The General Sherman Tree & Tokopah Falls

Bright and early this morning, I woke up and asked the kids what they wanted to do today.  They all answered "SLEEP!"  So Justin and I made breakfast while the kids caught another hour of shut eye.

Once we finished breakfast, we all loaded  up and headed out on the shuttle, bound for The General Sherman Tree.

The General Sherman Tree is the largest tree in the park, and it is utterly amazing. There is a 1/2 mile paved trail down to the tree, but guess who was dismayed to see this sign.

I am happy to report that Tatum made it all the way down and back up again with only a few complaints.

And when you have such an amazing sight at the bottom, the trail doesn't seem so bad.  This gigantic tree is 275 feet tall.  We couldn't even get a picture of the thing, it was so huge.

For perspective, that is The General Sherman Tree from another vantage point.  I still couldn't get the whole thing to fit in my viewfinder.

From The Sherman Tree, we went on to hike Tokopah Falls.  The Tokopah Falls trailhead is right next to our campground.  It is 1.7 miles each way, but the kids weren't taking any chances.  They made sure to study the trail map just before we left.  We didn't want a repeat of yesterday.

The trail was well marked, so there was no possibility of getting lost.  There had been bear sightings on the trail the day before (unbeknownst to the kids), so we made them make lots of noise while hiking.  Tatum and Rylee drove Connor crazy singing campfire songs Grandpa John had taught them in Roosevelt.  I think half the forest was serenaded by "The Grand Old Duke of York."

When we finally made it the falls, swarms of mosquitos prevented us from staying long.  We grabbed a quick picture and headed back down.

We made a quick retreat and headed back to camp.  We are enjoying lunch and packing up for our next adventure.  We leave bright and early for white water rafting tomorrow, so we are getting all ready for that.  We may even eat out tonight!  :-)