Manzanar National Historic Site

As mentioned on the main page of the trip, on my way home to San Diego, I headed down highway 395 thru the older towns of Bishop, Independence, and so on.

Just north of Independence I stopped at the Manzanar National Historic Site, where 11000 Japanese Americans were interred during WWII. It was a moving thing to see the memorial and Japanese way of treating the cemetery.

I left a few memorabilia of my own ... a hiking stick, a fishing lure, and a life saver, in keeping with the protocol, in case some revered elder might need a hand while walking, or could use the lure, or might have a sweet tooth.

Then I high-tailed it back home in the Van. I got some gas at Inyo Kern where a gentleman informed me that "yeah, but it can be 113 here and it's not as hot as 105 in Bakersfield" lol and made it home from Manzanar in about 7 hours. One really nice thing about coming home on 395 is that it seems to be downhill all the way from Lee Vining. When you arrive at Victorville, you're already at the 4000 ft of the Tejon pass and just continue downhill all the way to San Diego.

I got home safe and sound at about 4:30 pm that afternoon. The Van ran like a champ and I had a great trip!

This ends my Yosemite 2004 Trip :-)