It wasn't as freezing cold as it was in Grand Canyon. Maybe because it wasn't 5am.
There was no showers at the campground, but I did my very best to make myself look and feel more decent. After all, we were going to Yosemite today! And in addition to bears and god-knows-what-monsters, there would be people. Our fellow-turists, to be more exact. And turists always have their cameras ready. And looking more like a human, not some wild unknown monster, it would be more unlikely to end up in someone's trip-album.. Right there above the: "We don't know what this is but we informed the ranger. If it turns out to be a new species, it will be named after us: 'Gustafsson's monster'"
(I think I look almost human there, well-fed one!)
While we were packing up our car (and I was munching some breakfast) someone came to say hi:
I'm not sure was it just that I was unlucky or was the chipmunk a clever chipmunk, but I didn't get a chance to bring him with me. Whatta shame!
I found something else though.. SOMETHING I COULD HAVE BROUGHT WITH ME! But I decided that even once in a life-time I do what I'm told to do:
..So I left this trap there.
Yosemite wasn't too hard to find. Luckily!
Soon after these views, we found ourselves in a LOOOONG line. Everyone wanted to go to Yosemite. (Elevation was about 10.000feet at that moment)
Once it was our turn to pay the entrance fee and get the map and warnings about bears and other wildlife..
At the booth, the woman there informed us about something else too! Something we weren't prepared for.. at all! Wildfires! There was a huge wildfire going on so we were told to take a detour to the Yosemite Village(where the most important things are.. and our campground!). The detour was several hours. And we didn't even have too much gas. And gas costs money. And I had very limited budget. And driving takes a lot of time. And time..well, I didn't have so much time either.. And just to add up something to whine about, Volvo's 'check engine'-light went on! GGGGRRRRRREAT! Just awesome.
Once again we stopped the car. No one stopped this time. Not even any german couple. There we were..two blonds, a Volvo and Volvo's manual,which told us to take the car to the nearest Volvo autorepair-store! HAH. Like there was a Volvo-repair in Yosemite! HAH. So we had to find the nearest.. So we started to drive out from the Yosemite National Park. On the way we saw the actual wildfire and I got some ash on my shirt too..
We went to some tiny town nearby to find a car repairer. In the town's pizzeria(we went there to ask for advice, not to eat) they had a crazy sign that said basically said that they can refuse to serve people if they choose so. And that they have a right to do so!(The woman there was scary that I didn't take a picture of the sign.. And I didnt wanna upset her, because we needed her help!)
She told us to go to place A. The place A just asked what kind of car we have, and when we told them that it's a VOLVO,they said they can't help us. I think that in this point we decided to put the Pentti(navigator..GPS..whatever) on and ask him! He found a couple of them. But the one where we went to, was clearly someone's private farm. Or just inhabited by sheep and cows and horses. I didn't see any humans so I'm not 100% sure. So that was place B. Went to the place C next and there we encountered some real mechanics: a potbellied/beerbellied man plus 2 others. The BB-man was clearly the boss of the place and he said he can charge us $50 for just taking a look at the car. Maybe fix it if it's some really basic thing, but if it's something a little bigger, he can do nothing. And probably he won't be able to do anything, because it's an European car. But at least he could tell us that since the light wasnt blinking, we should be good. But once it starts blinking, we would be screwed! And that the nearest Volvo-repair is in Modesto. We thanks the BeerBelly &Co. And left. Just thinking about probably getting a nice bill from that repair(if we'd ever get to Modesto!) or getting stuck somewhere in Yosemite's roads with a broken car(the towing costs millions) was brain-fucking. We were now about 40mins out from Yosemite and kinda lost with our plans. Not for long, and Volvo did something unexpected: the light turned off! So there we were again..in another brain-fucking situation:
a) to try to drive to Modesto and pay for someone to check the car(and the clock was about 3.30 and Modesto was about 1hr drive away, so the repair-shop would probably be closed already! And then we would need to find a place to sleep! Sleeping in the car was illegal and getting a fine.. ehm.. not a good idea.)
b) go back to Yosemite and take the damned detour and camp(= probably sleep in the car again). Then early in the morning leave without seeing anything in Yosemite( the detour would have taken so long that we would have gotten into our campground in the middle of the night!)
We decided to go to Modesto. But the closer we got, the more clear it was us: we r not going to take the car to the repair. The car sounded totally normal and no unusual lights were on.
So then we drove somewhere in the middle of fields and stuff. It felt pretty finnish.
We got some "cheer-up!"-food from Burger King: Hershey's sundae-pie and OREO-shake! And the day got again a little better when we spotted a man doing some crazy-ass dance-moves in his car! And not just body movements! The face and the mouth in it had some ridiculous moves too!! It was pretty hilarious. We laughed and felt a lot better. The day kept getting back to very satisfying when we found Motel6! We check ourselves in. No more sleeping in a car! We got our own big beds! And ordered some food from PizzaHut. And I think I watched True Blood<3 Season2. Now I've seen 2 episodes from the second season! Cant wait to see the rest!
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