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		 Things to do in Fresno 
		
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			Yosemite National Park
			  
			Visit the homestead of one of the Revolutionary 
			Yosemite National Park in east central 
			California, stretches out over the Sierra Nevada Mountains covering 
			761,266 acres in the Madera, Tuolumne and Mariposa counties. Over 
			3.5 million people come here every year, with a lot of them spending 
			most of their time in a seven square mile area in Yosemite Valley. 
			The park became a World Heritage Site in 1984, with huge sequoia 
			groves, spectacular waterfalls, beautiful cliffs of granite, 
			magnificent clear streams and a marvelous biodiversity. The national 
			park, was part of the developing national park idea, although not 
			its first. With over 95% of the park designated wilderness, it is 
			one of the biggest and least fragmented habitats in the Sierra 
			Nevada mountains, with a large amount of plants and animals. The 
			elevation runs from 2000 feet to 13,000 plus feet, and has five 
			vegetation regions; alpine, sub-alpine, chaparral/oak forests, lower 
			and upper montane; which is lower than the sub-alpine areas of 
			mountains, but above the lowland regions. California has over 7000 
			varieties of plants, with half of them in the Sierra Nevada 
			mountains, and over 20% of that in Yosemite. Over 160 rare plants 
			thrive in the valley, with the unique formations and soil 
			composition. The geology of the park is characterized by the granite 
			rocks and remains of more ancient rocks. It was around 10 million 
			years ago that the mountains were raised up, and tipped to the east 
			so that the gentle slopes of the western side of the mountains could 
			be less accentuated and the deep canyons were formed. A million years 
			ago, ice and snow began to accumulate, and glaciers were formed at 
			the higher elevations, and guesses have put the thickness of the ice 
			at over 4000 feet. When these glacier moved, they began to form the 
			deep ravines and valleys that were sculpted including the U shape 
			valley that brings throngs of visitors here. Surrounded by 
			wilderness areas, Yosemite has the Ansel Adams Wilderness to the 
			southeast, Emigrant Wilderness in the north, and the Hoover 
			Wilderness in the northeast. Measuring some 1189 miles, Yosemite is 
			about the size of Rhode Island in the northeast part of the nation, 
			and is home to thousands of ponds and lakes, 350 miles of roads, 800 
			miles of trails and 1600 miles of streams. There are two federally 
			named wild and scenic rivers in the region, the Toulumne and the 
			Merced, that flow west through the foothills and into central 
			California. Most of the landforms were cut from the granite rock of 
			the Sierra Nevada Batholith, with some metamorphosed volcanic and 
			sedimentary rocks in the east by Mount Dana. They are called roof 
			pendants since they once belonged to the roof of the granite rock 
			that lay below. It was the erosion process that created the many 
			diverse domes, valleys and canyons that are found there today, with 
			many other extraordinary features abounding. Although Yosemite 
			Valley is about a percent of the park's massive areas, it is where 
			most of its visitors come to view and also stay. The El Capitan is a 
			huge granite cliff that looks out over the valley, and has grown 
			into the most popular rock climbing area in the country, and brings 
			climbers from all over the world. It is accessible year round, and 
			has a plethora of climbing routes. There are granite domes, called 
			Sentinel Rock and Half Dome that rise into the sky and have become 
			two of the most favorite. There are magnificent areas in the high 
			country of Yosemite, like the Kuna Crest, Tuolumne Meadows, Clark 
			Range, Dana Meadows and Cathedral Range that will keep you 
			captivated for hours. The Pacific Crest Trail and the Sierra crest 
			go through the park with peaks of red metamorphic rock, like Mount 
			Dana and Mount Gibbs, as well as many other granite peaks, like the 
			Mount Conness and Mount Lyell, which is the highest point in 
			Yosemite. You can find three spectacular ancient Giant Sequoia 
			trees, the Merced has 20, the Mariposa has 200, and the Tuolumne has 
			25. The fantastic trees grow bigger than any other species of tree, 
			growing into the tallest and the trees that live longer than any 
			other. There were many more before the last ice age, and in certain 
			places you can see the remnants.  
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			Fresno Metropolitan Museum 
			The museum has just recently 
			gone through a major renovation, and now has been restored to its 
			glorious beginnings, set within a 1922 Fresno Bee building, and 
			helped by millions of people around the state. The five story brick 
			building has terra cotta ornaments and arched windows, and was built 
			by George D. Hudnett, Inc of Sacramento, and cost was one million 
			dollars. It is an Italian Renaissance style architectural beauty 
			that was completely different from all other buildings in the early 
			20th century in this city's former styles. It would house the Fresno 
			Bee, the local newspaper, and numerous mythological Greek spirits 
			decorating the exterior. The McClathy family owned the paper, and as 
			it grew, it was expanded to include the radio station known as KMJ. 
			This caused the building to be increased in size in 1936, and again 
			in 1951, which saw the exterior decorations taken away, as well as 
			the brick façade. Growing in statue and size, during the 1950s and 
			1960s, with additional construction going on inside. The paper 
			eventually outgrew its space, and in the early 1970s, left the 
			building and it was slated to be sold. The owners wanted to take it 
			down in 1978, but the local banker, Lewis Eaton wanted to do 
			something else with it. He contacted Carlos McClatchy, and asked him 
			to stall the demolition, and said he wanted to put a museum there; 
			if the community felt likewise, and the engineers found out about 
			its stability. Carlos said he would wait, and Lewis got the 
			structural engineers to check it out. While the building was checked 
			out, public support grew, and it was decided and agreed that the 
			building would be perfect for a museum. In 1979, the Fresno 
			Metropolitan Museum of Art, History and Science was chartered and 
			Eaton named the first president of the board of directors needed to 
			oversee the works. The permanent collection contains landscape 
			paintings, many from the 19th and 20th centuries, which much of was 
			a gift from Dr. and Mrs. John D. Reife, with artists Chris 
			Jorgenson, David Cox, Thomas Hill, Hugo Anton Fisher and Maynard 
			Dixon. Another venue is the Charles and Sharon Small jigsaw puzzle 
			collection, with over 1200 puzzles, the William and Dorothy Petesch 
			Collection which are numerous caricatures from the 18th and 19th 
			centuries, decorative arts and crafts, Native American collection, 
			Ansel Adams photo collection, and many wonderful venues throughout 
			the year.    
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			Kings Canyon National Park 
			This national park is just 
			outside of Fresno, California, in the southern Sierra Nevada 
			mountains, and began in 1940 with over 462,900 acres that include 
			the General Grant National Park; which was started to protect the 
			General Grant Grove. The Sequoia National Park is located just to 
			the south of Yosemite, and many call it the Sequoia and Kings Canyon 
			National Parks and managed by the National Park service as one 
			locale. Kings Canyon was well known by local settlers as early as 
			the mid 1800s, and after John Muir visited the canyon and region in 
			the 1870s, it began getting attention. Muir couldn't believe how 
			much alike this canyon was with Yosemite. The future of the park was 
			in doubt for the next five decades, as some wanted to build a dam on 
			the west end, while many others preferred to have is preserved as a 
			state park. It was inaugurated into the national park in 1965, and 
			received the name from its river, Kings. The park is home to two 
			regions, the General Grant Grove, where the giant sequoias are 
			located, and the famous General Grant Tree, as well as the Redwood 
			Mountain Grove where the biggest sequoia grove in the world is 
			located. Over 15,000 sequoia trees are found here, with all having 
			over a foot in circumference in their bases, on a 3100 acre park. 
			The sequoia forests belong to the 202,000 acres of old-growth trees, 
			which are mostly conifer trees.   
		 
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