This year we met up with them up at a cabin just on the fringe of Zion’s National Park. Last year we met at a cabin called “Moose Manor” in Yellow Stone, which definitely had a moose feel and sometimes smell to it-but this place, well, it was undisputedly an upgrade. This cabin acted as our base camp to family adventures and a few mis-adventures as well.
Our first day trip was to find a cabin my dad had built when I was really little. It too is just outside Zion’s Park. My family, cousins, and friends all used to spend summers there and after we moved to Oregon when I was ten, I don’t remember ever going back (I’m speculating that was because we basically moved to the woods and camping out lost its novelty). After some serious driving around we finally found it…in all its abandoned splendor. 
We also stopped inside Zion’s to make the short hike to see the petraglyphs carved into the stone walls. If anyone can decipher these ancient scribbles, particularly the two stick figures, be sure to let us know when you make a comment! A few of us have made a few wagers on certain interpretations. 
Our day trip on Day Two was to hike up the Narrows. The trail down the narrows is a 16-mile all day adventure for people just shy of crazy. Although we may fit this description we had a few small kids in tow and decided to try out the easier family trek up from the bottom to where the river forks off 2 miles up where we’d turn around and come back down.
To hike the narrows you must be prepared for several things: prepared to get wet, prepared to swim, prepared to use duct tape, prepared to walk on wet slippery rocks, prepared not to cuss in front of the children should you fall, and prepared to make a run for it if it starts to rain. Our first stop to prepare was at the local wal-mart for 11 pair of aqua socks. Here we are fresh and spunky and ready to tackle the narrows in our new pink shoes…Kudos to Jeffery who was greatly disturbed when he couldn’t find any man-colored aqua socks in his size and had to resort to pink. He was a good sport!
Here's a bunch of happy kids who have no idea what's upstream...
Ten minutes later these happy children are hiking in chest deep water-or in Chloe's case, chin deep.
Here's Connor and Jeff. Jeff is happy the water hides the color of his socks!
Dave and Mark who came to conquer the narrows. They are happy when hiking...
...but not so happy when made to stop because a certain someone wants to take pictures.
Dave and Sharie & Jeff and Connor
Mark and I by a teeny tiny waterfall.
Our family minus Chey. We wished she could have been on this hike, after we show her our bruised feet she'll be happy she stayed back in Provo working to pay for BYU's fall tuition.
Later along the hike we decided our cool new aqua socks weren’t so smart after all...hot tip for you: they get bigger when they get wet. Good thing Mitchell never goes anywhere without duct tape in his backpack because several of us needed a little sock-modification as shown here. Thoughtfully he brought along an assortment of colors, we chose black as it complimented the pink.
Amanda Petersen was the stalwart hiker, she took Chloe through the narrows most of the way. At several points along the narrows the water got so deep we had to wade waist high and even swim for it at times. 
Somewhere in the deeper waters Chloe grabbed onto Amanda for dear life sending Amanda into the deepest part of the flowing river causing poor Amanda to lose both aqua socks. We all waded around the murky waters for some time and only recovered one shoe...er sock. With Mitchell’s duct tape to the rescue, this time using classic silver, we took the shoe liner out of her good sock and taped it to her bare foot, and without complaint Amanda walked the rest of the way with a “swish-slap! swish-slap! swish-slap!”
Our two hour day hike turned out to be a five hour odyssey. Turns out, this is a great way to get your kids to go to bed early...like on the bus ride to the parking lot. This works just as good as giving them a cup full of Benedryl.
Day Trip on Day Three was to hang out in the cabin all day and rest our tired dogs. This was a great plan until long about 3pm someone got bored and convinced the rest of us into taking a short hike (with bruised feet) to see where the virgin river shoots out of the rocks. Here is the signpost at the trail head when we started the hike, notice the sign in the background that went unnoticed…(it's the one that starts with the word DANGER!)
…and here is the sign five minutes later after the rain gods decided to wash us off the trial. We all came running back to the cars, completely drenched. 
It turns out the hike, as promised, was quick and easy. The shoe cleaning afterwards was not. This took us a good 30 minutes. Here’s a handy tip; don’t wear your brand new shoes, the red dessert dirt doesn’t come off so well, even with a hose and bleach.After a fun time in the mountains it was time to head to the Petersen’s home town of Mesquite Nevada…a lovely place to enjoy the summer.
Especially if your friends have friends who own a pool...and just happen to be out of town!
It was great to catch up with the Petersens, we miss them dearly!
Love Zions. Miss Zions.
ReplyDeleteThat picture of the husbands sitting on the rock is hilarious. It looks like David and Goliath!
And I loved the duct-tape-shoe-incident! So funny!