national park

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Revisiting memories from a Pink Floyd T-shirt

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The previous post in this series is here..

A long long time ago, there was a Pink Floyd T-Shirt that I used to have. It had a picture of a man diving into water. You can see his legs reflection only in the water as he has gone waist down into the water. The landscape in the background looks like some special effects from a Dune movie.

Post Google days, I find that this picture is of Mono lake in California!! Used to tell San that we should go visit it. Eventually we did go with her cousin’s family with the little kids to see Mono lake. But we did not get to stay for Sunset. It was also 95 F outside and the brine flies did not encourage us to spend more time there. It was still a great trip as we checked off “Mono lake”! ( just realized that when I moved all my old posts from blogger to squarespace, early Youtube video links never transferred over!!! Here was the original blogger post and a post with pics (sadly doesn’t show up in squarespace as the porting was probably not good!) . and here is the link to a past Youtube video.

After hiking Mt. Dana and staying practically in the same area, we decided to go see the sunset at Mono lake. It was a 10 minute drive to the Vista point and the entire group went there right after an early dinner.

This time the sunset did the T-shirt picture justice. We were treated to natures landscape show! The skies lit up in so many hues over the 45 minutes we were there! Two “bench photos” to start things off.

These landscapes made me photo crazy.. here is a landscape gallery! Yet again, I played spoil sport as soon as the sun went down. There were no restrooms in this area and I had to get back to the hotel room. So the entire group rushed back so yours truly could use the lodge restroom. No one complained.

These landscapes are really out worldly!

And a few panos..

A few more photos in portrait format..

A video highlights reel of our time watching the sunset at Mono lake.

It was time well spent. We were there for maybe an hour or hour and a half. We came back to the lodge and. got a good nights sleep. The next mornings plan was to go to Mammoth lakes and then come back home.

We decided to change that plan as well and visit something else.. that in the next and last post of this trip..

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The king and queen pagodas of Doi Inthanon

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The previous post in this series is here..

After going on the Ang Ka trail to the highest point in Thailand we came down that mountain and went up to another mountain within the park that overlooked Chiang Mai. Forty years ago the royal family commissioned two pagodas in memory of the previous king and queen with a beautiful park on top of this mountain as a tourist attraction.

The place is amazing. First you have to wait for a Hummer looking vehicle to take you to the top. Once up, there were escalators you could use to go up. We did use them where they worked. We walked around the pagodas and soaked up the views. Took some pictures. Then we had to wait in a station for a return vehicle. Joy managed to squeeze us in, given we were only two people and not part of a large group!

This was our last stop in the park. The next two hours was a ride back towards our hotel.. so we could rest.

The one pano shots I took from the top…

San dozed off while I watched the landscape change from mountain to traffic!

Here is a video highlights reel..

We finally made it back to the city center after a long day of travel and constant hiking..

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Angel's landing - aka adventures of a middle aged man

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The previous post in this series is here..

On our second day at Zion National park, we left our cabin at 6:30 when it was still dark, drove 10 minutes to the visitor center and boarded the Zion shuttle to the Grotto. The entire bus was going there or past that to narrows, so it was a 20 min ride. We were on the third bus. So a large crowd had already started up ahead of us.

Our permit to go from Scouts landing to Angels landing was 8:30-9:00 AM. So we walked as fast as we could to get to that point. Then it was pretty steep and a risky climb holding on to the chains.

We did make it to Angel’s landing and enjoyed the view. More than that it was a sense of accomplishment.

This is the best photo of me going to the highest point on the landing site. The top is around 2 feet by 2 feet. Wanted to stand on top. A few people did. I wasn’t afraid but there was a lot of screaming from the ladies and had to be happy with one foot on top.

Then we made our way back to Scout’s landing. By the time we almost made it back there was a huge crowd of folks going up. We were all down within 10 minutes of each other.

Ate a packed lunch.. tamarind rice tastes really good after a long hike like that as do idli’s with milagai podi. Our return from Scout’s landing to the shuttle stop was fast.

We decided to go get something to eat at Zion lodge after the hike, and get something to drink, use the restrooms and decide what to do next.. We had made it back to Zion lodge by Noon!

Angel’s landing has been a dream come true after so many years for me. Most of the photos are of me and Sangeetha. She does not like me to post more than two pics of her in any post but this one has to be an exception. Also I took the COVID and Flu shots yesterday and my hands and shoulders are sore.. so compressing all photos to two galleries.

A landscape one ..

and a portait one

A video highlight reel of our hiking (and at places climbing)..

This place is amazing. Needs some planning to do the hike. You are better off if in good shape and can hike steep rocks. Also not having a fear of heights helps. Definitely having hiking shoes, (poles for whose who need it till Scout’s landing) etc. help.

A totally amazing experience that will stay with us for a long time. We have been asked over and over again if this is harder than Half Dome. Nope. Half Dome last part on the chain is way harder than this.. but this one is riskier especially with a relatively undisciplined crowd. Still, a fantastic experience.

Angel’s landing - Check!

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