Trip Report #2--Things We Did While There

Here's what we did once we got there (see the post below to catch up on how we got there).

Lots of trampoline jumping and playing with cousins.
Lots of helping Grandma in the garden and eating freshly picked peas and raspberries. Also helping grandma thin her peaches.

Attending the Heriman Days parade and getting lots of candy.

After sitting in the hot sun for the parade, swimming in the reservoir.

Of course a trip to the Bean Museum and BYU Creamery. Always a must.

A side trip up to Boise to see my sisters Jen and Gwen. Jen lives on a farm and the kids got to ride their horse.

They also got to ride dirt bikes.

And of course some animal loving. Clara was in heaven trying to give attention to all of the animals that they have.

Then there were fireworks for 4th of July.

I had fun experimenting with my camera.

There was time spent with friends from times past. The Nagels are just the kind of people that you feel like you haven't missed a step with, even though it's years in between each visit.

Here are the boys, our 2 and 3 of their 4.

Family fun--they were trying to re-create the family picture you can see in the corner.

There there were birthday celebrations, a little early because we were traveling on Sophia's birthday.

And as always fun with the dogs.

Trip Report #1--Getting There

Ready for the run down? This is another one of our epic trips. Last time we did this was the summer of 2007, when we drove the northern route, stopping to visit some friends in Montana and to see Mount Rushmore. This time we took the southern route. We saw a lot of this...

And a lot of this (these 2 pictures Ethan took).
We made it to Albuquerque, NM in 2 days and our kind friends that we knew in Nashville let us stay with them and crash B's Father's Day. Very kind friends, I should say.

From their house we headed a little north to see the Four Corners Monument. This is as close as we got. At the last time I had checked a couple of weeks before we left there had not been a word about it being closed. Luckily, it was only about 10 miles out of the way. We'll just have to go this way again so that we can say that we've been there.

From there we headed to Monument Valley on the border of Arizona and Utah. I thought this was really impressive. The kids were still a little disappointed about not being in 4 states at once and were not as impressed. But you drive about 20 miles off the main highway and all of a sudden these massive rock formations start appearing, just sitting there in the middle of nothingness. There is a really nice visitor center there too. We didn't do the drive around and were just content to look around and take in the view from there.

After Monument Valley we headed west to get to the Grand Canyon. On the way there is a spot where the road we were on crosses over the Colorado River, a little further north east of the canyon. On each side there is a little visitor center and a separate bridge for walking across. There was some plaques with an explanation of how this river went on to form the Grand Canyon. Seeing it there put the Grand Canyon in better perspective.

We spent the night in Page, AZ and the next day drove to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. While I could have sat on the rocking chairs and taken in the view for hours (a very nice lodge sits right up on the edge of the rim), the kids were not as impressed/inspired and pretty said, "Okay, we've seen it, now lets go."

Inside the lodge is a statue of a burro. The kids thought this was neat.

From the Grand Canyon we chose to go up through Cedar Breaks, Utah. It's another canyon of sorts, but it takes you up over 10,000 feet. The kids were much more impressed with this view for some reason. They also thought it was neat to play in snow in June.

Then we headed for Lehi.

We've Been on Vacation

Well, we are on an epic vacation, as in I drove across country by myself with 4 kids while Phil was in India and then he joined us in Utah for a couple of days. We hit Monument Valley, Grand Canyon and Cedar Breaks...all very beautiful. A different kind of beautiful than the East Coast beauty. The kids all thought Cedar Breaks was the most amazing. This picture was taken at Monument Valley, which I thought was very impressive. The kids, not so much, but they were all still a little disappointed that Four Corners was closed. More to come as we get our computer working again and get home to recover. Right now we are enjoying time with family.