We arrived in San Francisco around noon on Saturday and drove to Yosemite that afternoon. We chose to take the long way and enter the park via the South entrance near Wawona because we had a room at the 'historic Wawona hotel' for our first night.
We thought this was a good plan because we'd be in the park ready to go on Sunday morning instead of having two travel days. It really was a pretty good plan except for the fact that we were up at 4:30 AM in order to get to the airport on time and driving the 4+ hours from San Francisco to the park was rough. Especially towards the end when it was dark and the roads were scary and twisty. Thank God Brian was driving!
We fell into bed at about 9:00 and slept with the windows open to let in the very chilly mountain air. The chilly mountain air was even chillier in the moring when we got up and I actually got to wear my convertable mountain pants on the very first day of the trip!
We headed to the Mariposa Grove of giant Sequoia trees after exploring at the cute Wawona hotel and visitor center. If you haven't seen a giant sequoia in person I can't explain to you how incredibly massive and cool they are. They're just mind bogglingly huge. And very cool. This was a nice easy way for us to ease into the park because the trails were gentle and mostly short. It flashed us back to our trip to Sequoia National Park five years ago and since we had such a great time on that trip it really put us into a good mood.
The most memorable thing about this day was a strange encouter with a crab working at the Wawona store. I ran in there in the afternoon to get some sodas and pretzels before we made the drive up to Yosemite Valley. I went into the store and picked up two 20 oz Cokes and a bag of Rold Gold pretzels. The total bill came to $5.07
I pulled my money from my pocket and see that I have a $5 bill and a $20 bill. I said out loud "oh rats" when I looked at my money and I hand the check-out guy the $20 bill.
He does not take the money but instead looks at me and says again that the total is $5.07. I don't reply, still holding out the $20.
"Do you have .07 cents?" he asks in a disgusted tone.
Just for the record, I was wearing hiking clothes (t-shirt and shorts) and was covered in dirt so I clearly didn't have a purse or anything with me.
I hold out my money clip with the $5 bill in one hand and the $20 in the other hand and say out loud "I have a 5 and a 20".
He then lets out a power sigh and says "well, maybe I can find .07 here". And he starts rooting around in some unseen penny jar behind the counter. He doesn't come up with the money -- gives me a dirty look -- and says "I'll check my pocket". And then he roots around in his own pocket to find the .07 cents.
Then he says "Give me the $5" like he's doing me a huge favor.
So I did and left with my food.
It was totally bizarre and extremely off putting. Am I crazy for thinking he was a big jerk? I mean I tried to pay for the stuff -- I had the money to pay for the stuff -- he was just unwilling to accept my $20. That's not a ridiculous bill to be using, it's not like I was trying to pay with a $100 or something crazy.
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