Spring Break

Sorry for my absence, I'm just winding down from my big Southwest Spring Break Adventure.



This will be a long one, so click below for the full text and pictures:

Carrie flew down last Friday from STL. After she arrived, we went to the airport's car rental center to pick up our car for the week. I'd reserved the car on Hotwire a few months back. When we tried to get the car they said they didn't have any Compact cars left, but they could give us either a 12 passenger van or a Mid-sized car for $5 more a day.

We tried to reason with the lady that we had a reservation for a certain price, and it wasn't our fault that they didn't have the smaller car available. Surely they could just give us a mid-sized car for the same price. But NoOoOoOooo... That woman resented us for getting such a great deal on Hotwire and basically forced us to pay the extra money. After going back and forth for a few minutes I finally gave in and handed over my credit card, figuring I could always complain once we got back (Note: Hotwire is currently reviewing my complaint.) The agent tried to make us feel better by giving us a Hyundai Sonata instead of a Chevy Malibu. Here I am with our sweet ride:



The first stop on our trip was Durango, Colorado, where we met up with Carrie's college roommate for lunch and a stroll on the river walk.



It's been a while since we last saw Jenni. She's married now and just had a baby last fall named Bennett. He's a cutie:



We stayed the night at Jenni's and after a yummy homemade breakfast we navigated our way off their mesa and got on our way to Utah.

Originally, we had planned to drive south from the Durango area, through the 4 corners, into Arizona and then up to Utah. But Jenni's husband suggested an alternative route that was a little more scenic but supposedly faster. There was snow in the forecast for Utah and it seemed safer to take a more southerly route... but who am I to argue with scenic drives?

We did see some really pretty stuff once we got a little farther into Utah!





And then the clouds came... And the snow.



By the time I took over driving duties, we were in a full-on ice and snow storm. Our route took us through the Dixie National Forest in Utah at elevations of 8,000-10,000 feet. The higher we got, the worse the weather was. The road was completely covered in snow, my windshield wipers were frozen up with ice, and I could barely see through the windshield. I had hopes that once we got out of the designated forest area, that the roads would be better. But it was a long, slow, scary drive.



At one point I had to get out and clean off the wiper blades and window. I made the mistake of stopping on a hill. So when we got ready to go again, the car wouldn't move. The wheels were spinning on ice and packed snow! I had Carrie take the wheel and then I did something stupid. I got behind it and PUSHED from the back bumper!!! Thankfully, the car didn't roll back on me. In fact, I somehow managed to summon the strength to push that bad boy out of the rut and up the hill. (Thank you Jesus!) Once the car got going, I did another stupid thing. I ran along side of the car, opened the door, and jumped in while it was moving!!! Seriously, I almost didn't make it.

Here I am reenacting my pushing the car as I ran along side of it:



Thankfully, the roads DID get better once we got out of the National Forest, for a little while anyway. There were some parts after that where it didn't even look like snow had touched the ground. Here's an incredibly relieved but still somewhat worried Carrie somewhere in Grand Staircase - Escalante National Monument:



Just when we thought the worst of the weather was behind us, we ran into more snow and bad roads. the deer and the turkeys were sure enjoying it though!



I was never so happy to get to a destination as I was that night. A trip that should have taken 6 or 7 hours took about 9! Blech. The bad thing was, by the time we got to our cabins, all the nearby restaurants were closed. We drove a little ways to Ruby's Inn and found their restaurant open. It felt so good to eat.



The next morning, we slept in a bit and then drove over to Bryce Canyon National Park. We knew that it was supposed to be cold at Bryce, and also knew that it might be snowy, but for some reason we didn't translate that into, "We're not going to be able to do much." We enjoyed an orientation video at the visitors center and then set off to explore some of the trails into the canyon. Of course, all of the trails were covered in ice and snow, and we weren't exactly prepared to hike in those conditions. We were almost too cold to get out of the car to take pictures from the scenic view areas, but somehow we managed. It was pretty, we just wished we could have gotten down in it.






With our day at Bryce shorter than expected, we headed on down to Zion National Park, keeping our fingers crossed that the weather would be nicer. It was only about a 1 1/2 hour drive, but somehow during that time the snow disappeared and the temperatures warmed up more than 30 degrees. Driving into the park was beautiful!!!








We checked into our hotel and went back to the park to look around. We tried going on the first leg of the Emerald Pools trail but somehow ended up doing the whole 3 mile trail. It was nice though, and not too difficult elevation-wise.




The next morning we set out to tackle Angel's Landing, which is one of the more popular, but also more dangerous trails in the park. The trail ascends 1500 feet over a distance of 2.5 miles. At the end, you climb up a narrow fin of rock, in some places only 4 feet wide, with more than 1,000 foot drops on either side of you. There are some chains in the rock to help you get to the peak, but no guardrails. Since 1983, 6 people have died hiking up to Angel's Landing (including a STL man in 2007).

Now, I really wouldn't consider myself a thrill seeker, but when scores of people write that this is the best trail in the park and one of the best trails in the National Park System, it makes me want to get to the top. I was a little bit worried though, since I can be afraid of heights and this definitely fell into the "If you're afraid of heights, don't even consider doing this" category. We were told that there was a landing, about 2 miles up, where you could stop and turn around if you didn't want to make the final crazy climb, so we decided to go for it.



I'm not exactly the most active person in the world, and I definitely had to take a lot of breaks as we worked our way up to Scout's Landing. Fortunately, pictures provide an excellent excuse for taking breaks:




Since it was such a steep climb, there were a lot of switchbacks cut into the rock. The steepest series of switchbacks are called "Walters Wiggles" and they get you Scout's Landing.


There were probably a couple dozen people hanging out at Scout's Landing when we got there. We could see just a few brave souls heading on to the last scary climb to Angel's Landing. As we sat and enjoyed some snacks, we were attacked by some crazy ground squirrels who were after my Luna bar wrapper. One of them even climbed inside my bag! Carrie kept telling me to zip up my bag, but I didn't want to because it was just so darned cute. I was hoping it might accidentally come home with me.



After a rest, I hopped up and said, "OK, let's go!" I charged ahead to grab onto the first set of chains that would help me scale up the rocks. Carrie reluctantly followed, but after about 15 feet, she decided not to continue. She had new shoes and she didn't trust them to get her up the side of the cliff. It didn't help that there was another group of people following close behind, rushing her a little bit. I didn't want to leave Carrie behind, but I also wanted to say I actually finished the trail. I continued on for a little bit more, then got to a landing where I was able to clearly see the final steep climb up. I realized that it would probably take me another hour to finish the trail and get back to Carrie, and I didn't want to leave her down at Scout's Landing by herself, worrying about me. So I took a few pictures, turned around, and went back down.



Going down was a lot easier than going up, but it still took a little time. By the time we finished, we were ready to eat and rest a bit. Then we went on the anti-climactic 3 mile Watchman Trail later in the day.





It was cold in the morning, and our legs were SO TIRED from our hikes. So we decided to just do an easy paved river walk before we left the park.




We left around 11 and started our drive to the GRAND CANYON!!! The drive down into Arizona was a little boring. There were a lot of Native American folks selling stuff in booths along the road. We got to the Grand Canyon and it was incredibly busy.

I was expecting it to be pretty touristy but still found it a little annoying since the other parks had been so quiet. We walked along the rim some and took a few pictures. Here's me being unimpressed with the Grand Canyon:



And here's Carrie loving it!



We saw that there was an evening ranger program a mile or so down the rim, so we started walking towards it. It got dark and quiet and all of the tourists disappeared. It was actually a little scary there for a bit, but we eventually found our way off the rim trail and got to the program. The program was about the beauty and danger of the Grand Canyon. The ranger was really great but the presentation was mostly about stupid people dying at the Grand Canyon. We were really paranoid the rest of the time we were there, expecting that every yahoo who got too close to the edge to take a picture was going to fall off and die.

We tried to walk down the Bright Angel Trail into the canyon but didn't get very far. It was pretty icy and muddy and it looked like people were having to crawl on their hands and knees to get back up to the top. No thank you! We walked down far enough to take some pictures and see some mules and then we were out of there.




Thursday evening we drove to Flagstaff, Arizona and checked into a hostel there. It is a place that Carrie had stayed at years ago. It wasn't too bad, but it was very loud with trains going by and a bar across the street. We just happened to be placed in a room by the street and I couldn't sleep at all! The good thing about the hostel was that we got to watch LOST in a TV room with 5 strangers. It was great.

Friday morning we had breakfast in Flagstaff and then drove back toward Albuquerque on I-40. It was about a 5 hour drive, but we broke it up by visiting the Petrified Forest National Park. Carrie had been here before and said it was "interesting", which secretly meant that it was a little boring. It was pretty fascinating to see all the trees that had turned into rocks. And the landscape was very pretty in parts. But other than that, it was just a bunch of rocks laying around. We still managed some pictures:





We got back into Albuquerque Friday evening and Carrie stayed until this afternoon. It was a nice trip but I'm glad to be home, where the most walking I'll do is the 500 feet between my house and Tamarind.