Yosemite NP: Day 2: Inspiration Point & Lower Yosemite Falls
The next morning, we woke up to eat the continental breakfast at our inn and then set out for Yosemite, day 2! we asked this guy to take a picture for us and it wasn't as good as this pic taken with the selfiestick haha.
We tried to find "inspiration point" trail, and we drove back and forth through the tunnel like 3 times trying to find the start of the trail. The last time, we realized that it was the opposite side of where we had parked so we embarked on our 1.6 mile hike! It was kind of steep hiking up, but it meant it was much easier going down too!
Our trail! We all got pretty warm during the hike and had to strip off some layers. It was a good exercise that we needed!
Kathy...LOL
A fallen treee
We found this icicle in the tree! It's so cool, I wondered how this happened!! I doubt someone left it there..
Michpoo!
WE'VE FINALLY reached Inspiration Point! Our wise messenger (jenny) delivers us a very inspiring message--YOLO and Happy 23rd to us!
Behind the scenes
TIGHT GRIP on her
These ppl <3
My friends are the most beautiful!
Jenny clearly loves this face sandwich!
i said "let's pretend we're dreaming a nice dream!" and then kathy....LOL
warmest place on our body is our PITS. and between our LEGS.
Going back down!!
We were making this with the hot water at the shop and ppl were looking at us with envyyy and ppl even asked us where we got it HAHA. wise kids :)
We left at 8am from Brandon's place in SJ and we took about 3 hrs to drive into Yosemite NP. On our way in we saw a sign that said "Swinging Bridge" so we stopped by, but there was only a bridge, not swinging. But it was still a nice view.
Jenny said: Be One with Nature.
This was already kind of like a mirror lake, but the one we went to was much prettier! After this we went into Yosemite Village and had lunch. They bought soup and it all smelled so good, but since I had bought an extra 85Degree bread, I finished my bread!
Our first go at my selfie-stick! :)
The master said "come, my minions."
It's like a painting!
So pretty!!
This was during our hike, on our way to mirror lake, and we saw a giant rock and we climbed it and then we became trendsetters because afterwards ppl started lining up to climb it. Okay, maybe we're not trendsetters, but there really wasn't a line before we did it haha
Do you see the reflection in the back?!!
Then we arrived in Mirror lake! So beautiful! all the fall colors...even though it's winter....
This artsy girl haha
Our picture with the Mirror Lake!
This picture always reminds me of "i don't fcuk withchuu"
Then we went ice skating in front of the Half Dome!
Ice skating with the selfie stick and someone photobombsss
I love this picture so much!!!!! We look like we're floating.
OMG Jenny's eyes in this picture are so pretty!!!
Testing out the camera..
<3 Yay. HS Trackstars reuniteddd :)
Kathy left earlier cause her feet were frozen and she was just really cold the whole day :( but we found her sitting by the fire haha
Fire Fire to warm up! :)
We saw someone with the s'more set so we went to buy our own too....$10 for this, and $4 more for sticks....-__- but we would have felt pretty incomplete without it.
Ooey gooey deliciousness!
SMORES!
Afterwards, it got really dark and we took the shuttle back to the parking lot and drove an hour to our hotel! It was a pretty decent hotel for the price we paid and we cooked cup noodles! We tried cooking it with the coffee maker at first, but it wasn't even hot enough for it to work...so we just gave up and microwaved it. Much healthy. Then we watched a movie and that concluded our first night! :)
We stayed in Page, Arizona the night and then drove to the Grand Canyon in the morning!
This is the Grand Canyon. it is very grand, but it also looks the same for the majority of it. So the view gets quite repetitive.
Mi MaMa!
The roof of that circular building!
Unamused. Jk, very amused, but bad timing haha
SEE? Same view.
Same view, different filter.
Ditto. LOL I'm underplaying it, but something named GRAND canyon should be mind-blowing!!!
My last long REAL weekend of the year....spent at Grand Canyon!
MAMA and I! :D Look at that cool cloud in the background (and not the grand canyon LOL)
WOOT! Caught this sign too!
BYE GRAND CANYON! We drove around the south rim and went home after.
I thought the Grand Canyon would be amazing, but maybe I just expected too much. I should always not have any expectations when I'm going somewhere, but it's named the GRAND canyon. I should rightfully expect something grand and amazing. But it ISSSS GRAND but not grand-fully amazing. Okay, onto the next place, no more of this, hehe.
We arrived in Vegas on Thanksgiving day and we had Wolfgang Puck for dinner! It was mediocre for the price...but then after dinner, we went black friday shopping! I could not with the Frozen dolls!!!! SO CUTE. i stood in line with it for as long as i could before my cousin went to pay for the gifts and I sadly put them back on the shelf :( so cute, but would be so useless in my room.
We left Vegas at 7:30 AM and we were supposed to get to Antelope Canyon by 1140 for our tour. So we were in Utah for a bathroom break and then after we got in the car, the time went ahead an hr and we were freaking out because we had just crossed the border and had entered into AZ and there's a 1 hr time difference which we TOTALLY forgot. So I was driving like mad on the highway and somehow we made it there on time!! We didn't have time for lunch but we had some candy leftover from the other night so we ate that to keep us full throughout the tour! :)
Walking down into the canyon!!! So exciting
Good hair day. Not the mother.
Antelope Canyon!
"OPEN YOUR EYES" -mother.
It's a wolf!
Look at that father mad judging me...
Yay cousin!! :)
Look at the layerssssss
So many selfies.
<3
Cant even tell where we are in that polaroid....
PEACE. I kind of got stuck there...
It's a bison!!!!
The real question is...
Who learned....
From who....?
Our tour guide showed us that this is the Rocky Mountain sunset. It's sooooo beautiful!!!
Look at the family behind us. We weren't the only ones at least.
Climbing upwards, this part is towards the end. It was pretty crowded that day, with it being the holidays and so the tour which usually lasts 1 hr 15 took about 2.5 hours to walk through the whole thing, which was fine cause we got to maximize our money spent haha.
Coming out of the canyon!!! So cool how we just peeked out from there.
Mother on my shoulders~
about that thug life.
Our tour guide taught us how to take pictures of us taking pictures of ourselves. LOL We had a lot of fun experimenting with it!
Told my mom to stop hiding behind me....she doesn't look any skinnier. Only awkward.
Afterwards we drove like 10 minutes and arrived at Horseshoe Bend!
This is picture is taken by my mother LOL she was scared so she stood far far away and took a picture from far far away.
This guy took this picture and he just put the camera up in the air, didn't even look through the eye hole and took the freaking polaroid picture. I was like WTF. but it ended up the best picture...professionals still know what's up.
People kept telling me to be careful but i live on the edge (of glory).
This is Mr. Bun, our tuk tuk driver who's always smiling!
Last group photo before we had to leave.
At night, we took our bus to Vietnam...the bus costed like 25 and it took freaking 16 hours. So this was our first bus. It's a sleeping bus and it's so weird..it's all dark and you're basically like shoulder to shoulder with the person next to you and it's weird if you're next to a stranger cause there's nothing separating the two seats.
This was our bus!
We got picked up from the hotel in a van which took us to the bus stop. And we met these 2 Japanese guys, one of them is cut off. And the one in the pic is only like 19 and he's traveled alone and he barely speaks English and he's just so brave.
In the morning, we were in Phenom Penh and then had to transfer to another bus that took us to another bus stop and we took the other bus to Vietnam.
We didn't have that much money left so we shared a sandwich and noodles for breakfast in Cambodia in the morning when we were in Phenom Penh. When we were in VN, we also shared a plate of chicken. We were very hungry, but also very broke. And then we got to the VN border and we had to get off and they examined our luggages and then we got back on the bus and it drove some more and then it finally dropped us off at a bus stop and then we had to taxi to Lynn's grandma's house. The entire trip took about 16 hours. But it was such a new experience, and def cheaper than the 200 ticket to fly from Cambodia to VN! Thus concludes our Cambodia trip!! :)
At night, we had dinner in the hotel, and we learned that Peter came up with all the menu ideas and had to test all the food first. Hmm...dream job?
Afterwards we went to the Cambodian Circus!
It was a very small circus and very intimate!
The story is about a guy who is weird and different and bullied by everybody else. Then one day he turns into a really attractive girl and everybody is mesmerized by her, but then a lot of bad thing starts happening to the village and so they decide he has to turn back into a man. So they do voodoo and he becomes a man again and then everybody is nice to him now. haha not sure what the moral of the story is...
RIPPEDDD.
FIRE jump rope!!!!
Crazy talented girls.
This was the process of turning the girl back into a guy...
After the circus we got to take pictures with the performers!
They're so cute!
I stood next to them and they were like woah! you're so tall!
They're so funny
The guy on the right is really funny and goofy throughout the whole show!
I had a lot of fun at the circus even though I got a really big bug bite there since it was dark so it was perfect for bugs...
I was so happy with AMERICAN BREAKFASST. I think i had like 2-3 pieces of toast...and the dragon fruits were SO sweet
In the morning, we took the tuk tuks to go to a school where Peter used to teach English.
Our driver, Mr. Bun made a pitstop along the street and bought frog meat. He's so smiley all the time, I like it haha.
This was one of the classrooms. We arrived at the school and the schedule was different so we weren't able to teach them English since none of the classes were teaching English--they were teaching Thai and like other subjects that we'd be of no use. Soo we left.
The school was a temple-school, so there were temples nearby and monks go to that school.
The classroom
The temple.
More temple.
Then we went to get supplies for the kids at the orphanage after. We bought books, pencils and erasers.
We also went to the street market to buy rice!
Afterwards, we went to buy some rice and school supplies for the kids at the orphanage. We split the money and purchased it for the kiddies.
This was the street market where we bought it from, and it was kind of similar, or at least it reminded me of VN's markets.
We went to get lunch before going to the orphanage lol and that was the beef we ate..it was so rare. Usually I'm okay with meat that's more rare, but it tasted no bueno so we sent it back and got another one.
This was a bit better...
Salmon! These were all served on these sizzling hot plates so it cooks more on it as well.
Fried rice!
More fish.
Mushroom!
When we got to the orphanage, there were kids on these swings and other kids making art on the leather.
So cute.
It's crazy how intricate they make it!! They first trace the design on a leather and then they start carving it out and then they'll paint it with a color and then let it dry!
We were able to also make the art with them and this was the girl who helped me with mine (but more like she made it and i sat there in awe, and she let me use the tools once in a while)
There were 5 girls helping us, one for each of us!
That was the book of designs we got to choose from and they would just draw it!
Lynn using the tools! I think she hit her kid's hand...
She's tracing out the design and I asked her to write my name and her name on it!
The design! Her name is Chrep, I could not pronounce it...
Then she takes that long metal tool on the left and presses it into the leather and then uses the hammer to cut it out
And then she let me hammer parts of it haha
After she was done, she went out and brushed it with that red ink! Then we waited for it to dry.
This is the outside area where she took me to paint the leather.
Cows and ducks.
The final product!!
Ron and his kiddy
When we were coming back from outside, where Chrep was painting on it, we heard the rest of the kids singing! They sang 老鼠愛大米 in Chinese and then in English! I think they knew how to sing it because they're funded or supported by a Taiwanese group who come and help them out every once in a while. The kids were singing to a tour group who had come and bought a lot of their artwork--I'm glad tour groups come here to support them.
Then we started passing out the stationaries and books we had bought them and they were soooo gracious. They weren't greedy for more and always said thank you and anyway, it's just really different if we had given things to the same age group in US, but different backgrounds, so can't really compare. I need to remember to be more thankful.
This little boy drew himself a sideburn hahaha
The signs in Chinese!
Some of their other artwork..
Also bought this for $1 USD...
Ron bought that big tree, just like the one we had seen in the beginning.
This is their outdoor kitchen, and I think the group in TW are trying to get sponsors to get them a real kitchen. I walked by and there was a bowl of rice and a cat was just eating out of it...I don't think that's very sanitary...
Their classrooms.
He was so cute!!
That girl is so cute.
A giant elephant!!
Their janky and broken computers :/
"We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope"
Our day after Angkor Wat: Dinner and meeting Peter
On our way back from Angkor Wat, we saw these piggies on the motorcycle.
Do you see it?!
We took a fat nap after Angkor Wat since we were tired from waking up really early. But then Natalie and I got really hungry and we went out to get fried noodles. It was yummyyyy. Also, it started to rain randomly, so we were walking back and eating while we were walking in the rain
Then we were DETERMINED to get boba, and we asked EVERYBODY on the street where "chatime" is since Lynn had it the night before. We even asked a policeman...but no one knew about it and we kept walking around and around until we were ready to go home and give up, but then we turned at a corner to go home and we found it!!! The struggle for boba is real. And then we brought some back for Lynn!
At night we had dinner at this fancy Cambodian restaurant for Khmer food. It's interesting that it was so fancy...
Banana chips free as appetizers
Spring rolls lol
Chicken Fried Rice
The famous fish curry
Beef!
After dinner, we went back to the hotel and met up with Lynn's brother's friend, Peter, who is the owner of the hotel. He was telling us that one of his employees was hit by a car and had been in the hospital, so he has been going there to kind of help him and take care of him. This korean guy (there's a pretty big community of koreans there, and Peter said that it's because koreans who are cast away from their home go to Cambodia...idk, not to sure on the facts) hit his employee and just drove off. Luckily some passerbys got his license plate number down and then when they found him, he wasn't willing to take any responsibility. And the most he did was pay like 4,000 when the man's motorcycle was ruined and he's been in the hospital with broken bones and was unable to move and talk for a while. It's crazy how corrupt the system is in these countries, and how EASILY people can get away with crime. You REALLY have to take care of yourself.
Even the hospital where the man was staying at didn't take care of him! He was still in his bloody clothes days after the accident, and they never even moved him and there aren't even really walls so germs can easily spread throughout the hospital. :/ What Peter told us really gave us an insight on what a corrupt system is like.
We had booked a bus to go to Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, to look around the next day, but Peter was going to show WIllis around Cambodia and take him to an orphanage. So we changed our bus to take us to Vietnam and stayed in Siem Reap with Peter and WIllis the next day. I'm so glad we stayed since I didn't know what to do in Phnom Penh, and we got to see so much more of the Khmer culture in Siem Reap.
Looks diff, because some were taken on iphone, and some on dslr :)
WAY too early to smile...so this was the result...You can see the workers in the back cleaning up the grass out of the water.The front, as you walk in.
old man chilling. Ron chilling, and reading his book on Angkor Wat. By far, my favorite picture in Angkor Wat. He seems so at peace.
So intricate. Can def tell how much they respected their higher beings by all the details and work put into the temple.
Many Buddhist statues because it was subsequently a Buddhist temple. Beheaded statues due to timeSo artsy, eh?
finally smiling more normally...early mornings not my thing.
Then we visited some other temples around
Where the Tomb Raider was filmed with Angelina Jolie.
Such beautiful artwork on the walls Such amazing talent, and simple happiness while kids in America are on ipads on phones...including meh :/ Nice reminder to appreciate the simple pleasures in life. The gang.#headtilt #matchingelephantsEarly morning selfie game...not strong at all. Look at all the crazy intricate details all over!!!!Look at that TREE!!!! so cool. Kid with her mom who was sweeping the floor in front of Angkor Wat. She is so cute.
Woke up early @ 4am and the ride to Angkor Wat was about half an hour from our hotel
Cost $20 to get in, but $22 if you use Khmer currency.
They took our picture on our ticket, idk why, my pic literally looks like a mug shot.
I really wanted to go back to the hotel by 10am to eat American breakfast (toast!!), but we decided to walk around other temples. I'm glad we did because other temples were less crowded and actually just as equally magnificent. :)
Not as great as I thought it would be, I'm not sure why I had such high expectations for it.
Last day in Phuket, Thailand: Butterfly Garden, Banana Boat, Patong
It was $10, so at first no one wanted to do it, but because we got a car to get there, it was kinda pointless if no one went in, so Ron, Nat and I went in. Ron got a discount because he's Thai. Natalie was the first one to get a butterfly on her! we got these little cups of honey and we'd have to put our hands by the butterflies so they would come up close to us.
Ron asked one of the worker to get the BIG butterflies on us, and when the guy put the big butterfly on me, it peed on meeeeee.
Before we left, I found a butterfly on the floor and picked it up. It was injured so it stayed on me for a really long time haha, then I put it on a leaf and left!
For lunch we got hot pot at MK Gold! It was so yummy. It's like a chain store all throughout Thailand.
This is the garlic noodle that came with the duck. It hunk they're famous for this.
We went on a banana boat which is pictured below haha It was so funnn when we fell!
So we sit on a banana and then the boat pulls us out around and then they'll make really sharp turns and then we'd all fall out.
WHEEEE it was so fun!
We fell out of the water, and Natalie can't swim, so we helped her, but major props to her for doing this even though she can't swim. I lost my bead bracelet in the water :( I've had it since like 2nd grade, so it was very sad.
At night, the owner of the hotel, which is Ron's family friend treated us to dinner, but since he was really busy he wasn't able to join us. We got banana milk and watermelon juice!
There's a pad thai cart across from where we live and it's SO good. We were on a very, very tight budget towards the end, but I couldn't not eat this padthai. It's really good!
Eating pad thai while watching the sun set :)
So beautiful!!!
Our first thai tea and on our last day! It's not as sweet as it is here...but still good.
Exotic fruit. I tried durian for the VERY FIRST TIME. and also my VERY LAST TIME. I can't handle the smell, and the taste has lingering of that smell, so I can't...
Another night, another fried ice cream :)
Poor doggy.
At night we went to Patong again and went "bar hopping"
don't want none, unless you got bunsss hunnn
omg, much respect to pole dancers. So amazing, so talented.
LOLOL LOOK AT THE GUY IN THE BACK, HELLAA JUDGING.
We went to a bar and they had a band playing some pop songs. We started dancing and signing along and Natalie said to go on the stage, so we jumped on stage and started dancing with them!
haha this picture's so fun. can't believe we just jumped on stage and started dancing!
The girl on the left is the singer. IDK how we even took this picture..I thought they were signing!
Afterwards, we went to find the guy from dinner the other night and asked if we could sing hahaha
We sang "the Lazy song" I think... Look at willis so into it haha
Then we asked the guy to pose like that with us! He is so nice, he took the pics of us while we were up there embarrassing ourselves and he's also a great singer!
When we finally got back to our hotel, since we live across the beach...I ran into the ocean and dragged Nat with me. She can't swim and she was holding her phone. I make good choices. I thought it'd be fun. I had fun hehe. Oh, and my flipflop was floating away and then I was chasing after my flip-flops in the water...thanks for putting up with me, guys!
Streets of Siem Reap! There are cars with drivers on the left and on the right, so many are probably imported from various places.
We got to our hotel, Angkor Pearl, which is owned by Lynn's brother's friend and there were tropical fruits in our room! The dragonfruit was so sweet (I basically ate it all, and the one in the boys' room too). And the Rumbutan! So Yummy!
At 4pm, when we finally decided to stop bumming and go explore Siem Reap, we walked out and had noodles-mmm my favorite! At first we thought they were bean sprouts, but they're actually local Khmer noodles--all fat and short.
The fat and short noodles! With fried egg :3
This is the streets of Siem Reap.
When we woke up at around 4pm, we went to Pub Street to get some food.
So many exotic fruits.
I got an avocadoa smoothie, or maybe Ron did, or I think we both did. I forgot, but it wasn't very good.
I thought these were just bean sprouts at first, but they're actually noodles!
We got fried noodles for dinner.
Then we played the shuttlecock kicking thing with these pros. We were just as bad as when we were in Vietnam, nothing changed. And Lynn kicked backwards so hard that she fell on her face, sorry, I thought it was funny, but good thing she was okay.
The two ppl on the ends are the pros...they said they wanted to expand it since this "sport" isn't very popular in other countries. We're so bad at it.
Siem Reap Night Market--we walked around and bought some souvenirs. We also tried the shuttlecock game again, in which we showed absolutely 0 improvement in since we last played in Vietnam. While trying to kick it from behind, Lynn fell forward! Sorry Lynn, but it was quite funny..heh.
(THIS is how they actually play, it's AMAZING: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b56BlEBvFtg)
In Vietnam, there was an European guy asked if he could join us and we were so hesitant because we suck. so. much. It was basically a game of pick up and kick, pick up and kick, pick up and kick...we were all exhausted playing with him, because we knew we sucked, but we were trying so hard because he was there. Then he checked his phone and he said "Oh, I was supposed to meet a friend, and I'm late. Bye!" We all thought it was an excuse, but we did see his friend afterwards, so he wasn't just tired of us. Success!
Then Ron was like, let's just sit. Cause they say I'm always stimulating myself and doing stuff, so they wanted to just sit and do nothing. That's something that I learned from them on this trip...that people actually sit and do nothing for the sake of it. I always occupy myself, keep myself busy, so it's really new to me.
Bye bye, Angkor Night Market...I shall be back tomorrow.
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