On-Walkabout: Across California’s Coastal Range

Well it was time for my wife and I to leave redwood country to head for our next destination which was Yosemite National Park in California’s Sierra Nevada mountains.  However, to reach the park we would first have to cross over the California Coastal Range to the east and take I-5 south towards Yosemite.  As we drove south of Redwood National Park my wife and I had our first sighting of the large wildlife that lives in the area when we spotted this herd of elk grazing on the edge of the forest:

We pulled off the side of the road where a number of other cars were already parked in order to get a better look at the grazing elk:

It seemed the elk were pretty used to people staring and taking pictures of them because they didn’t mind staying out in the open despite all these people looking at them.  Anyway after checking out the deer we then made our way east across the California Coastal Range:

The highway switchbacked up and over the rolling hills which provided some nice views of the surrounding country side:

The Coastal Range is no where near as rugged as the neighboring Sierra Nevada mountain range and just mostly just rolling hills, but it is in these rolling hills that the world’s largest trees thrive:

Eventually the road leading east over the range dropped in altitude and for many miles the highway drove through what appeared to have been a fairly recent massive forest fire:

Though this fire appeared to have been quite big, it was small compared to the couple of bushfire seasons I went through while living in Australia.  Towards the end of the highway my wife and I stopped at this scenic lake to enjoy the view and eat a packed lunch we brought with us:

It wasn’t to much farther that the highway we were following eventually connected on to I-5, which we took south through Sacramento.  The valley that I-5 travels along is mostly a large flat farming region with a few rivers running draining out from the Sierra Nevada mountain range in the distant horizon.   We eventually reached Modesto, California that evening where we spent the night.  The next morning we planned to drive to the nearby Yosemite National Park.

Next Posting: Yosemite National Park