Fischertrails Yosemite Trip Day 6 Our Farewell to Yosemite!

We woke up early the next morning early enough to still have the option to leave on the backpacker's bus. Still not sure what we wanted to do we asked each other what sounded better to leave this morning or spend the day in Yosemite Valley and leave this evening. The choice was pretty obvious to both of us
we were going to be on that morning bus. As much fun as we had we were ready for a real shower and were not looking forward to fighting for the best shot with the tourists again.

We quickly packed up our camp whispered good bye to the boy scouts that were awake that early and headed to Curry Village. We weren't sure where to find this supposed bus but we figured our best bet was to just ask around. We saw a older couple who were carrying backpacking backpacks looking like they were up to catch a bus. We stopped them and asked if they were going to take the free shuttle to Toulumne meadows, they looked at us confused and said we don't know of any free shuttle but we are catching a bus that is going to Toulumne Meadows for $14.

Well we were disappointed it wasn't a free ride but for just $5 more than what we were planning on spending we would be in a comfortable tour bus with air and comfortable seats headed back to our car, there was no question about it we would catch that bus. We bought our tickets and started talking with the couple that gave us the info about the bus we were excited to exchange stories about our trips. They were curious if we had seen any bears we said yes in Little Yosemite Valley they were surprised to say they saw bears in the same place we compared stories and then Tim and I looked at this man and looked at each other with suspicious grins, when Tim asked "wait a minute are you GARY?!?!?!" Then the man laughed and said "yeah I'm Gary!!!" we all shared a laugh reminiscing on our run in with the bear and Gary's famous whistle "now would be a good time for your whistle Gary". We found out Gary and his wife were in their 50s and had just taken their first backpacking trip this week. They were hooked just like us!

We sat near Gary and this other adorable family we met on the bus home and we shared laughs stories advice the whole 2 hour bus ride. We stepped off the bus with a bittersweet farewell hanging over us as we got off the bus. It was weird meeting people connecting only to say good bye shortly after, it felt like we should keep in touch, but what really would we be keeping in touch for I'm sure when we all got back to our lives sooner or later we would have lost touch. So we said good bye and wished them luck and Happy Trails in all their future trips. We got back to the car to find it still in one piece! Relieved and reluctant to leave we threw our packs in the car and drove to the Toulumne Meadows general store, picked up a couple souvenirs from our first back packing trip, and headed home. It had been an incredible adventure and a wonderful journey but now it was over and we were ready to get back home.

 Saw some deer as we drove home

Bye Yosemite!