the San Francisco Giants mascot?
18. Name two of the first five national parks in the US.
19. What is the name of the lake in Kings Canyon?

And with that, we went to bed for our 4:30 a.m. wakeup and 7 a.m. flight back to Charlotte.

CARV21 might be over but I’m already thinking about next summer. Thanks for reading.

Peace. XO.