Insult on top of injury in Wawona...uhh...Big Trees

[John Kasaian]

Suzelle's Easter Break is winding down, so we packed a picnic lunch and went to Yosemite National Park for a last hurrah this morning.
A friend who is a ranger in the Valley warned us that traffic is so bad right now it takes 3-4 hours just to drive around the Valley, so Happy Isles is out, Plan B then, would be the Wawona Historical park just inside the South Gate. We took a walk up to grand old Wawonuhhh I mean Big Trees Hotel to work up an appetite and low and behold, the Historic massive white wooden Adirondack chairs that graced the Great Lawn ever since the glacier receeded has been replaced by piddly, flimsy resin plastic replica-oids!
If anyone here has had the pleasure of sitting down in a real Adirondack, you know what I mean. They are marvels of wood working, heavier than a ships anchor, and big on comfort. I've often thought of photographing one with the 8x10 as an homage but I guess that's not going to happen. The Wawona Adirondacks had been around for so long that they likely kissed the rumps of Presidents Woodrow Wilson and Teddy Roosevelt.

It's an outrage!

[Drew Wiley]

Shame, shame! Infamy! I tromped into the Roaring River backcountry patrol cabin with my buddies a few years ago for a lunch break before heading onward
to Cloud Canyon and beyond. Because I was the old timer, I got to sit in the hand-carved rocking chair that has been there for decades. We shared a lot of
stories and lore with the resident ranger. After that, furniture consisted of fallen logs at the "luxury resorts", and boulders above timberline. But since it
was either raining like crazy or snowing every afternoon at higher altitude, furniture was unnecessary.

[Leszek Vogt]

John, the old adage says...if you want it done right, you need to make it yourself. Just looked through the latest Fine Woodworking and they reveal how those chairs are done....presumably for comfort. Not sure this helps....

Les

[Willie]

Ask hotel management and you may well find where they have the chairs stored. Never know, they might even be hoping to find a few folks to take some off their hands.

[John Kasaian]

A lass I know, a retired Navy Commander, was charged with running a physical/vocational therapy program at a hospital. One "exercise" was to build a real gosh darned Adirondack chair with all those angles. She nodded and smiled when I told her about the shenanigans at Wawona/Big Trees.

[John Kasaian]

Ask hotel management and you may well find where they have the chairs stored. Never know, they might even be hoping to find a few folks to take some off their hands.

Willie, IIRC these would probably be federal property. Not sure how they would dispose of them.

[BradS]

I heard that the bears took all the old chairs to use around their camp fires at night.

[John Kasaian]

I heard that the bears took all the old chairs to use around their camp fires at night.

They could certainly support a bear!

[Drew Wiley]

The bears sit around in the evening watching the tourists being fed garbage.

[HMG]

Adirondacks gotta be green! The green ones are much more comfortable than the white ones.

[John Kasaian]

Adirondacks gotta be green! The green ones are much more comfortable than the white ones.

It would be difficult for the golfers to find green Adirondacks after shooting the 19th hole (different tee positions format 9 holes into 18)
The course and lawn may still be irrigated with recycled waste water, so they are a vivid green.
Rum soaked golfers and bears likely appreciate the contrast white Adirondacks offer.