Utah Trip, Part 2: Bryce Canyon and Escalante

Sunday afternoon, we stopped by Grandma and Grandpa Richards and Aunt JaNae's house before heading to Bryce.  Brady and the kids stayed by the curb, keeping all illness away from their compromised immunity, but I was lucky to see Grandpa.  He was admitted to the hospital the following day with pneumonia and a host of other problems.  We love to see Grandma because she makes us feel like we are her favorite--and I've decided she makes everyone feel like that.

We wondered if the 4.5 hour drive would be difficult with the kids, but it zoomed by with Zachary's homework, listening to conference, and chatting about our previous excursions down to Southern Utah.

When we had been married one year, we made a spontaneous decision to buy a tent and rush down to Bryce Canyon.  I had three days before Winter and Spring Semester, and Brady was about to start working full time.  We didn't have a lot of extra cash, so dishing out $100 for the tent, paying for the permits and entry fees, gas etc., felt extravagant.

We got down to a full moon, and enjoyed several days hiking, moonlight walking, and catching up.  Remember college?  So busy.  A different kind of busy than our life right now.  It was magic for us and ranks as likely my top "before kids" memory.  I distinctly remember spending time talking about what kind of parents we would be, and discussing our desire to raise kids who enjoyed and appreciated the outdoors.  We even imagined what it would be like to come with our kids.

With so little time to plan a trip, it wasn't as easy as I hoped to throw in an excursion.  We had to book three separate hotel rooms--one in Escalante, a full 70 minutes away--and there were other hiccups along the way.  But pulling into Bryce and showing the kids the views for the first time made my heart sing.  I couldn't stop grinning and my heart was pounding in my throat.

We intended to have a child carrier for when Kate puttered out, but couldn't seem to locate one in time. So, we held our breath and hoped for the best.  Kate hasn't ever hiked more than about 2.5 miles, and we didn't know how her feet would do with her skin condition, or how good her endurance was.  To be fair to her, we hadn't given her a shot to prove herself until this trip.

At a shopping center on the way down, the kids were begging for a tiny toy at the register.  We of course shot them down, but realizing a bribe might come in handy for three full days of complain-free hiking, we decided to dangle the carrot.  Zac could get his car and Kate could have her mini-Tiana if they had a good attitude and they both succeeded each day.  Having Zac responsible for Kate's encouragement and success was the key to the trip, and he was an awesome cheerleader for her.

We thought our bribery plan was golden but by minute 8 on the 6-mile journey, Kate was already bawling and saying she needed to be carried.  Her cries echoed through the canyon.  Luckily, we chose the hardest hike first, so it was vacant and we didn't interrupt anyone else's experience.

She got over it fast, and soon enough, they were both frantically pointing out arches, windows, and hoodoos along the way.

Zachary found an animal design in every rock structure.  This one is a lion:

The famous "Wall of Windows" on the Peekaboo Loop Trail:

My favorite pic of these two from the trip:

I love barren trees against red rock.

Zac's pic for show-and-tell (he flashed the shaka in every pic for Utah unless we specifically told him he could not):

The hike was pleasant and the kids were all-stars.  Late the night before, I stayed up reading review after review and trying to decide if I should take my untested three-year-old on a trail marked "strenuous" with "major elevation change."  Overall, the hike was easy, and Kate did about 3.5 miles of it herself.  Zac had no trouble, as always, because that kid doesn't wear out.

The walk to this view was about 0.2 miles, and Zac thought that was asking a lot since we already told him there was "no more hiking today."

Brady told me about his backpacking adventures in the wilderness surrounding Bryce.  Ahhh, wilderness.

The kids (and sick Brady) slept in the car while I drove from viewpoint to viewpoint in Bryce, and ran a few of the easy paths.

One of my favorite pictures of Zachary from the trip.  I love that his eyes barely clear the railing.

Aqua Canyon (looks like Thor's fist but that famous Hoodoo is elsewhere in the park):

A raven.  These birds were everywhere.

Natural Bridge:

Brady spent time teaching me how to use the camera properly.  We were both obsessed with the aspens and their stunning yellow leaves.

Rainbow Point (I think):

The kids liked seeing prairie dogs more than rocks:

Chipmunk:

Really scraggly deer:

Like I mentioned at the start of this point, Bryce holds a huge place in my heart.  One memory that stands out boldly is posing in front of the full moon.  We have two lovely pictures in photo albums (I will scan and include), and recreating the memory turned out to be a pretty big deal to me.  It was a big enough deal that we nearly missed getting to our Escalante motel in time because I had to have this picture.

HAHAHA!  Look at that tiny star, er, full moon!  Magical, huh?  Oh well!!

The next morning, we took our time making it to the trail head for Lower Calf Creek Falls.  This decision alone almost ruined our day, because it turns out that neither of us had cash or a checkbook (rookie traveler mistake), and the Camp Lord wouldn't let us park without our $5.  We drove a full hour to the middle of nowhere, paid $1.59 for peanuts marked 3/$1.00 and got cash back so we could park and be on our way.  We luckily snagged the very last parking space of the day.

We gave the kids a gummy bear every hour of the trail, and told them it would give them super powers. They totally believed us.

Zachary kept telling Kate, "Don't worry, there's no snakes or mountain lions in Utah."  Hmmm...  We decided not to correct him until we were done hiking.  (We always correctly tell him there are no snakes in Hawaii.)  I had to finally tell him about the mountain lions because of warning signs that one had been spotted recently.  I didn't want Zachary out of my eye-sight.

This hiking trip to Southern Utah was worth it just for this picture.

Petroglyphs on the mountain:

Snake grass.

Destination!  Kate made it without any help!  It's almost three miles to this point.

The hike itself was not particularly interesting, so we took tons (and tons) of pictures of the waterfall.

We finally convinced the kids to dip their feet in.  BRRRR!

Kate wanted to dip them in and run away a dozen times in a row.  There were a few others at the falls and she put on a show.

Hiking back out.  This is nearly six miles, and with breaks, it took us almost 4.5 hours.  That's a long time for 6 miles, but we were super proud of Kate for hiking 4.5 miles by herself!

The kids were constantly on the hunt for cairns.

Zac got in the car before we told him to empty his shoes of sand.

Day 3!  The kids were motivated to hike in Bryce again to earn their prize for "Hiking the Hoodoos," a program the park puts on to encourage people (and kids) to hike rather than just snap photos at the top.  We first did a quick walk to Mossy Cave.

Waterfall in the background:

Then we took off on the park's most popular hike, the Queens/Navajo Combination Loop.

It's the most popular for a reason: it's the best one.  It's also really crowded and full of tourists that think it's not the worst decision to stand on a sandstone, unstable ledge and pose.  We thought we might witness a senseless death!

Wall Street:

These Stellar Jays were spectacular.

"The Queen":

Thor's fist:

My little champs.  Kate did this 3.5 miler without any help:

Oh, Bryce.  Love it.

We stopped at The Rock Shop on the way back and each kid picked up a souvenir, in addition to the pins they earned for hiking from the Ranger.  The kids were busting with excitement to get back to their cousins, and we were really happy we didn't have to eat any more meals in southern Utah.  Yuck.

I wish Brady was healthy for this segment of the trip, but he handled it well, crunching on ice chips to ease the pain and thinking that surely, surely his eyes would be better when he woke up the next day.  After a full week of red, juicy eyes, they did in fact look better on Wednesday and Thursday.  We magically also acquired an antibiotic for Brady (wink, wink), and he was 100% better 24 hours later after a week of nasty sore throat.  We made it back to Cory and Kristen's in time for Indian Mulligatawny soup at Kristen's, which was about 600 times better than anything we ate in Bryce, and also in time to infect 4 of their 6-member family.  Ugh.

Our whole family counts this trip as a success, and I'm glad we made some memories together.