Hi Sierras Day 5 Hit the mountain!

[parisdisneyfan]

We slept well in the mountain air, and woke around 6 watching the sunrise. Although the condo had a kitchen we still went out for breakfast. There was a starbucks at the bottom of the stairs but the queue was long so I went to the Genuine NY Bagel & Deli store. I had pancakes which were supposed to come with blueberries and strawberries but they had run out so I had bananas! Neil had a ham and cheese croissant. It was ok but think we will try for SB tomorrow.

We enjoyed a lazy morning sitting on the balcony sorting out money, writing up what we had done, Neil sorting the techie stuff and dd phoning. As the weather was lovely we decided to go for a walk into Mammoth itself rather than the ski resort, this was on quite a steep hill but very pretty. We stopped at a couple of shops, strangely a Ralph Lauren outlet but hey we got a good deal on some socks! Then a touristy one and got a fishing t-shirt for bil christmas. We then found a Subway and had a nice sandwich for lunch, sitting in the sunshine. We had started to walk back up, and although we didn't have headaches we did realise that 7000 ft altitude was getting to us and we hadn't realised how far we had walked downhill. We were just catching our breath when luckily the free bus/tram thing came by so we hopped on and were back in 5 minutes rather than the 20 it probably would have taken us walking.

We collected the car from the extremely tight underground car park and we were headed back to the 395 for the short trip to Mono Lake and Lee Vining, however we decided to follow the scenic route instead of the way we came in yesterday, and it was very pretty. Once on the 395 we followed signposts to the south tufa on Mono. This was very pretty and interesting. We spent an enjoyable and informative 2 hours following the trail down to the lake side and among the tufa stacks. These are calcium like structures that bubble up through the lake bed and make large masses, similar to coral but not alive. The reason you can see them now is because LA diverted the streams that flow into Mono Lake and the level has dropped hugely over the last 50-60 years. This has now stopped and they are hoping that the level will start to rise again. It is quite sobering to see the boards as you walk down the path, telling you that this was the water edge in such and such a year. Lots of birds live around the lake, up to 2 million at some times of the year, with around 60,000 of those being Californian seagulls that come to breed.

It was interesting watching them feed on the sandflies as they had developed a comical technique - they run through the swarm on the beach with their mouths open and catch them as the flies fly up The water here is 2.5 times saltier than the sea, similar to the Dead Sea and like the Dead Sea it has no outlets. Due to the salinity no fish live in it just something called brine shrimps. Anyway we discovered via the information boards that despite there being no fish the ospreys like nesting on the tufa stacks and just fish in other lakes nearby.

Before leaving I had my first experience of US outdoor loos - pipe and loo seat over hole in the ground - ok, until I read some graffiti "Watch out the snakes don't bite your hiney" if I hadn't been desperate...

Anyway breathing calmed down we headed on to Lee Vining to get our Yosemite pass but we had stayed so long at Mono that we had missed the visitor centre. We filled up with fuel and then headed back to Mammoth via the June Lake loop, and what a great choice that was. Firstly spectactular scenery and second we saw the ospreys that may have been nesting at Mono. We didn't see them fish but watched them looking over the lakes, wonderful

We were back around 7.30 and wandered round the resort to find something for tea. We ended up getting take out from the Smokehouse restaurant. I must admit it wasn't bad food but really 45 mins for pasta for Neil and chicken and mash for me - if this is off season how do they manage in the ski season? The chicken was slightly undercooked for me, so I left some, but the mash and pasta were good. We finished off the B&J and had an earlyish night as need a good start for a long day in Yosemite tomorrow.

[orlandosgr8]

Another really lovely day, it sounds like you got to see some great scenery.

[abiknox]

the snake comment made me laugh!

[CrispyA]

That altitude is tough!