Yosemite was a dream

So our trip to Yosemite started off on a crazy stressful note. 

We were meant to start our journey with a 6:50am bus ride on the 31st, however I (well I guess we? but since I was in charge of the booking, I should have checked) did not think of double checking how many nights we were meant to be staying in SF and was almost certain that we had one more night left. So in the day of the 31st, we were on our way to brunch when Topo mentioned that he got an email saying that our bus had already left and so I quickly checked our booking and realised that we had missed our bus :'((((( Thankfully, it was not pass our check out time at the hostel and so we had time to head back to grab our bags and think of a plan. 

always check people. always double check. 

A few tears, panicked moments, arguments and a train booking later, we found ourselves at the same cafe we had planned on going to brunch to called Vegan Picnic, which had phenomenal food!!!! We then caught the 2:30pm amtrak bus, followed by an amtrak train that had to stop halfway due to some malfunction = more stress because we were going to miss the last possible bus after to get to our accommodation, but thankfully followed by a bus that rescued all passengers on the silly delayed train to Yosemite Mountain Bug Resort! 

We had to lug our suitcases up a hill to get to our resort from the bus stop, which was hella tiring after having sat down for hours and when we finally arrived, I was just so so so glad that we had made it after all that afternoon's stress. Though I would have preferred not to have been so stressed out, it was a good learning experience to 

#1 always check your bookings especially on a multi-destination trip

#2 stay calm because things will eventually be ok 

I absolutely loved the tent that we stayed in! I have never stayed in an accommodation like this and would definitely do it again. We got a 15% discount off accommodation, food and spa (unfortunately we had arrived too late to enjoy it) because we arrived on public transport

I was so impressed by the restaurant at the resort because they had really good vegan options and even vegan desserts! There was a really lovely outdoor fireplace where 2 ladies were singing and playing the guitar whilst people ate smores round the fireplace :') 

The next morning, we had gotten up at 5:45am because we wanted to catch the earliest bus at 6:40am to get to the visitor centre. It was really chilly, much colder than I had expected, but we managed to get ready so quickly and grabbed our suitcases with us, even managed to grab lunch to go and ran all the way to the bus stop with our suitcases to then see the bus leave in front of our eyes. We were literally 30 seconds away from the bus stop  

took some pics whilst waiting for the next bus hehe

In the end, it all worked out perfectly well because when we arrived at the visitors centre at 8:55am on the next bus, we found out that it only opened at 9am. The reason that we wanted to go to the visitors centre was because the lady at the resort mentioned that we could store our suitcases there whilst we went hiking but to our disappointment (and anger), there was no storage spaces for visitors to leave their bags seeing that most people either arrived by car or were staying at lodges in Yosemite. Topo and I then walked around lugging our suitcases trying to find a sneaky hidden spot to store our bags. After 2 failed attempts because people had found us out and told us we couldn't do that, a lady mentioned that we could try to store our bags in one of the lodges despite not being guest. 

and Hallelujah! There was available storage space for us at the Yosemite Valley lodge and the kind staff let us store them there even though we weren't paying guests :) 

We then embarked on the Mist Trail, a signature Yosemite hike that takes you to both Vernal and Nevada falls. The hike wasn't easy,  it took us 4 hours for a round trip and we had to take breaks to catch our breaths and rest our legs but it was simply magical and breathtaking and just looking back at these photos makes me want to be there right now 

This was taken just from the bus stop outside the visitors centre so you can imagine that once you step foot into the Yosemite area, it's already beautiful all around you 

Topo and I actually joked when we just arrived at the visitors centre that the views here were already enough so we could now move on to our next destination hahaha

Hiking to Vernal falls was such a crazy experience! 

The strength of the waterfall was so powerful that you could feel the water on your face as far as 50m away 

this was the path to the falls where we had started getting wet

and we saw so many rainbows!!!! 

Rainbows make me so excited

We then stopped for lunch and had delicious sandwiches that we had bought earlier on from the resort. They had wrapped the veggies and the bread separately so that the bread wouldn't have gotten soggy by the time we ate them - how sweet and the veggies were so fresh and there was even avocados in there!! Our lunch pack even came with a little ziplock bag containing trail mix with m&ms' and cookies!! enough said. It was a great lunch

accidentally dropped food quickly became a snack for this cute squirrel

I hope it didn't mind the mustard

We then continued our journey to Nevada falls 

This journey was even tougher than before because it had gotten much steeper 

We then embarked on the Muir trail back to the trailhead :) 

That's Nevada falls in the background 

Our legs were pretty tired by the time we finished the mist trail but we decided to go on the mirror lake trail since we had limited time left to explore the park

The trail was much shorter, it was just a mile away and also relatively flat the entire way

Mirror lake was not as its name suggested as the lake was definitely not still enough for you to see a reflection of the rocks (according to our interpretation, this was how the lake got its name) But it was still pretty and we lay under a tree for a good 45 mins before heading back to the lodge to grab our suitcases

I want to come back to Yosemite in the future and this time to do a week of hiking so that I get to explore everything that this majestic place has to offer :')