Grand Vacation-Day Three

On Day Three of our Grand Vacation, we woke early again at our campsite and without even hurrying had packed everything up in the van and were on the road by 8 a.m. That early morning sunrise sure gets you out of your sleeping bag before much of the day has gone by!

We stopped at the Forest Service visitor center at Jacob Lake, the junction about 45 miles north of the north rim. The volunteer told us that there are a few park rangers who stay in the park during the winter, and to get out to the plowed road at Jacob Lake, they have a two-hour snowmobile ride. Talk about some isolation!

We drove back to Fredonia, then north across the stateline into Utah.
As we reached Kanab, we ran into a parade. I was ecstatic, I was hoping to see a parade, but I hadn't been able to find out in advance when any were. We don't get to go to that many parades, so I think it's a good experience for Desert Boy, plus they're just fun.

It was July 3rd, but because most of Utah shuts down on Sundays, Kanab, like many other towns, was celebrating Fourth of July on Saturday. We walked along the parade route and found a thriving downtown and lots of spectators.

The parade entrants were generous with their candy, and Desert Boy got some good practice in picking up candy and waving to people to encourage them to throw more.

Afterwards we stopped at the visitor information office and learned that their was a festival in the town park, located a few blocks north of main street. We easily found it and had a yummy lunch of Navajo tacos and tamales.

Besides a deluxe playground under some nice shade trees, the park also had a fountain feature, and Desert Boy enjoyed running around in it.

If there's water, he's happy. And he got even happier when we decided we had enough time to visit the city pool, located right next to the park.

The Kanab city pool was the fanciest city pool I've ever been to. They had a huge kid section, with a playground set right in the middle of the water.

I was happy to go down the little water slides with Desert Boy.

In the deeper section was a big water slide, a lazy river, and a lap/basketball area.

Ed tried out the waterslide, finding that it was much faster using the mat. Here's a video of going down the slide:



Desert Boy tried the lazy river with me and was a little scared because it was over his head. Then we put on his life jacket, and he found he liked it much better.

Smiles as we drift around. Thanks, Ed, for bringing your waterproof camera!

More happy swimming!

It was beginning to fill up as the day wore on, and we still had several hours to drive.

But there was enough time to get Desert Girl wet before we went on our way.

The scenery was beautiful on the winding mountainous highways. We stopped at an overlook to see Navajo Lake.

Then we went to Cedar Breaks National Monument, with its breathtaking scenery. It's a lot like Bryce Canyon, but on a smaller scale.

I liked that there was still snow down among some of the hoodoos.

We tried for another posed photo, but the kids weren't into it. So we drove along the monument road at 10,000+ feet elevation, stopping at various other overlooks and enjoying the 63 degree weather.

Ed and Desert Boy checked out the 2,500 foot drop to the bottom of the amphitheatre.
Finally it was time to go and drive further down the road, heading home.

Another ice cream stop helped make the trip go faster.

And then finally we were back in my valley, with some great storm clouds lending extra drama to the views.

Ed managed to get some great photos in the evening lighting.

Stormy summer evenings are definitely one of the best times to view the Great Basin.

And to top it all off, there was a rainbow out in the backyard. Home sweet home!

Grand Vacation-Day Two-Afternoon

After lunch at Point Imperial enjoying beautiful vistas of the Grand Canyon, it was time to drive south and see some other overlooks. The roads are long on the north rim, and it took awhile to get from spot to spot. The views were worth it, though, with amazing scenery in every direction.

Ed sometimes hiked a bit further than the rest of us--here's one of his self portraits.

You can just see from Desert Boy's body language that he wasn't enjoying himself anymore. It was clearly nap time.

I managed to snap a photo of this side canyon first.

And Ed captured some of the great shadows that the clouds were throwing over the treacherous terrain. I kept thinking about how neat it would be to be a bird and be able to swoop over all those side canyons and buttes and see what was hidden from our view.

We drove to a shady spot under some ponderosa pines, and the kids slept quite awhile while Ed went for a little hike by himself.

I enjoyed the peace and quiet with a field of lupine around me.

When Ed came back, Emma was more awake than him.

And apparently a nap didn't quite cure the attitude.

Nevertheless, we decided to push on and see another overlook, at the end of the road.
The trail led to the rock outcrop that is above the arch. It looked like an exciting little hike.

It was quite a dropoff from the top. I was certainly glad that all the fences seemed solid, and we kept Desert Boy close.

When we posed for a photo of all of us, this is the best we got. Desert Boy was having a tough time feeling happy.

I knew what would cure that, and since we had seen nearly all the overlooks accessed by paved roads on the north rim, we headed back to the general store in the visitor center area.
Ice cream improved everyone's disposition, and even Emma liked chomping on the crinkly wrapper.

There was still something that could make life a little cheerier: a shower! I used to be able to go for days without a shower, but that was in days gone by. And it was amazing how much better I felt after $1.50 for a 5 minute shower.

Meanwhile, Uncle Ed found Desert Boy observing a flower the proper way. It appears he did listen to our earlier admonishments.

After a picnic supper, we sought out a good spot to view the sunset.

While I enjoyed the changing colors, Desert Boy had fun playing hide and seek with his uncle.

And showing him the joys of toilet training. We've made great progress, but toilets are definitely quite optional at this point, even if they're not far away.

The shadows continued deepening over the canyon, but Desert Boy found a new friend with a video game who was willing to share, and he was much more interested in that.

It was a wonderful day at the Grand Canyon.

Grand Vacation-Day Two-Morning

On the second day of our vacation, we woke up bright and early. I can tell you that American robins are the first bird to start singing, and they start long before the sun is even thinking about coming up. My tentmates were thankfully more oblivious to the noisy birds, so we didn't get out of the tent until the sun was up.

The DeMotte campground was quite nice, although I noted that many trees had been cut out of it. I'm guessing that they were diseased or dead, and the Forest Service didn't want any hazard trees left to endanger campers. There were a nice variety of ponderosa pine, aspen, and white fir.

We were on the road to the north rim of the Grand Canyon before 7:30 a.m. My brother Ed and I were surprised by the big open meadows along the way. We had visited the canyon in 1989, but we found we had huge gaps in our memories.

Being early meant we got a good parking spot, and we immediately started off along a trail near the canyon.

Ah, the early morning view of the Grand Canyon. The gorge going down the center of the photo from left to right is where the Kaibab Trail goes, 15 miles of hiking to get to the Colorado River. I had remembered that the trail was very long on the north rim side, but I sure didn't remember looking at the topography and seeing how far away the river was.

We met up with a volunteer ranger-guided hike and decided to join them. We learned about the different plants around the rim.

Emma didn't seem to appreciate the knowledge. As you can see, she was in the jogging stroller, which handled the terrain just fine, although I wouldn't want to let go of it in the wrong spot! But alas, we eventually got a flat tire and didn't get to finish the hike. We went back to the van and tried to patch the tire, but there were so many thorn holes (I think from near our house, not in the Grand Canyon), that it didn't work too well. So out came the baby carrier and we headed back to the canyon.

The Grand Canyon lodge is perched on the canyon edge and allows for spectacular views. It wasn't even busy at about 9:30 a.m.

Then we started hiking some more and stopped to take more photos. It's hard not to take photos at the Grand Canyon.
Desert Boy likes to dress himself these days, so his clothes are always askew and often backwards. We even had two different types of shoes on the other day. It gives him a great sense of accomplishment to dress himself, but it can make for some interesting photos!

We continued on the trail to Angel Point, which had some steep dropoffs. Fortunately Desert Boy listened to directions. He wore his adventure pack so he was ready for exploring.

We found a safe place to do a little rock scrambling and see more of the view. The Grand Canyon is so immense that it is quite overwhelming. It's hard to know where to look and definitely difficult to comprehend the grandness of it all.

Although the north rim is remote, there was a steady stream of people visiting the overlooks and hiking the trails.

On the way back to the van, Desert Boy spotted a bright red flower and wanted to take a closer look. So he took out his magnifying glass. I thought it was so cute of him. Then we realized he had picked the flower to hold it at a more convenient angle. Oops!

Here's one of my brother Ed's great photos. He took even more than me and generously shared them.

It was getting time for lunch, so we drove to Point Imperial to have a picnic lunch. Desert Boy thinks picnics are exciting, and we were happy to agree. There were picnic tables at the viewpoint, but they were in the sun so we got out our lawn chairs and made our own picnic area.

The view was great, and we had a relaxing lunch. The main course? Why, chips, of course! We could get Desert Boy to eat anything if we promised he could have some chips afterwards.

I guess this is what Emma thought of it all.