Summertime Groove

We felt like we got a late start to summer with being gone a week and then sick a week, but now we are in our summer groove. There are the usual suspects like the dairy...

Playgrounds new and old...

Backyard fun...

Bear World (notice the scar! She calls it her "crack" and will tell me that her "crack needs more gasoline!" That's vaseline, which the doc told us to keep applying until it had healed. I think we are nearly there! Just slathering on the sunscreen to prevent darkening now.)...

and baseball.  Owen is doing coach-pitch this year, which is a challenging twist! He has got a hit at nearly every at-bat, so far!

For some extra parent bonus points, we found an awesome car show to take our car-aficionado to. He was in heaven!

And we took a fun family bike trip around the Snake river greenbelt here in town one beautiful afternoon. More of that rock-throwing that we're into! It takes two smalls to drive this old tractor.

The big news, though, is that the tooth fairy has been busy at our house lately. Three teeth in one week! Here's the progression. The middle picture made me laugh all day, because that one upper tooth was so loose that it moved when he talked and sometimes he'd smile at me with that tooth unknowingly twisted sideways. But he didn't want to pull it, and it fell out sometime during the night. However, no teeth were lost and the tooth fairy was able to collect all three! Hadley keeps asking if her teeth are loose yet. :)

And on a side note, our garden is producing again! Lots of arugula, sugar snap peas, radishes, spinach, oregano, parsley, and lettuce so far.  Oh, and we are up to our ears in strawberries, which we love!  So far we've made several batches of strawberry freezer jam, frozen whole berries, strawberry poke cake, strawberry watermelon popsicles, and of course tons of plain ones! I have my eyes on some strawberry lemonade and strawberry muffins next. I feel a little like Forrest Gump...

Zion National Park

Can you say "over-crowded"? That was our experience at Zion. They only allow cars in the southern part of the park, and a shuttle gets you to the rest.  That sounds great, but you have to get to the shuttle, and there was a serious dearth of parking! 

We came in through the east entrance and drove the width of the park, up and down every parking lot we came across and ended up back out of the south entrance, way down on a random road in Springdale, Utah. We decided to picnic at the park just past where we parked (by the public library for nice public restrooms too!), while we discussed whether to stay and fight the crowds or just make the drive back through to the cabin. It was hot, but Hadley still enjoyed the playground! Our kids have played on some pretty scenic playgrounds, incidentally. (Unfortunately, Owen had gotten sick the day before and stayed back at the cabin with Oma.)

We decided to go ahead and see the park, since we were there! So we had to pack up what we needed from our car, hike down the road to the city shuttle stop, ride it a few stops to the park, exit and re-enter the park on foot, walk through the visitor center to the park shuttle stop, and wait in a crazy, snaking line like we were at DisneyWorld, all in 95 degree heat. 

By that point, we opted to ride the shuttle to the end and do the Riverwalk hike up to the Narrows. The shuttle ride was enjoyable, with informative, pre-recorded messages that came on periodically for things to look for outside the windows. And my seat-mate was pretty good company.

It felt great to actually start on our hike (it had probably been almost 4 hours since we left the cabin), never mind the hundreds of fellow hikers! But the Virgin River was a welcome, cool respite from the heat, and throwing rocks into the water never gets old for some, so we took a quick detour to the water.

However, there was still a mile of trail before we got to "The Narrows", so we trekked on. It was a beautiful hike at the bottom of a towering canyon next to the river with varying lush/desert/marsh greenery.

My favorite were the weeping walls where water seeping down through the huge mountains finally reaches an impenetrable layer of rock and trickles down the rock face. Mosses, ferns, and flowers take advantage of this extra moisture.

Finally at the end of the trail where the sidewalk stops at the water! You can continue on through the water to the Narrows, but we were not prepared for that kind of a hike. Dipping our toes and ankles was enough for now. Ahhh....

After a while walking in the river (and Hadley accidentally squatting and soaking her shorts), it was time to undo the whole adventure - 2 shuttles and one long car drive back through the park. At least there was plenty more sight-seeing to do from the car! Not too much wildlife, but we did see deer, squirrels, and bighorn sheep, too. (Also, possibly spotted condors, which are hard to distinguish up in the air.)

One of the best things about the east entrance was going through the mile-long tunnel through the rock. It was so long that they had to provide "windows" periodically for glimpses of light. I think Hadley enjoyed the tunnel most of all! Although there was so much more to see, I don't think I'll be coming back anytime soon, unless I can get down there in April/May/October away from the crowds and heat.

After our Utah adventures, we headed back home, and Oma and Papa took a detour down to the Grand Canyon for a couple of days. Hadley made the trip home mostly asleep because she got a stomach bug the day before we left, and it stuck around for 4 days. Just as she got better, I got ill. Then Owen the next day, and then John. Oma and Papa came up to Idaho for a few days and got to see Owen play baseball one night, but then we all started dropping like flies, so they started their trip back home. I didn't get very many pictures of their stay with us, but I think they got some good quality time with the kids between illnesses (dancing performances, variety shows, puppy and kitty, etc.) and came away unscathed. :) Until next time!

Bryce Canyon

On our first morning at the cabin, we all headed to Bryce Canyon about 45 minutes away. It was a pleasant temperature at the visitor center and more forest-y than I was expecting. I guess that's what you get at 8000 feet of elevation.

After a quick spin around the vc and an early PBJ lunch, we hopped on the shuttle to see more of the park. Our stop was at Sunset Point, and the views were spectacular!

We decided to do a short 1.3 mile hike (Navajo Loop Trail) down into the hoodoos, and we could tell from the overlook that most of the 550-ft descent would be in the first part of the trail.  This picture is looking back up at the numerous switchbacks we just came down, and we all know that what goes down must go back up at the end.  Yikes!

The trail made use of some tunnels to cut through the huge walls of hoodoos, which the kids enjoyed. (We even got to drive thru a couple of rock tunnels on the road to Bryce.)

The last switchbacks led to Wall Street, Bryce Canyon's only slot canyon. It was an impressively narrow stretch between rock walls that provided some much appreciated shade.

Can you tell that I had a serious grip on Hadley's arm the whole way down? Ha! No Yellowstone repeats were going to happen here, if I could help it!

How does a tree this large take root in an inch of dust and solid rock?  Pretty amazing!

Once we were at the bottom of the canyon, it was much hotter.  But there was still an impressive amount of wildlife and trees thriving in this dusty, dry place. Such a pretty contrast between the evergreen trees and bright orange rocks!

The way back up was many more switchbacks with a gradual incline thrown in between for some different views. Climbing up 550 feet at the high elevation was a challenge! Kudos to John who did it with 30-lb+ kid on his shoulders!  And Owen was a champ all the way by himself, though he did say he was done with hiking for the day.  :)

 The hoodoo on the very left below is called Thor's hammer (not hard to see why).

We met up with Oma at the lodge, and John and I did a quick walk to Sunrise Point for a different vantage point. I was hyper-aware of the ledge while trying to take our selfie!

Then we decided to head back to the cars for more food and to drive to the end of the park road. Our first stop was at Natural Bridge, which was well worth a peak. It's hard to tell here, but it spans over 85-feet!

This is what it looks like when you are sub-3-feet tall. Let's just say that someone has a lot of faith in guard rails!

The end of the road was Rainbow Point, which curves back around to look at the whole formation from the south. A truly amazing landscape that is difficult to capture on film!

We were all dusty, tired, and ready to head back to the cabin by that point, so that's what we did! All in all, Bryce is worth a stop if you are in the area, and really not very crowded for a national park.