Colorado Springs to Minnesota! Summer travels continue...

Thought I would update the blog with more adventures from our summer! Here's a look back in June at our time in Colorado and Minnesota. :)

After leaving The Black Canyon of the Gunnison Natl' Park, we were on our way to Colorado Springs! Here we are on Monarch Pass (11,312 ft)... it was gorgeous!

We stayed with our friends Mark and Tiffany, (Thanks guys! We miss you!) and they showed us around their beautiful town. First stop, the Garden of the Gods. Here we are in front of some of the huge, jutting, red rocks... and Curt and Mark climbed up between a couple spires so I could catch this shot:


Here's my favorite pic overlooking the Garden - it was simply breathtaking!

We checked out Denver the next day, and a rockin' REI downtown in a huge old train station that had been remodeled. From there we took off and traveled up to Boulder where we hooked up with my friend Laura and her husband Travis, who graciously showed us around and took us to the BEST Mediterranean restaurant we have ever been to. YUMMY. Lamb meatballs, bacon wrapped dates, cheeses, humus and spreads, pizza, smoked trout, and... well, you get the idea. :) It was off the hook! (Thanks guys!!)

Here's a quick morning shot as we are saying goodbye and about to take off for Minnesota.

We drove straight from Boulder to my grandparents farm in central western Minnesota; 15 hours later, we had arrived. Yiiippppeeeee! We had a WoNdErFuL time visiting with family and friends. My little sis (Mark, we missed you!), brother Chris and his wife Karen, and my mom all stayed at my grandparents farm, and though it was bitter sweet being there with both my grandparents now passed away, we had a wonderful time going through all the memories contained in the house. Old trunks and boxes explored turned up videos dating back to my mom's first steps and pictures of my grandpa on family road trips from the 1930s! It was so fun.

Here's a few pics from our time out there... Here's my sis, mom, me, and my uncle Curtis outside my grandparents farm house:

My uncle Mark and aunt Elaine and cousins Lance and Rosina:We had a great wiffle ball game out in the front lawn one afternoon... I have to say, I was hitting 'em out of the park!

A quick pic of us girls after the big game:

We also had fun exploring "the old farm house" as we call it -- the farm place a mile from my grandparents house that my grandpa was born in!

Here's Curt and I in front of one of the old out buildings... and we even ran into a wild turkey!

We also spent lots of time over at my Uncle Mark and Aunt Elaine's as well... They have a beautiful place, full of warmth, and lots of adorable cats to boot!

Here's a pic of the fountain my aunt built all herself -- I want one of these for our house some day! They are so crafty! :)

We also had a ton of fun checking out some of old relics we found -- here's Jen and I sporting some old glasses, and my bro talkin' on the original cell phone.

Here my bro is wearing my grandpa's original American Airlines hat and shirt, posing by one of the ultralight airplanes my grandpa built.

We love and miss you grandpa and grandma, thank you for some of the most wonderful memories of my whole life out at the farm in Minnesota. It will always be a second home to me :)

More summer adventures and updates to come as I try to catch up our activities with our blog. :) I gotta get on this! Love to you all, and we hope you are having a wonderful summer filled with your own adventures!

Arches and Black Canyon of the Gunnison

First of all, happy 4th of July everyone! I have been meaning to update our blog for weeks now.... and there have been lots of adventures since the last post. I'll start by continuing with our National Park's "tour" and camping we did at the beginning of June. Later I'll update with Colorado pictures, Minnesota, Walla Walla, Chelan, and Bellingham.... so stay tuned! :)

Curt and I continued our adventures as we left Zion by heading to Arches National Park! It was beautiful… We arrived about 5 pm, and since there weren’t any camp sites available, we just hung out and hiked in the park until it got dark, which wasn’t until about 9:30. We LOVED Arches, and the little town of Moab just outside of the park was awesome – definitely somewhere we would like to visit again. For any of you mountain bikers out there – apparently it’s DA-bomb. :)

First we took a little jaunt to Balanced Rock, which you can see me “holding” here:

Here's a pictures of Double Arch, and Turret Arch:

From there we headed up the road to the trail head for Delicate Arch. The hike was gorgeous! Amazing panoramic views and scenery – this was one of my favorite hikes of our whole cross-country trip…and the view at the top was mesmerizing. I could have sat up there for hours (and many people were doing just that!) Check out Curt and I under the arch....

After viewing the Fiery Furnace from above, and snapping a few last pics in the fading light, we made a little late dinner and headed out of the park to find a place to camp for the night.

Next stop, The Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park in Colorado! I have to be honest, this stop was high on Curt’s list, but I had never even heard of it, and didn’t really know what to expect as we drove the high mountain road up to it.

Boy was I ever in for a surprise! It was gorgeous! Sweeping views of a breathtakingly deep canyon with a green river flowing at the bottom…We decided we definitely wanted to hike down the steep canyon walls to the bottom, so into the visitor’s center we went to grab a back country pass.
You can see the river... WAY the heck down there!

My first clue should have been when the Park Ranger mentioned the hike was “SELF-RESCUE” (aka, if you fall and break your leg, you crawl out…yikes). It didn’t help that they kept mentioning this fact, and then had to show us a book of all the scary parts of the hike (like the section you have to repel down the trail with a chain, or all the loose boulders you crawl over, or the THICK layers of poison ivy you cannot possibly avoid). Did this deter us? Heck no! So down the trail we went. I definitely thought about turning back after sliding (not hiking mind you) down the first 50 yards of the trail. Think all loose rocks, dirt, and pine needles on a ridiculously steep incline. The fact that Curt also put HIS cell phone down as the emergency number our contact sheet we gave to the rangers also had me a little worried. Sweet that they would be calling our cell phone, which doesn’t get service, if we ended lying at the bottom of a cliff somewhere!! (Thankfully that didn't happen).

Here's some pictures of the descent:

On our way down we also kept a look out for poison ivy, which sadly, niether one of us knew how to identify. We finally decided on the plant below. Wrong, wrong, wrong! We looked it up later, to see what it really looked like, and I'm sure we were frolicking in meadows of the itchy stuff! Thank goodness I was in pants. :)

Finally at the bottom of the canyon enjoying some lunch:

It was actually a pretty awesome hike, and if given the chance to do it again, I would definitely go for it!

Our adventures continued in Colorado.... and I'll update soon with pictures from Colorado Springs, the Garden of the Gods, and Boulder!

Adventures in Zion National Park

Our trek across country has been wonderfully fun thus far....and we wanted to begin by sharing a few of our favorite highlights from one of the three national parks we have explored in the last week....Zion!
We rolled into Zion in the late afternoon on Monday, and we were fortunate enough to reap the benefits from someone who had to cancel their camping reservations (yay!!) So we set up shop, and began looking over the handy brochures and maps to pick out what hikes and sights we wanted to do/see. Of course I tended to veer away from the ones that stated: "extremely strenuous, steep exposed cliffs with long drop offs, not for those with a fear of heights." So what hike did we end up doing the next day? Angels Landing of course! (Scared out of my mind - but the view was totally worth it).

The peak we hiked to is actually the one above Curt's head:

A little something to get my anxiety levels sky-rocketing. You want shaky legs before you start hiking the part where you hold on to chains and you have a 1,200 ft. drop on one side, and an 800 ft. drop on the other, right??

They weren't kidding. Cliff exposures? Notice the chain in the corner of the left picture?!?

As Curt leaped from one rock to another like a gazelle, I held onto the chain with sweaty palms for dear life. In the end... the view was amazing, and I am glad we both made the trek, and made it up and back down in one piece. The view from the top:

The Emerald Pools were also amazing.... (and not so scary to get to)... though I am realizing that we actually didn't take many pictures of the pools. Oops. And to be quite honest, they weren't really emerald. At any rate, the surrounding scenery stole the show:

We also wanted to hike "The Narrows" -- which follows the Virgin River through one of the many canyons in Zion. Darn those required permits! (Though, let's be honest for a second here, the 16 mile hike through mostly water with the constant reality of a flash flood snuffing you out in seconds did make me feel a tiny bit better about not being able to do it. That and the people we witnessed going farther and farther upstream -- some up to their chests in icy cool, rushing water, yeeesh). Don't get me wrong, however, Curt and I fully plan to go back and do it, anyone else interested??

All for now... more summer adventures and pictures coming up!

Amanda's Wedding

Clearly this spring has found us rather busy, as I haven't updated our blog in years it seems. As of this Friday I am done student teaching and practically done with my Master's program! Just a few loose ends to tie up and my diploma application to send in! Waahhooooo! :) It definitely feels good. This Sat. we'll celebrate by going boating with our good friends Brian and Andrea, and then on Monday morning, take off for our cross-country adventures! We are planning on camping in Zion, Bryce Canyon, and Arches Natl' Park, then hitting up Colorado (seeing a few friends along the way)... and then booking it to Minnesota to hang out with family there for a week and a half. We are way excited :)

Yesterday I got back from a whirlwind Memorial Day weekend in Walla Walla for Amanda Thomas's wedding, to her now husband Justin. Curt wasn't able to make it (the $500 dollar plane ticket was a bit of a deterrent), so he headed up to Mammoth for some high-altitude training, aka: trail running while I stuffed myself full of wedding cake and paid the price for it (sick all Monday night... ugh). The weekend was a total blast, despite missing Curt and being sick however, and here are a few pics capturing the fun memories made:

Here's Amanda and flower girl Madeline Harrell at rehearsal :)

Tyler, Lisa, me, Katie, and Amy hanging out at the reception....

Me, Amanda, Katie, Kelsey, and Amy at the "photo booth"

Amanda and Justin cutting the cake..... ...... it was soooo yummy!

Hopefully we will update more often along the way this summer .... can't wait to see all our loved and missed family and friends! :)

Planet RAW! Yuummmmyyy....

Yesterday found Curt and I taking a beautiful drive through the mountains near Malibu - saw a few shacks the size of castle's along the way - and the pictures we took just do not do it justice. Especially since I passed on trying to dig the camera out of the bag in the back seat as we wound our way up switch-backs with drop offs straight down on my side with no guard rails. I just kept saying "Oh, it's so pretty!" followed instantaneously by... "Keep your eyes on the road!"

Here's a pic as we snake our way down the slopes and get a shot of the ocean (our brakes smelled AWFUL... and then Curt decides to tell me he remembers the time his brakes got so hot in his truck in college that they stopped working. Perfect.)

Once we got down to the 101, it was smooth (and for the most part, brake-free) sailing on our drive along the coast south towards Santa Monica. Saw a few more "shanties," and stopped at one of the state beaches for a couple candid shots (love those yellow flowers!):

We continued our drive....
After a little shopping at REI (our favorite!) we had dinner at Planet RAW.... I was SooooOOO excited. It did not disappoint! We sipped the best smoothies either Curt or I have ever had (by his own admission)... a mocha "milk"shake for Curt, and a coconut one for me.... Though I failed to snap a pic of these, shoot! For the main entree we dinned on the AVO Honey Mustard Sandwich on flax "bread" (me) and Curt on the Fat Cheese Sandwich on "wonderbread." Unbelievable! I kid you not, the honey mustard on mine was the best I have ever tasted. And nothing on the menu is made with anything other than fruit, veggies, nuts, seeds, spices, and honey... all RAW, and all super delicious!

I'm happy with my own tasty raw concoctions too..... Like the cherry, strawberry, almond, vanilla smoothie I made yesterday morning... mmmm. :0)

'till next time.... later alligators!