“On the outskirts of Comfort, Texas, atop rolling limestone peaks of the Texas Hill Country, The Lost Madrone Ranch is the magical place where I walk — literally and figuratively. I visit the ranch to experience nature, seek respite, find inspiration, form ideas, renew my energy, work, create and enjoy life.”

With the above words, I launched this blog eight months ago, promising to “soulfully share the wonder at the minutiae of what is around me and hope it motivates you to find wonder in your world.”

I recognized that where readers may be “walking” might look different from where I walk. And yet, looking closer at nature, wherever you walk, reveals a majesty that imparts power to daily life.

Sometimes the majesty is found in small creatures in your own backyard.

Sometimes the majesty is found in grand landscapes in faraway places.

Jim and I recently returned from a trip to Yosemite National Park.

The majesty is magnificent.

Mammoth granite walls and domes rise like cathedrals as if constructed for giants to pray for our world.

Groves of massive sequoias set among multitudes of stately pines are firmly grounded in place,

and yet, as you walk among them, their stretch for miles, their song from winds blowing through their branches, and their perfume swirling in the surrounding air makes you believe you are part of a heavenly march, walking proudly to profess the glory of creation.

An abundance of breathtaking vistas — some famously recorded in books and on postcards seen by millions,

and others reserved for you alone, for that split moment when your gaze captures a scene that is uniquely yours and can never be repeated in that exact way again — where if you only experienced one of these views it would be worth the travel to see.

Our trip was a last minute one, pulled together only three weeks out. Advanced planning could not have improved upon the visit.

Yes, forest fires were present in the area, but I have a history with forces of mother nature. Tropical storms, historic floods, and erupting volcanoes are among the events that have detoured many of my travels, outdoor parties, and visits from out-of-town company.

Fires were just part of our Yosemite story.

Like in life, the detours presented opportunities that enriched our experience.

For example, the road closure leading to our park entrance routed us to discover Mariposa Coffee Company.

An entire post could be devoted to this place, so I’ll detour for a moment and mention…

if you are ever on Hwy 49 near Mariposa, CA, make the turn off the two-lane road and follow the smell and smoke, not of fire, but of roasting coffee beans, to the rustic shop with counters of over-sized jars filled with a wide assortment of coffee beans freshly roasted in the one-of-a-kind roaster named “Frank,” built by the ex-DEA agent, Gerry, who he alone runs the roasting operation he has perfected over the past 28 years at his family business. As you watch the roasting process through the doorway from the shop, do not let your fear of Gerry’s intense manner in which he focuses on roasting scare you away, and he will invite you to learn about his method of roasting the beans to a precise temperature, spinning the hot beans in a steel drum designed to extract unwanted gases, and then hand-pouring the beans into the antique mason jars to sweat out the moisture as a final step before the beans are ready for measuring into coffee bags by Gerry’s daughter who hand writes the word “enjoy” on every bag they sell and ship. Oh, and they are not a coffee shop with fancy machines for serving specialty drinks, but they will take the time to walk next door to their home and make a smooth, rich, brewed coffee for you that will warm your palette as you drive away, satisfied from meeting a family who puts passion in their business and welcomes you to enjoy it with them.

As we headed along our alternative route to the park entrance, the lingering aroma of coffee permeating our rental car was replaced by the smell of smoke from not too distant forest fires.

For the next six days, this smell would wake us during the night when sleeping with open windows, greet us in the morning before shifting winds pushed the smoke from the valley, and surprise us off and on throughout the days depending on shuffling corridors of smoke drifting between us and brave firefighters working a fire line somewhere in the forest.

While we vacationed and our brains and bodies were being relaxed, nourished, and replenished by the beauty of the surroundings, it was not lost on us that firefighters were battling to contain the fires with the exhausting intensity required to manage a forest and/or protect lives and property.

Contrasts can detour your thoughts to sharpen your appreciation of a situation, steer your experience, and guide your formulation of beliefs about what you are observing.

And so, many of the over 1,000 photographs I snapped over a six-day stay were through the lens of a smoke-filled sky.

Who is to say the opportunity was not a detour to seeing a scene more lovely than the view without the smoke?

The luckiest part of our last-minute planning was happening upon a cabin rental with a last-minute cancellation, making a magical place available for our Yosemite stay.

Did you know there is a small, tranquil enclave of private property located inside the Yosemite boundary that pre-dates the establishment of the National Park? I had no idea. Foresta is an unincorporated community just eight miles from the heart of Yosemite Valley where only a handful of cabins are available for rent.

Clouds Rest Cabin is another place deserving of an entire blog post, so I’ll detour for a moment and mention…

if you plan to visit Yosemite National Park, avoid the many hotels outside the park gates and even pass up the wonderfully historic but filled with people National Park facilities set within the valley, and find open dates to reserve Clouds Rest Cabin, a custom constructed, perfectly appointed, and impeccably kept cabin built by owners who live in Foresta, whose carefully curated art on the walls and library of books on local history and events, trails and hikes, birds and animals, flora and fauna, and fiction and lore will reveal their love of all things Yosemite, including the iconic granite monoliths of El Capitan and Half Dome, which you can marvel at from your bedroom window or back porch balcony, even through the smoke. As visitors file in and out of the park each day, you can remain relaxed within the park boundaries, visiting park highlights before and after the crowds congregate, lending an eerie yet privileged feeling to experiencing the expansive park in such a personal way, and offering meaningful moments to encounter the majesty.

Again, the majesty is magnificent.

In Yosemite, eyes focused on a fragment of wonder cannot convey the enormous power and scale of the entire scene.

 

Hiking to the top of Vernal Falls and looking behind you on the way up, the people on the path below appear tiny,

until you get to the top and glance back again at the same path, and then the people below are mere minuscule specks in relation to the mountains far in the distance.

The water, thunderously plunging over the precipice of the falls,

appears deceptively calm on the surface at the top.

And, the entire scale of Vernal Falls that appeared jaw-dropping at first sight, shrinks as you continue climbing toward Nevada Falls further up the mountain.

Another mile and a half higher, at an elevation of 6000 feet, is Nevada Falls,

which looks almost underwhelming compared to the granite grandeur of neighboring Liberty Cap and the back side of Half Dome. Miles below all this wonder at the higher elevation, Vernal Falls is no longer even in the picture.

Talk about a mind travel of contrasts!

Back at the cabin in the late afternoons, the smoke in the air would clear for a time, so I would grab my camera and walk up the road, looking across the Foresta meadow to view the Yosemite Valley and the surrounding Sierra Nevada mountains.

Here, the screaming grandeur was silent, and I was alone to look closer. I could not help seeing comparisons in the detail.

How similar was the peeling bark of the manzanita

and the puzzle-worthy bark of the pine

to that of a Texas Madrone?

The thick, creviced, bark found on the trees of Foresta,

caused me to recall the shaggy bark of an old growth cedar of the Texas Hill Country.

A small dried plant specimen standing on the ridge of the meadow

reminded me of the dainty floating seeds of the grasses that blanket our hilltop slopes and wave layers of brown in the winds throughout winter.

And, the colonies of delicate ferns rising where fire had previously cleared the ridge

took my thoughts to my favorite fern-laden gorge on the Lost Madrone Ranch where I sit and reflect in the quiet of the setting.

“Only spread a fern frond over a man’s head and worldly cares are cast out, and beauty and peace come in.” John Muir.

Scars from fires could not avoid being seen,

nor could I avoid the raw emotions they elicited.

Jimmy’s fire accident, almost six months ago, was a detour that sharpened our appreciation for life.

The scorched trees still standing had a different sort of beauty to them, one that in a motherly view was the most beautiful of all — the beauty of resiliency, standing stronger than before.

Other scenes in Yosemite are otherworldly.

A fly-fishing excursion in the high country of the Sierra Nevada led by an expert guide took us trekking for six hours up Yosemite Creek.

The boulder lined creek of clear-flowing glacier water carves through the exposed granite mountains like a secret crevice filled with treasures, such as this California golden trout.

The hike down was the quintessential Sierra Nevada experience —

passing sequoia, pine, and juniper shaped by the harsh climate of the high elevation;

stepping in any manner of direction along the smooth vacant granite surface;

and taking in the grandeur afar while discovering surprises at my feet.

I continually commented that I felt like I was walking on the moon, at which Jim continually reminded me that I had no idea what that was like.

Despite the alien environment, an earthly familiarity would strike at any step.

How comforting to spot a Sierra Indian Paintbrush so similar to the Indian Paintbrush that carpets the Texas highways in spring.

And what do you know, growing along the cracks of the granite were clumps of sedums!

While visiting a national park, I tend to imagine the greatest treasures are contained within the boundary of what our park system determines most important to showcase and preserve. But the one occasion when we ventured beyond the park, Mother Nature reminded me there is no border defining the creator’s touch.

Just outside the Yosemite Park gates at Tioga Pass, the tallest paved mountain pass in California, the road — an engineering masterpiece on par with the surrounding marvels of nature — descends from an elevation of almost 10,000 feet to the town of Lee Vining at 6,781 feet.

The drive is adventurous, and I gasped more than once.

Neither words nor photography can fully capture the scale, but notice the giant curve of the road cut between the mountainside and the valley below.

Now, take a look at a zoomed-in section and try to see the three cars along the pass.

Finding words is difficult to describe the thrill of the descent, and it is equally challenging to describe the scene when arriving at the bottom where the road spills into the Mono Basin.

Mono Lake is another place deserving of an entire blog post, so I’ll detour for a moment and mention…

this bewitching body of water is an inland salty sea with a million year history of nature and man shaping the formation of the basin. “Tufa Towers” — essentially limestone formations — emerge from the lake surface in groves and grace the windswept shoreline in a mystical way so dramatic I could not control my awe of the entire scene, nor my finger on the shutter button. While billions of alkali flies and trillions of brine shrimp thrive at the lake, there remains a sense of standing in a deserted landscape, hauntingly beautiful and forever memorable. The contrast was staggering.

Many times throughout our Yosemite trip, the unexpected would pop out through color. In a previous posting, “Savor: Things, Ideas, and People,” I share the fun in the “flashes of orange in nature so dazzling in intensity you are hijacked into happiness because of the surprise gift.”

Orange was popping in Yosemite, and I felt like each encounter was a gift.

Do you see the pops of orange in the photo below?

Look closer, and find where the two following pictures are located in the picture above.

El Capitan, an over 3,000-foot tall granite monolith with sheer walls, is a famed rock formation attracting visitors to view, photographers to capture, artists to depict, and rock climbers to climb.

With sadness and sharpened perspective, I followed the tragic news this past week of multiple rockfalls from El Capitan, causing injuries and a fatality. That rockfalls are a common occurrence in Yosemite and that these victims were not climbing at the time but were at the rock base we drove past days before, adds a pang to the reflection that Yosemite is breathtaking and life-taking.

Detours. Contrasts. Majesty.

Yosemite and the Lost Madrone Ranch are strikingly different, and yet, when walking at either I am invited to look and learn, to listen and feel, to marvel and think, to wonder.

“Wisdom begins in wonder.” Socrates.

Where do you wonder?