John Muir’s California: Sequoia and Yosemite
After leaving Sequoia National Park, we went to Yosemite National Park and stayed on the property at The Ahwahnee. The hotel was commissioned in the 1920’s in the hope of drawing affluent visitors to Yosemite. It was felt that affluent and influential visitors would encourage continued support of Yosemite as a national park. The Ahwahnee was named a National Historical Site in 1987. The Ahwahnee was positioned close to cliffs with a goal of making it “part of the scene…
As part of our Tauck tour, we drove to Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks. They are adjacent to each other but became national parks at different times so have different names. They have been jointly managed since 1943. Sequoias grow in both parks. Giant sequoias grow on the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, between 4,000 and 8,000 feet in elevation. They are closely related to the coast redwoods we saw at Muir Woods, but there are differences….
San Francisco would be the start of our Tauck tour, John Muir’s California. We’ve been to San Francisco several times, but did go back to one of our favorite spots, Fisherman’s Wharf. We walked the piers, checked out a restaurant and took pictures of Bay Bridge which connects San Francisco and Oakland. While in San Francisco, we stayed at the St. Francis Westin. They had a picture gallery documenting some of the hotel’s history. The picture below shows the hotel’s…