Sequoia National Park

We had a really nice evening at the Best Western.  The kids enjoyed getting into the pool and the hot tub.  We found a grocery store and stocked up on some food for the rest of our trip.  The next day we drove into sequoia park.  It was very lucky that the government was offering all fourth graders a special pass into the parks so because Kirk is in fourth grade we got in for free!  The trees there are pretty awesome to see and climb on.  We also saw two black bears.  Kirk has good eye sight because he spotted one up in a tree I would never have noticed it that easily.  He was up in his tree pretty high so I jumped of our car to take some pictures.  I didn't think the Bear would come down.  Really soon though he came right down and it didn't take him more than a minute or two to get to the ground.  I was high tailing it to the van.  Really glad that I didn't get mauled by a bear.  The kids have a great story though.  Next time I'm renting a telephoto zoom lens so I can get a pictures of the wild life with out risking my own life.  We got a small cabin inside the park.  It actually was available which I guess is the upside of visiting during the off season.  It wasn't crowded at all and it just felt really secluded and fun. 

The small black bear behind the kids.  This was the first bear we saw just outside of the park.  That is somebody's house there.  This bear was much smaller than the one we saw up close in the tree.