Flashback Trip: Channeling Our Inner Ansel Adams At Yosemite

Ansel Adams is one of our favorite photographers of all time! His amazing black and white photography that captures the natural beauty of places like Yosemite National Park has always inspired us. So with that in mind, we thought it would be fun to give ode to Ansel Adams by sharing black and white photos of our very first trip to Yosemite that we took back in 2013! Now these photos capture one of the longest hikes we’ve ever done which started in the meadows on the valley floor and led to the Four Mile Trail (it’s actually 4.8 miles) where we had access to amazing views. We also had a close encounter with a pretty nice black bear…nice because it didn’t attack us even though it was walking down the trail when we were walking up, and there was only 10 feet of distance between us. Then we ended up at Glacier Point where we got to see Half Dome off in the distance and then hiked the Panorama Trail to the Mist Trail to see some of the famous waterfalls. The loop trail totaled around 15 to 16 miles which kicked our butts but left us with lasting memories of this amazing park!

**On a side note, we wanted to let you all know that we had to put some of our travels on hold hence our recent hiatus from the blog. We had a bit of a scare recently when our 19 year old cat was feeling sick. The vet found a mass in her stomach prompting us to take her to a hospital to get an ultrasound where they found a tumor. They tried to take a sample of it to see if the mass was cancerous, but for whatever reason during the fine needle aspiration procedure, she stopped breathing and her heart stopped beating. For a moment there, we thought we had lost her…but luckily, the ER department was in the same building. They revived her after being dead for about 10 seconds. So we decided after her near death experience, we do not want to venture far from her. Along with the tumor, she already has hyperthyroidism, kidney disease, and high blood pressure which we have learned is somewhat normal when you have a cat that is turning 20 in a few months and is almost 100 years old in human years. Honestly, we are not sure how long she has to live, and that hits us hard especially because she has been part of the family since she was three months old. But on a positive note, we are happy to report that she is feeling a lot better now with new medications. She is almost back to her old self…jumping around like she is completely unaware of her age and screaming at us when we are annoying her which is often. So we just want her to be happy and comfortable which requires us to be home more frequently. Though we do have a few more flashback trips we would like to share, and we still plan on taking day trips around the PNW as well as spotlighting all the interesting sights in Seattle. We hope to be blogging about our new travels soon. We will definitely keep you all posted!

Hope everyone has a great week and wonderful start to the new year!