arrived at Mono Village late afternoon and Sue and Eddie checked in, there room was brilliant, it was the cheapest room so far and thankfully the price didn’t reflect in the quality of the place! After they checked in we went to check out the campsite, we all instantly realised why the campsite never sold out, it was massive! We opted for a site fairly close to the motels as we had been warned that there was a resident bear so nobody fancied a big huge walk in the dark to get to either the motel room or campsite! What we did find a bit odd was that there weren’t any bear lockers, we were told as long as the bears couldn’t see anything then they would probably leave your car alone!!! Once we’d set up camp, Rob and I headed back to the motel, Cath and Andy stayed at the campsite as poor old Cath wanted to chill in the hammock for a while. When we got round to the motel, Sue and Eddie told us that they had been speaking with their neighbours who’d told them how the bear comes past the motel at more

or less the same time every night. We were very excited about this, but I’m not sure Sue was quite as keen at the prospect of seeing a bear as we were! Wow, we had fell on our feet with this place, it had been booked in such a hurry and without any real research, we had both been a bit unsure of what to expect but it was just fantastic. Yet another incredible side to this ever amazing sunshine state of California. Also to our amazement the onsite café/restaurant served a limited veggie menu but veggie none the less and Sue kindly offered to buy us a meal as everyone was a little bit tired and nobody really felt like cooking - especially with the thought of the odd hungry bear wandering by!!!

The café/restaurant looked like a proper old style diner, we weren’t really holding out too much hope of a gastronomic delight but it sure beat cooking! We placed our orders and to everyone’s joy we