Shabbat Shalom,

Lisa

What an incredible experience the middle school had in Yosemite! We left warm, sunny Pasadena at 7:42 am from school bound for the majestic Yosemite National Park on Monday morning. Packed tight into our reliable van, we made the eight hour journey up to the beloved national park. We stopped for lunch at Millerton Lake just outside of Fresno.  After a beautiful drive up and down and all around the mountains of the Sierra forest, we arrived at Yosemite. We made a quick detour through the Yosemite Valley, past El Capitan and Half Dome, and arrived at Crane Flats, our home for the next couple of days.  The moment we jumped out of the van, we realized that we were not in Pasadena anymore.  The temperature was 30 degrees and the snow on the ground was at about 6 inches. After getting settled into our cabin, Paradigm, we picked bunks, unpacked, and started a fire in the iron fire place, the heat source for our time there.  We then had an informative orientation session with our site leader Lauren, who went over the rules of the camp and the trip.  We enjoyed an awesome dinner of frittatas and veggie soup, and then embarked on our evening program, a night hike through the woods using nothing but our senses and the light from the moon and the incredible stars above. We all got into bed for some much needed rest.  The temperature at bed time ....14 degrees!!!