Road Trip! - Utah

We started our road trip later than we had hoped, but just after Lullaby's birthday, we headed SOUTH! We had originally planned to head toward Idaho, but the fires had smoked out most of the areas we wanted to go to, and didn't look like they were going to clear any time soon. We made it to Meadow Hot Springs at night, swam in the dark. 

The next morning we woke up to a lovely view and went for a nearby adventure to try and find the obsidian beds. There was a little off-roading but we found them! So cool! It was super windy. We loaded up the car with WAY too many rocks, and headed back to the camper. 

The kids played and read some books while I helped Paul set up his work station for his first day of work on the road. It was a slow and clunky process at first. We had to find north and point the StarLink in that direction, making sure there was no tree cover, lay out the solar panels, connect everything to his computers, and get all the cords connected to the correct things.  Then once he was set up, the kids and I headed back to the springs. They were just a short walk from where we had the camper set up. 

When we were done with that, we set up the little picnic table and chairs for lunch and more reading time. Then inside for school. 

We drove farther south, to Zion for Matix's birthday. We set up a table full of birthday cards and gifts for him to come out to. Mostly scary books and Pokemon cards. We stayed in an RV park in Zion for a few days and loved all the amenities, especially the pool. The kids were the only ones to use it most of the time. 

Back to the camper for lunch and school. 

Then we went to explore a little while Paul finished work. We found a little petting zoo and old looking western town in Virgin, the town where we stayed.

Then back to get Paul, and we went out to eat at a Mexican restaurant to celebrate Matix's birthday. I loved the art on the walls, super weird and fun.

Matix knew I wouldn't be able to bake him a cake, and once we got to Virgin, we realized what a small town it was. He thought we didn't have anything for him, but that night I pulled out the giant rice crispy treat I got the day before, stuck in a candle and we sang to him. He was totally surprised. Then we watched Transformers, which he hadn't seen since he was little and obsessed with that movie. He still remembers some of the script.

Paul had off the next day, so we went for a drive into Zion, and then a hike. It is SO beautiful.

We passed some goats on the way in, so we parked and walked back along the road. The kids each got little cameras that print polaroids, which only worked half of the time. They used the pictures to add to their journals and got some cute pics of the goats because they weren't very afraid of us. 

The hike was steep, and long, but the views?! Holy cow.

This cliff was so steep, even Paul decided crawling would be safer. He crawled with one kids at a time to the edge to see over, while I quietly had 4 separate heart attacks. 

Then to the end. This was the view! Wow! 

On our way back the trailhead, the kids were pretty sure they saw Bigfoot. Once we saw him, he stopped moving... see the small black figure slightly to the right of center in the top picture?

We went exploring in the little shops and found a sign from the DUP ladies.  We sent it to Great Grandma Berg.

Out for ice cream with his birthday money from Grandma Kim and Grandpa Louie, thanks! Then some window shopping and dinner.

Another day we spent panning for rocks and gems at our RV park. They had a little stone identification area, and we ended up doing several lessons about the stones we found there. 

Caterpillar find.

More time in the pool. This time, once of the workers from the hotel was there and asked the kids to help him clean the pool. Several plastic water bottles had fallen into the pool and were nearly invisible, so he couldn't fish them out with a net. He asked the kids if they would swim down for them. They loved to help, and their reward was they got to take anything they wanted from the lost and found that had been there for a few weeks. The got goggles, sunglasses, diving toys, you name it. So fun.

From his workstation, Paul spotted a few lizards.  Then that night, we decided to "plug-in" for the first time and realized we didn't have the right cord. Thankfully that area is a big area for RVs and Paul found a cord at one of the nearby stores. 

Outside and inside of the same hole in the mountain. So fun.

On our way out of Utah, we grabbed Sully some new runners, which he chose specifically because they had the name Avia on them. Our next stop was Arizona!