6/9/2017 - Day Trip from Bishop

Friday - Today we made the trip we had planned for yesterday.  I slept well and woke up feeling pretty good.  My arm where I got the tetanus shot was actually more sore than my head injury, for the most part. It still hurts when I lean forward or bend over, I guess I put pressure on it then.  Anyhow, we started with breakfast at "Jack's Bakery."  And word must have gotten out about Joe's situation yesterday.

After breakfast, we headed south to Lone Pine to take the drive through Alabama Hills and the Movie Road, where many old westerns were filmed, including Roy Rogers' first starring feature. However, en route, we came upon a pretty herd of 25-30 burros alongside the road.  Joe had to turn around and come back to them for pictures, but they cooperated and stayed put. 

We always have the snow-topped mountains in sight, so this was a pretty drive. 

 Someone got creative with a paint brush here.

There was a 1 1/2 mile arch loop hike along here so the four of us braved this.  The path was well-marked with rocks, and there were lots of arches to see, supposedly 300 arches are in this area. They began making movies here in 1920, and over 400 movies have been filmed here so we will pay closer attention to the old westerns the next time we watch them. 

It was a pretty easy trail, but a lot of ups and downs, sometimes a little slippery in the loose gravel.

 Getting back to the parking lot and the car was a welcome sight.

From there, we headed to the Japanese Internment Camp called Manzanar where 10,000+ Japanese Americans and Japanese immigrants were "relocated" during WWII.  There was a visitors center with exhibits, an interesting 22-minute film of these people telling their stories.  There was a barracks that had been renovated, and a short drive around the encampment with some concrete pads still in place, and a small cemetery.  We saw our second wildlife along here, 2 jackrabbits jumped out in front of us.

We headed back to town and picked up Dave's car, which they had just finished working on.  We got back to the RV about 3:00.  I finally managed to get my laundry done, and we all made trips to the grocery store, there's a good-sized Von's Grocery and a KMart here in town.  Lots of restaurants, some art galleries, sporting good stores, a Penneys that is closing.  A lot of traffic, especially trucks.  Also a lot of hikers are seen around town, many of them hitch-hiking, we assume back to their vehicles, wherever they left them.

We saw one group being picked up, and they were filling the trunk of the car with all their gear.  They are all pretty heavily-laden, would be interesting to know how long they have been up in the mountains.

Tomorrow we intend to drive to some lakes and to the snow.  That will just about finish up Bishop for us, but this is a really pretty little town.