Day Seventeen - Yosemite!

Twice in years before Larry and I have planned to ride through Yosemite National Park and across Tioga Pass only to be denied due to forest fire activity. This would be our third attempt.

We got another early start. Larry had an alarm set, but he woke before it went off and decided we needed to get going. I think it was about 5:30 AM. We got the bikes loaded, had breakfast and since we had gassed up last night, we were riding at 6:50 AM. We got out of town and headed north on CA-41. It was freeway riding for the first 30 miles or so and then the road turned into an undivided 2 lane as it started to climb in elevation. Clovis was at only 361 ft, and we would top out the day at 10,000 ft.Fifteen more miles and we were oficially in the Sierra National Forest and the road got a lot curvier and the air temp began to drop.Ten more miles and we were at the entrance gate to the park. After getting in we stopped to put on some warmer gear as the temp was now down to the mid 60's. 

Day 17 Track

One thing I hadn't counted on was the fact that much of Yosemite National Park has a 35 MPH speed limit. Given that we had about 100 miles to get across that was going to make for a longer day that I had been thinking of. But there was some upside here too. For one, 35 MPH is a much more relaxed pace then we might usually be riding which would make it an easier day and it would certainly allow for more gawking time. The second big advantage would be much better gas mileage. That would be important because gas stations would be sparse along the way and the prices in the park were near $5.0 0. So we just went with it and ran the limits, and well into the park the limit did go up to 45. Traffic was for the most part light, especially since this was the last day of the holiday weekend.

I took a lot of video, in fact I ran out of battery, but I have uploaded one of the shorter one to give you an idea of what it looks like from a rider's perspective.

And here are some selected photos we took.

Forest Fire Damage on the horizon

From some vista point 

Same vista looking down - you can see the road (line through the trees mid photo)

As we exit at the east entrance - line of cars waiting to pay to get in

Aside from the great scenery along the way and the varied nature of the geography, one of the more interesting phenomena we experienced is how long the run into the park and up to Tioga Pass was (nearly 90 miles) and the how short and steep the exit at the east end was (3200 ft descent in just 12 miles)

Out of the park now - Mono Lake

t the east end of Tioga Pass Rd we would turn north on US-395 which skirts along Mono Lake. We were now in Lee Vining CA and were hungry for lunch so we found a diner and stopped for a while. It was only 11:00 AM local time, and the lunch menus were not yet out. I ended up having a 3 stack of blueberry pancakes (some of the best I've had in a very long time), while Larry had soup and a sandwich.

View from US-395 near Bridgeport CA

The above shot was taken while I was riding along. I thought the view was nice with the cattle, clouds and mountains.

We were only about 100 miles from our overnight destination of Reno, NV, but since Larry can't resist any excuse to ride a twisty road, he had us routed in the general direction of Reno, via a trip around the eastern shore of Lake Tahoe. Much of the lake is obscured by development, but we did manage to get some photos at an overlook. The other noticeable thing was how many cars were parked along the roadsides with vacationers making the most of the last day of the holiday weekend.

Lake Tahoe

After leaving Lake Tahoe, we were finally headed for Reno, but not before we rode across yet another Sierra pass - Mt Rose Summit on NV-431 (a designated Nevada Scenic Byway)

We had one more item on the agenda before the hotel - The Reno NV Post Office, which was conveniently located just across the street from our hotel.

Reno, NV post office

We arrived at our hotel at 3:24 PM and the temperature was about 97 degrees. Oh yeah, I made 328 miles on this tank of gas befire getting my low fuel warning light - which normally comes on around 260 or so! When I filled later and ran the calculations, I got 54 MPG on this tank!

Today's Stats: 325.7 miles in 8:27 elapsed time, 6:59 saddle time