but before we get to Part 2, The children’s novel about Hokusai’s life has the aged master predicting that some day his young apprentice, Tojiro, might take up a walking stick and see the world beyond Edo. He suggests the lovely walk along the Tokaido to Kyoto.
Part 2: Penn State
This posting is going to have two parts (1 & 2)
Part 1: Sequoia National Forest
One of the things Michelle most wanted to do before going off to college was to re-visit Sequoia. We took the kids twice; both times they were very little, and the second time was the first time they’d actually been in enough snow to make snowmen. We’d been cabin camping around Grant Grove then, but most of my memories of Sequoia were tent camping in Lodgepole (quite primitive when I first went to Sequoia many years ago, revamped a decade or two ago so that there is now a nature center, small store, even laundry facilities by the campground entrance.
The Deadly River (Rio Mortal), Kaweah River, Sequoia, CA
It’s a big campground that straddles the north fork of the Kaweah River. Yes, there are some flush toilets, and an impregnable steel bear-proof box is in each campsite.
Here’s the problem: Sequoia fills up 4-8 months in advance every year, and Michelle mentioned this with a little over a month to go before we bundled her off to Pennsylvania. Still, nothing ventured. I kept at the online registration site, and someone must have eventually canceled because two nights at just one tent site opened up, and I grabbed it.
We loved the peace, the change from Los Angeles (Santa Monica). The weather was clear and warm (tending to hot), the air so rich with evergreen that, matched with the thin air over 6,000 feet, it prompted the rangers to post an air warning (not from smog but from possible allergies). The river (main visual entertainment along with the flickering fire at night) rushed blue and green, and Michelle was a bit miffed I told her I wasn’t bringing a swim suit. Now my reasoning was this: last time I’d been to Sequoia, signs about river deaths were posted at the trail head. This time new signs shouted, “Deadly River – Rio Mortal” (with the last wave from the hand of a drowning person sinking beneath the water).
Then we saw groups of kids swimming in the clear pools. It really did look inviting. I offered to give Michelle my spare shorts to swim in, but we both settled on dangling our legs in the water. COLD DOES NOT DESCRIBE IT. And we saw the reason when we hiked up the trail to Tokopah Falls. There are still patches of snow and ice in the shadowy parts of the mountains; the river is ice-fed. With ice-numb feet we decided that maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing we didn’t bring out suits.
The Hikes
Sequoia has changed a lot. In an attempt to lower the footprint of so many thousands of tourists they now have shuttles from one meadow to the next, and that’s a good thing (unless 44 Chinese hikers are piled into an already-full shuttle that says, “Maximum Occupancy 25). But day one we took the shuttle to the General Sherman tree, walked through the pudgy, orange giants and came back to the campsite for a bite. Then the trek up to Tokopah Falls (leisurely as long as you are in shape, used to the thin air, expecting the switchback scree near the end) tested our city legs.
Michelle and I reach Tokopah Falls
We actually saw a mother bear and her two cubs on the trail (they didn’t seem to bother with the hikers who snapped a gazillion photos), a pretty rare sight. And we did make it to the falls where we took pictures of parties who took pictures of us and so on.
The trail head is deceptive, though. It’s so gentle (100 feet of blacktop leading to duff and then a variety of trail types), that this hike attracts kids, aging great-grandparents, mai-tai-toting couples in flowered shirts and muumuus, and people decked out in K2-ready backpack gear. On the way back down the trail, a few groups asked, “Are we almost there?” Michelle and I would try to assess the general condition of the group, and we’d give a heartening, “You’re almost there” or “You have an easy walk for about a quarter mile followed by some switchbacks over some loose rocks for the final quarter mile.” One couple with their kids had walked about 2/3 of the way in flip-flops, and they were tired. They asked us how much farther it was to the falls, and we told them. They looked crestfallen; they’d come so far but were just too footsore and unprepared to go the final bit. “But you can actually see the falls if you go about 100 yards around that bend there.” We actually walked them to the lower view of the falls, and they were happy they’d not hiked so far just to miss seeing the base of the falls.
The next day (our last full day; it was a quick trip) saw us indecisive. There was a lot of roadwork going on in the park, and we’d wanted to go up Moro Rock, but that road was closed. That also kept us from another hike we’d planned-Crescent Meadow. We sort of ambled to Giant Forest area, and Michelle noticed the “Road Closed” sign was gone. So we drove past the Auto Log (you can no longer actually park on top of it for photos) to Moro Rock. this was one of those “I’m pretty sure I’m not in any shape to make this climb” moments. There are over 400 steps carved into the rock surface that allow tourist to toil up to the top where there is a spectacular view (more spectacular if the smog/fog doesn’t obscure the San Joaquin Valley in the distance) of the mountains ringing Sequoia. We were the second people on the rock (the first was a tourist who’d side-stepped the sign (which was there when he started) and hiked three miles in (impressive since he had about forty pounds of camera equipment strapped to him).
Michelle on Moro Rock, Sequoia
And we had no problems; we just chugged up the steps and inclines and turnings and were there! Yes, we each went through a bottle of water on the way up, but water’s good stuff, no? And we took pictures of Castle Rock and the valley below us before we headed back down (the first shuttle was just arriving when we were about 1/2 way down.
Our last Sequoia hike was a sedate ramble around Crescent Meadow. Well, sort of. We were going to do the 1 1/2 mile loop to look at what John Muir called, “The Gem of the Sequoias” and end up at Tharp’s Log (a hollowed-out, fallen log with rough-hewn table and fireplace and bed that was used by a rancher when he brought his cattle up to the meadow from the valleys below in the late 1800′s). Uncharacteristically, I did not look at the trail maps. I was sure I remembered the route.
Well, I didn’t. We ended up taking a side path that had us dragging around muddy, mosquito-clouded Log Meadow. Tharp’s Log is not actually on Log Meadow; though there are plenty of other logs on this path which had not been hiked in some time (if the overgrowth covering the trail were any indicator). Hiking while batting away mosquitoes is not my favorite activity, and I was tired and grumpy when we reconnected with the trail to Tharp’s Log. Still, we made it (yes, with some mosquito bites), saw the rustic log-home, hiked the simple trail back to the parking lot.
It was a wonderful trip. It showed me I need to walk more, and it reminded me just how much fun I have traveling with my daughter.
(to be continued)
Moving Michelle to College did take a lot of attention and time, and the month leading up to it was packed with to-do items. She’s off at Penn State where the Forensics Department has the niftiest van ever:
PSU Forensics Van
I’m going to catch up on a few quick items here:
Busy, hectic times. I’ve nearly finished George Meegan’s book; I’m learning teensy bits of Japanese (trying not to cross my eyes when I hear the variations which MAY occur and reminding myself that English is hardly a stranger to this; my daughter was pointing out words which sound alike but which have very different meanings which must be determined from context, and I thought about homophones in English (which and witch, there and they’re and their–that sort of thing; she says that in hiragana they will be spelled the same, but the differences are plain in kanji). I really think I need to buckle down and learn AT LEAST hiragana or katakana so that I can sound things out. I’ve also discovered that so many American-adopted words can be figured out with a bit of effort: boo-rou-soo for blouse, for example.
I’m trying to get back to my t’ai chi practice to add to walking, and I’m now seriously looking at “stuff” at REI and other shops.
But, really, the only walking-related progress I can point to is coming up next week when the kids and I are going to Sequoia for a last camping trip before Michelle goes away to college 
We’ll have lots of nifty hikes there. I’ll post…REALLY…I WILL!
Oh, and I have to include a link to a site that may be a rich source for me to pore over pre-trip. It’s a tourism site encouraging strolls along sections of the Old Tokaido inShizuoka Prefecture. There are maps, tips, historical notes, and so on, and they’re available both in English and Japanese. Now I realize this only sees through less than 1/2 of the posts on the Old Tokaido, but that’s still a great start:
OK, it’s been awhile since I’ve posted here. I plead…well…busy-ness. Michelle and I have been shopping and making up the itinerary for her soon-move to Pennsylvania. My neighbor whose husband works for Google has added me to the Google+ beta, and I’m seeing if that will be a good way to talk to my daughter when she’s away at college. I’m trying to get a jump on my new Film & Lit class (I’m only on lecture 3, but I have the framework of the class all set up).
On the learning Japanese front, I’m still not the wunderkind that would make a language teacher beam. Ito sensei has saved some conversational Japanese cassettes (and accompanying books) for me, and that’s a blessing, but I”m still distractable by the little things. I was reading episode 23 of Hikaru No Go, and I came across henohenomoheji–doodling with Japanese characters. Michelle remembers Kazumasa showing her simple nonomo face drawings when he stayed with us. Here’s a simple site with some information:
And I’m been reading George Meegan’s book The Longest Walk in bits; he’s reached Central America at this point. Aside from feeling that I’d really not enjoy the hardship that even a yoshikart could not make up for, I’m struck by how the walking diary is really a love story. And putting this together with Kintaro Walks Japan (Kintaro is in love with Ayumi, George and Yoshiko Meegan’s daughter), the whole thing washes over me with joy and relationship.
It’s a very busy time, but I’ve not vanished.
It’s Father’s Day, and what a lovely gift appeared on the dining room table this morning. There were also balloons that Jamahl (one of our cats) had managed to untie from the back of a chair, and I’d gotten a much-needed early gift of BBQ utensils last night.
But the gift this morning was completely unexpected: Living Language Japanese (book, CDs, dictionary) and a pocket travel dictionary.
Now my feet are really to the fire; I was dawdling with the basic text and workbook Michelle brought home from her Japanese class(es), and my excuse (which was a real one) was that the CDs were missing, so it was hard for me to practice in the car, while playing World of Warcraft, walking along the beach, just noodling around the office. This set comes with four CDs to help me practice some words, phrases, sentences, dialogues.
I love that it says Complete in the title. I’m pretty sure four CD’s won’t have me mastering the entire language. But I’m also pretty sure that it will give me the rudiments I need to ask directions to the nearest bathroom or hotel or restaurant or telephone or bank. And I can, quite possibly, stuff four CDs worth of information into my greying skull.
Added to Ito sensei’s help, my GameBoy DS Japanese Tutor game, a number of websites many of you have been so kind to share with me, I should be on my way. Along those lines, I learned this morning that Japanese rarely use the phrase “I love you.” Of course the word love is befuddled with loads of meaning (Platonic love is not romantic love is not motherly love is not love of Snickers candy bars). Several sites did teach me how to say “I love you” (and love the thoughtfulness of the Father’s Day gifts), but it also gave me some interesting notes on “love” Vs. “like”:
watashi wa anata wo aishiteru (I love you)
watashi wa anata wo daisuki desu (I like you…with various ending options… delete desu, add da if you are male, etc.)
I’d better memorize the difference… this sort of thing could get me into trouble!
OK, Michelle and I were considering our getting-her-installed-at-Penn-State options, and the Road Trip looked like the best option (though she though I should not join a sorority). A five (maybe six) day drive through Four Corners, across Kansas, stopping at my relatives in Indianapolis, on down into Pennsylvania would be long and tiring but fun. And we now own just about every Glee CD on the planet, so we could sing across America. There was the added advantage of being able to shop for all of her stuff here and hauling it rather than cramming what we could onto a plane and joining the mad shopping rush near college.
I didn’t want to make the solo trip home, so the idea of a one-way rental car seemed to fit the bill. Bill is right. I looked into it, and by drop-off in State College the car alone would cost me over $1700 (economy model); the one-way luxury adds a lot to the cost. Factor in gas, hotels, souvenirs from half a dozen Mystery Spots along the way, and this move was looking prohibitively expensive.
The train is a possibility (I love train travel), but if we popped for the cheapest sleeper (and we would; it’s a 57-hour trip), the price is still pretty steep (though we would not have to add gas and hotels). The downside is the stations are quite where we want them to be, and trains are not always on time. I’d hate to be stuck in Chicago an extra day and not get to college on time. Though, honestly, I’m not too worried about that; we could leave early.
Another option (and the one that’s at the head of the list at the moment) is taking the plane to Raleigh and visiting my brother and his family for a couple of days before getting a car to drive 8 hours up to State College. This has the one downside of traveling with quite a bit of stuff on the plane there (and I’m not a huge plane fan), but we could manage a couple of checked bags, and we could do the rest of the dorm shopping in Raleigh while my brother and his wife are at work. We’d have a rental car (relatively cheap because I’d return it to Raleigh airport and take the plane back).
This also gets in the way of my mad desire to shop for all of the stuff on The Definitive Freshman Checklist . I’m excited to shop for gizmos and gadgets with my daughter.
Pluses and minuses and practice: figuring out how to pare down here world so that she can have a comfortable, efficient, fun mini-world in her 1/2 of a standard college dorm (and further paring down that list to figure out how to pack necessities for the plane) is good practice as I’m considering how to pack things Tetris-like into a hiking pack for a long walk down the eastern shore of Japan.
