Camping at Big Sur

On Sunday morning, Kate and I packed our bags and drove two hours south of the bay to Big Sur to go camping!

I love Big Sur, it's one of my favorite places. A lot of other people feel the same way though, so ever since I started to work a 9-5, I haven't been able to go. My last trip was in 2014 when I was in graduate school and we went from like Tuesday through Thursday or something. Campsites fill up ridiculously fast on the weekends and now that I'm living further away, it's a bit harder to do a day trip. Not impossible, as Yosemite is about the same distance away and I'm considering doing a day trip there soon.

But with my 9/80, I can do a Sunday - Monday camping adventure! I was already going to be in the bay last weekend teaching a day at Kate's summer camp (Saturday, it was amazing but I was so tired) and had planned on staying the rest of the weekend anyway, so I asked Kate if she wanted to come camping with me. She said yes! I didn't really know what would be available, so I looked around and saw that Big Sur had ONE SITE LEFT for that night. So I grabbed it, obviously!

Um so all of these pictures are from my last Big Sur trip because
I haven't had time to do any photo editing since this trip. I'm sure
I'll put them up as a WW one of these days but for now, I'm okay
being kind of confusing. 

The river was flowing much better this year!

We drove down in the morning, getting breakfast and picking up some snacks/meals/drinks for the trip on the way. I didn't have anything on my list that I really wanted to do, other than go on a hike. I've changed up my fitness routine in the last week, so I was kind of really sore, but I also love hiking.

We got down there a little early so our campsite wasn't ready yet, so instead we went to the waterfall I have been wanting to go to for years. McWay falls is a waterfall right on the coastline that falls directly into the pacific ocean. The lighting wasn't perfect but that's what photoshop is for. But again, haven't edited any pictures yet, so here are some more from the trip I took four years ago.

I have this on canvas at my house!

One of my favorites

From there we went to the campground and wandered around the store (also picked up a magnet because I collect them from various places and some fire glowy stuff) before heading to our site and setting up. It looks the exact same from when I was there nearly four years ago, but the river is actually flowing!

We set up our tent and got everything all organized once as we could, including putting up my hammock. Then it was time for sitting still, not talking to each other, and reading books. I'm mostly through Charlotte's book and am... enjoying it in small doses.

After reading, we decided to go wander around. I really wanted a long exposure on the river, so we grabbed that before going on a short hike over to this fire pit area.

Back at the campsite we decided to make a fire. We played a board game, ate dinner, and made s'mores (all while talking about horses a bunch of course) before going to sleep.

Long exposure on the river

Hiking through the burned trees last time (2014), we hiked a
different hike this time so I didn't see these trees to see how
they have changed

In the morning, we packed up and drove to the parking lot near one of the trail heads. I had really wanted to hike Pfeiffer Falls, but that has been unavailable for a few years. Apparently they're doing repairs and it will be okay next year! So we hiked a shorter hike that promised to lead to a place called Valley View. It was a little disappointing to climb all the way up there only to find the valley covered in fog, but that was okay, it was still a great hike.

After that, it was just driving back up to the bay, where I then drove up to the peninsula to teach lessons and then back home.

I told Kate I had already taken this picture when I took it
again during this trip lol

This was my phone background for a long
time, it's weird to see it on the blog lol

Overall it was a great trip, if a little short! But Big Sur fills up so quickly that I think we were pretty lucky to even get the one night. Later this summer my family is camping together for the first time in 18 years, but we're headed north!