04.06.2019 - Drive to Lee Vining

[Sam_Smith]

Travelling this time was DH (54) - driver/eater/moaner/petrol head/biker

Me (51) - navigator/planner/booker/spreadsheet creator/feeder

Up early as usual but we had a long drive ahead of us so we were fine with that.

I enjoyed what we saw of LA, but DH did not. He says it's a dump! My only comment is that the homeless situation is very sad. I heard on the radio whilst we were there that a conservative estimate of the numbers of homeless in LA is 52,000. At times we were actually stepping over people on the sidewalks.

After another 7:30 breakfast at Denny's

we packed up and got ready to move on. Now after much Googling last night we decided not to try and drive on Route 66. I know I know, what about the name of the trip report I hear you say! Well it would have added 126 miles to our trip today, so the trip report is now called:

The NO Route 66 Whistle Stop Tour June 2019!

The next 326 miles had some stunning scenery and we stopped half way for petrol and a snack

and the further from the coast we got, the hotter it got!

Which was odd because the more snow we saw!

We finally arrived in Lee Vining and checked into our motel. The Yosemite Gateway Motel £305 for 2 nights. We had a view of Mono Lake from the balcony outside our room

It was so pretty. There was a babbling stream at the bottom of the hill and that is all we could hear. There were hundreds of butterflies in the lilac bushes and the air was so fresh.

Lee Vining is a very small community which happens to be the closest town to the Tioga Pass, so there isn't a lot there. We ate at the small BBQ restaurant which was right opposite our motel. Bodie Mike's BBQ. It's a small family run BBQ place and was very nice.

I had an appetiser of loaded pulled pork fries and a side salad and DH had ribs

It was all very nice and DH polished of all of his ribs as well as some of my pulled pork.

Tomorrow was supposed to be a drive to Yosemite, but the Tioga pass was still shut due to snowfall. The pass has only been shut so late in the year a handful of times in the past, but they had seen unprecedented levels of snowfall so we had to change our plans.

[Mortimer Mouse]

Really enjoying your report so far. I'm toying with the idea of a future road trip so it's so useful to read of other peoples experiences. Those views from the car look amazing.

Very sad to hear that they're so many homeless in LA.