Escalante 2011

Don't kill me... but we went to Escalante last weekend with Nathan and Abby, and we took a bazillion pictures, and I really must post all of them. They are all too awesome to be cut from the finals! I'm sorry if this takes forever to load!

Ryan and I took a trip to Escalante shortly after our wedding in 2008. The entire time we were there, we kept saying how much we wanted to return with Nathan and Abby. It was fun to finally bring them here.

I must say that traveling with two teenagers is quite different from traveling with an 8 year old and a 10 year old. I want to publicly apologize to my mother for all the hell my brother and I must have put her through when we were teenagers and we fought in the back of the car on family trips. Payback's a bitch, friends of the blog! Nathan and Abby fought a lot. A lot... as in, at one point Ryan said, "Do you want me to end this vacation right now? I will turn the car around and drive straight home!" And he meant it! (I'll admit I had to stifle laughter when those words came out of his mouth... and it's a good thing I did, because the teens took him seriously and stopped their bickering... for at least 10 minutes.) OK, OK, the kids weren't that bad... but yes, they did bicker like teenage siblings will do. This is really the first year that the kids haven't gotten along really well, so it took us a little by surprise!

We stayed in a cute little cabin at a fun RV park. It was only $49 a night to stay there! It was neat, clean, and exactly what we needed. Our accommodations were right in the middle of town. We ate a delicious breakfast at the restaurant next door and then headed out to Devil's Gardens.

The red rock looked so pretty with Abby's hair.

The weather was perfect!

The kids were all about taking goofy pictures. Naturally Ryan and I were up for that.

We did some hiking around. Even I could join in - it was mostly flat.

Though I did somehow make it up onto an arch.

We loved the weird landscape and yelling to hear our echoes. We talked about why this area is named in reference to the devil and hell... we figured it is because the early explorers had never seen anything like it and thought it might resemble classical descriptions of hell.

After Devil's Garden, we went on an easy hike to Lower Calf Creek Falls. The hike was flat pretty much the entire way. I did just fine on the way to the falls... but the way back was pretty awful. Our hike was on Saturday and I'm writing this on Wednesday... and my back is still in pain from the hike. No, I still haven't recovered from breaking my vertebrae. It gets frustrating. I'm still glad I went, though! Good memories with the kids!

We brought our binoculars and the kids were fascinated by the granaries in the cliffs and the pictographs. Very cool.

It was a warm day, but Nathan wanted to wear his hoodie the entire day. Kids these days! (He sure looked cool, though!)

Dad & the kids...

The falls!

Nate (as he has been calling himself lately).

Sweet Abigail. Is she cute or what? So grown up!

Dad and the kids again.

Some things never change... Nathan is still always quick to spot cool insects and plants.

The beautiful creek banks.

It's been a wet spring, and there were a lot of beautiful flowers to see that weren't here the last time we came to Escalante.

On Sunday we took a different way home. We stopped at a lot of scenic overlooks to enjoy the scenery and take pictures.

We drove through Manti and took the kids to see the Manti LDS temple. It is a majestic building.

Self-portrait by Dad!

Time to head home. Goodbye, Escalante and Manti!