The King of trees

From the wide flat dusty hot plains around Fresno we gently rise up towards another National Park. In fact it's two national parks in one, Kings Canyon and Sequoia National Forest. Driving here felt like being back in Mexico or South America. For an hour or so we pass countless shacks besides fields in which oranges and limes are growing. Many grape vines are also here but they look withered and less organised than their South American wine producing neighbours. Rubbish litters the roadside as dust blows into the abandoned houses.


Ahead is a mountain range where we are heading. Gaining altitude again feels like we're suddenly in a different country as the snow begins to appear by the side of the road until it gets car high at the national park entrance. Timing isn't always something you have a say in and it seems coming to a national park on a Saturday is a bit of a mistake. It's packed. It may be covered in snow and ice but the sun is shining and plenty of families have travelled from Fresno to picnic and barbecue. People are cooking great slabs of meat on large 'camping' stoves in the backs of pick-up trucks and kids are running around throwing snowballs and screaming with their parents. It sounds a bit like the swimming baths.
We walk around the slippery trail through humongous trees that have been around for hundreds of years.


The largest of the trees and one of the biggest in the world is the General Sherman giant sequoia. Massive it is. It looks fake it's so big. There are also a couple of trees that have fallen years ago and now have hollowed allowing people to walk through them, this is the size of these things.
We get away from the crowds down by a snowed over lake. This is also where a couple of bible camps are located. I don't know why but I feel a bit nervous around these oddballs. Ok, so it's mainly just average looking kids playing around but there's just something not right around here.

We walk in the deep snow for a while and take in the undeniably beautiful landscape.
We've had a few days of the cold and snow so we fancied getting some warmth and heading down south is the best option at this time of year.
After all this time and the variety of landscapes we still haven't left California. Before we do we have to check out the most southerly and most famously sun-drenched of Californian cities, San Diego.