Travels in a Tin Can

probably actually several miles away but what made her idea more stupid was
the fact that the land between the hotels and theme parks is largely
undeveloped swampland. They do not have street lamps along the road, and
neither do they have pavements. They do have crocodiles. We walked for
about 45 minutes in the darkness until a combination of running out of
pavements and Emma feeling something slimy go in one of her flip-flops
drove us back. Fortunate really because when we got back to where we had
started from and got the bus we realized just how far it was to our hotel –
about a 20 minute bus ride! Anyway, back to our moment of madness in the
Californian mountains.
We had wanted to visit the Giant Sequoia National Park when we were
further north, near Yosemite. We were keen to see the biggest trees, having
seen the tallest in the Redwood National Park. However, we ran out of time
before heading back to San Francisco, but now we were near-ish to the
southern end of the sequoias and had a day to spare. Snow had closed some
of the roads, so we thought that this time the weather, rather than time, would
thwart our plans. I was content to bow to the elements and accept that we
were going to have to leave the trees for another holiday, however Emma was
more disappointed and looked for any opportunity, even a half chance, to see
them. And she was in luck.
The campsite that we stayed at the night after leaving the west coast -
the site of our campfire and icicle strewn hosepipe - listed the roads that were
still open through the mountains, including the one we needed to travel - the
Sherman Pass! (Dramatic sounding, eh?) So, we packed up camp and
headed towards the start of this road.