03/10/2006 El Portal Redemption Pt 2.

So now I'm driving, not riding. As I cruised along, through winding roads towards El Portal, the gateway to Yosemite, I had flashbacks of my crash. Time and again. It filled me with dread and I knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that there was no way I could have completed this trip on a bike. I had simply lost my nerve. As I wound my way up the mountains I became increasingly more grateful that I was driving now. The road up was treacherous and I even saw two guys on Harleys stop halfway and turn back. I felt like a loser, still do a bit, but with every flashback and every glimpse of the beauty of this place, that feeling dissipates a little more. Last night I finally made it to El Portal about 9:30pm. I took my time getting here, stopping at Moro Rock. That was a climb of about 400 steps onto the top of this granite monolith that gave me a view of the spectacular valley below. Beautiful stuff. Took a couple of photos of this Chilean couple whose camera battery had died. I told them I'd email the shots to them once I got back home. Lovely old folks. Anyway, made it to the Cedar Lodge and found out the bar was still open so after writing last nights post, I took myself over for a beer. Well, at about 1:30am I staggered back to my room and flaked out! The bar's a great spot. Not many in there but the barmaid was really friendly, the jukebox had some good tunes and the Newcastle Brown Ale was on tap... After a couple of hours, I was reasonably drunk. I met an Armenian fellow called Arthur...how about that! He had one eyebrow and wore an upmarket tracksuit. He told me that he knew the guys from System of a Down (they're Armenians) and that he lived in LA. Pretty cool guy. Any way, after countless glasses of "Dog", I lurched back to my room singing Serbian drinking songs.

I greeted this morning with a significant hangover and got moving quite late but not too late. This was Yosemite day!! After some time eating a decent breakfast and showering myself senseless. I made my way to Yosemite National Park. Good friends and loved ones, I really don't posess the literary skill to adequately describe the majesty of this beautiful place. The sight of these giant granite monoliths, rising thousands of feet above the valley floor is simply awe inspiring. I have never seen anything like this. It is belittling, it is inspiring, it is moving and it is the one thing that has justified the difficulty I encountered getting here. I took a tour of the valley floor and when we came upon El Capitan, 3500ft of solid granite wall, I was moved to the point of tears. Perhaps it was some of the recent trauma playing havoc with my emotions, I don't know, but this gigantic rock made me feel really good about still being around to appreciate such beauty. This really is a magical place and one day is just not enough to take it all in. Maybe I'll tell you more about this in the next post. Before I go though. Candy Bar report: Baby Ruth: Lots of nuts in chocolate. Pretty good. Payday: Lots of nuts around a chewy caramel bar. Great, very sweet but offset by a little salt on the nuts! More later. God Bless. M