California Dreamin’ (A Tale of Going West): Trip Planning
Singapore Airlines A350 Business Class SIN-SFO / SFO-SIN
Parc 55 San Francisco – A Hilton Hotel
Big Trees Lodge, Yosemite National Park
The Majestic Yosemite Hotel, Yosemite National Park
Hampton Inn & Suites Merced, also any other U.S. Hampton
Hilton San Diego Airport Harbor Island Hotel
The Comic-Con Experience
Virgin Airlines A319 First Class SAN-SFO
Staying in Yosemite
When planning trips many months in advance, sometimes you make decisions without having done the full extent of research necessary for a well-informed decision. In this instance, it was initially planning to stay for only night in Yosemite National Park, sandwiching that between stays at the nearest Hilton property (Hampton Merced).
What my Singaporean brain failed to process was that a ‘park’ could be massively gigantic and that it was a 2h drive from Merced to Yosemite Valley (probably the most central part in Yosemite).
So, sometime closer to the actual trip, I started looking for a property within the park to stay in, focusing my search on national park properties and basically looking for whatever was available. I’m not the camping sort, and any of the properties book out months in advance (especially since I was visiting in summer), so my options were rather limited – I was probably looking for rooms made available through others’ cancellations.
The search yielded Big Trees Lodge, a property with a rather uninspiring-sounding name (it’s actually a National Historic Landmark formerly known as the Wawona Hotel) with some rooms available. Beggars can’t be choosers, so I decided to just take whatever was available. It had the bonus advantage of being more moderately priced than the other hotel within the park I’d be staying at the next night.
Arriving
It was nearly dusk by the time we arrived at the property – at that time, there was a fair amount of parking available, mostly around the loop around a central fountain that leads up to the lodge’s main building.
This main building is where you check in, and it’s also where the dining room (essentially the restaurant) is located. We arrived pretty late and checked out quite early the next morning, so we never ate there. The building is also the only place on the property equipped with WiFi.
Upon checking in, we were given a map of the property – most of the rooms were actually located in cottages around the main building. Happily, we were assigned a room just a short walk away.
The Room
I’d mentioned earlier that this place is a National Historic Landmark – this becomes quite apparent when you step into the room.
I’d opted for a room with an ensuite bathroom – there were cheaper options where you had to go to a common toilet/shower. The bathroom wasn’t particularly large, but I thought it was worth the additional investment.
There’s also a walk-in closet with plenty of space for your luggage, should you be hauling trunks of stuff through Yosemite. Mine felt very empty in my one night there.
There’s also a door leading to an adjoining room, so it’s probably possible for families to request for two connected rooms with direct access.
It had been a relatively long drive up from San Francisco, so most of the stay was really spent catching up on rest.
The Grounds
After dawn broke, we spent some time taking a look around the property. We finally got to see Clark Cottage (where our room was) in the light of day.
There’re some chairs and a table just outside each room (on the porch) – it’s pretty relaxing just sitting there looking out at the trees. For awhile, anyway.
A short walk away from our cottage (also visible in the above image, actually) was the ‘swimming tank’, which looked pretty much like a normal swimming pool to me.
We ended up not exploring the property all that much since we’d wanted to explore the park instead, but I imagine that if you wanted an inexpensive property within the park to relax at over a few days, this one would do rather nicely.
Conclusion
I’m not usually a fan of quaint and old hotels, but I suppose the location of the property changes that attitude somewhat. When staying in the middle of all that nature, quaint old lodging with minimal internet connectivity becomes rather… well, natural.
The location is still a little far (almost an hour’s drive) from Yosemite Valley, though – if I had a choice I might go for the more centrally-located Yosemite Valley Lodge instead, especially if not that much time will actually be spent indoors.
