Yosemite national park/San Francisco: Karaoke in the garden of Eden

After some days of big town life in Los Angeles and partying at Hermosa Beach my next stop falls into the "Great adventures of nature"-category: Yosemite National Park, the US' oldest national park. Hoping to meet some nice new people I explored it with an organized camping trip instead of just going by myself. Not exactly backpacker-style, I admit, but a lot less strenuous and definitely worth the money.
As it's a camping trip the sleeping part happens in the bus, the tent (for those who brought one) or just outside on a mattress, for those who want to look at the stars while freezing to death. Why freezing to death? Well, the park lies between 2'000 and 12'000 feet, and at that height, even in summer, it's fucking freezing at night, pardon my french ;-)
We start out in San Francisco late at night and therefore arrive at the park the next morning, in a garden of Eden, a little paradise on earth, a... OK, let's cut the crap, before it becomes even more corny. Let's just say it was really beautiful :-) And it definitely reminds the Austrian world traveler that he actually has a equally beautiful landscape at home right in front of his doorstep.
All in all the trip was four great days with great people in the amazing landscape of the Yosemite Park and the Eastern Sierra Nevada. Even though I noticed once more that camping's not really my thing, even less with more than 30 people in the camping bus... Finish and highlight of the trip was the final karaoke night in a small town saloon somewhere on the way back to San Francisco. To cut a long story short: The drinks were cheap and heavily mixed (Best and cheapest Vodka-Red-Bull I've ever had!), the song selection for the karaoke was surprisingly decent, and while one part of the group rocked the stage (with highlights like "YMCA" and "Paradise City") the rest was busy as fans and groupies on the dance floor.


Driven by the Irish part of the group we even continued the partying the next night doing a pub crawl with pretty much the same people in San Francisco. Those girls could drink and party, amazing. To say it with their own words: "We're trying to keep it down, but we can't help it, we're Irish!"
Apart from that first night my stay in San Fran was pretty relaxed. I had already done all the usual tourist stuff during my last two visits, so now I could focus on the really important stuff: Just hanging out ;-) Just looking around the old hippie part of town, wasting time in a nice little cafe or a park, checking out the local "Guitar Center", browsing through record stores for hours (Amoeba Records ROCKS!!), etc. Also I met up with a friend that Lukas and me had first met in Thailand and we all shared the same night ferry to Koh Phangan, definitely a bonding experience. She invited me to stay with her and her boyfriend Jimmy, we discussed travel experiences and future travel plans during several nights of beer and wine and they showed me awesome places around San Francisco off the beaten path.


After a short stop in Hollywood and Venice Beach to visit the local Hard Rock Café I'm now heading into the desert: Las Vegas is calling!