California bound

We had a great week plus road tripping to Tom's nephew's wedding in Mammoth Lakes. We took our time and had a relaxing journey.

With no definite plans we decided to head over to the Eastern side of Oregon along the Umpqua River route and that landed us at Diamond Lake for the night, an unexpected jewel. We walked the bike trail that goes all around the lake (almost 12 miles, though we only went about a quarter of a mile) and met some great people who we ended up talking the night away with around their campfire and then headed back to our room in the dark.



This was my first time at Crater Lake and found not only the lake to be incredible but the surrounding terrain, including the Pumice Desert. We hiked up to the fire lookout and was lucky to have the fire patrol ranger let us into the lookout hut and provide an overview of his fire detection techniques.He demonstrated the purpose of the rubber souled stool in case of lightening saying that he kneels on the stool and "assumes the position" (praying for his life).








Finally, the purpose for the road trip -- Chad and Oona's wedding at Mammoth. We headed to our cabin at Convict Lake where the wedding, reception and festivities took place. It was beautiful and the weather was picture perfect. See those blokes on the bikes at the 11,000+ foot summit of Mammoth -- they're friends and we thought crazy fools to ride down the mountain on dirt bikes until we decided to do the same our last day at Mammoth. It was harrowing, albeit exhilarating and I'm glad no body parts were broken in this pursuit of adventure. (Note: We did not start from the summit)











A week of dinners, barbeques, hiking, biking and gondola's to the top of the mountain concluded with the wedding of Chad and Oona in the most beautiful setting on Convict Lake. Our cabin faced the party cabin (among the pictures below).






We headed West from Mammoth through Tioga Pass and Yosemite National Park with all of its fantastic rock formations (lots of rock climbers), Alpine lakes, John Muir/Pacific Trail, and overlook into the Valley floor to the famous Half Dome.