If your days are spent juggling the stress that comes with getting everything ready for the holidays and the everyday stress that comes with raising a family then I’m sure you there is a least a part of each day that you long for a Calgon moment. The rigors of getting your home ready for the holidays is enough for anyone to want to escape… and take a nice long vacation.
When I am being run ragged I think back to my trip to one of the most peaceful places on Earth– California’s Yosemite National Park. It is one of the oldest national parks in America and is the ideal place for a family vacation or for an individual getaway.
Sure, the 1,200-mile park boasts deep valleys, pastoral meadows and ancient sequoia trees, but my favorite part about Yosemite is its waterfalls. Yosemite Falls is one of the park’s most popular features. It flows irregularly, which means it’s a seasonal waterfall. It measures about 2,500 feet from top to bottom, though one fall, Bridal Veil, stands about 600 feet tall on its own.
Besides the serenity it provides to stressed-out city slickers, the park’s expansive natural beauty provides incredible backdrops to family photos. Photography happens to be one of my hobbies, but you don’t have to be a shutterbug to capture incredible shots. I always joke that my 2-year-old could grab a camera, snap away aimlessly and the pictures would still turn out wonderfully. The park lends itself to pictures because you can go 30 miles and get a whole different shot and at different points of the day.
Along with the waterfalls, El Capitan is one of the most photographed features of Yosemite. El Capitan is one of the iconic monoliths of Yosemite National Park. It stands 3,500 feet above the valley floor and its sheer granite face is just about 3,000 feet in length.
Whether you are hiking its trails, photographing its granite cliffs, or simply sitting at the edge of its massive waterfalls, Yosemite offers a calming retreat from the chaos that reigns in everyday life. The park is a glorious site, awash in natural light–light on the cliffs, light on the waterfalls, light on the trees, plants and the flowers. It’s a destination you will not regret visiting.
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