Vegas and Death Valley

We finally said goodbye to Utah, and we headed to Las Vegas. We spent a day visiting the Las Vegas Museum of Natural History, swimming in the R.V. park pool, and then we took the kids to a casino/hotel where they have a giant fish tank and live mermaids that swim in it. Unfortunately there were no mermaids swimming because there was a problem with their breathing machines. So we left there and took the kids on a drive down the strip to see the lights.

It would have been fun to take them to see the pirate show at Treasure Island, the river through the Venetian, the volcano at the Mirage, the fountains at the Bellagio, etc. But they were fussy and tired and walking all of them down the strip while people thrust pictures of naked women at them, didn’t seem like the best idea. We stayed at an RV park (a real CLASSY joint called the Hitchin’ Post) in a not-so-nice area of town. Andy went out walking at night to try and ‘make some money’ at a casino. He came home 10$ richer. He claims he won it playing blackjack.

Vegas

The next morning was ridiculously hot again, so we spent some time in the pool then we headed to the playground across the street. It LOOKED nice from across the street, but it was the dirtiest playground we’ve been to this entire trip. It was covered in trash, graffiti and questionable stains. I started to feel sick watching them play on it (the kids were oblivious to the filth), so I rushed them off to the R.V. to sanitize.

Then we started our drive across the desert back into California. We stopped at the World’s Largest Firecracker and Andy bought some fireworks to light off for the kids. We also stopped at a real live ghost town (maybe not so ‘live’) called Rhyolite. The night before, Andy and I had been reading an article on msn on ghost towns and we were saying ‘that would be cool to see one of those,’ and then we drove right past one of the featured towns. Annika, Soren, Sawyer, and I explored the town, which went from 8000 people in 1907 to 14 people by 1920. Once the mine stopped producing, the town died. The remnants of the buildings are interesting and you could see the old mine scars on the hillsides. One of the town’s houses is made out of glass bottles, which was cool looking. 

We could barely look at the camera; the sun was SO bright.

Ghost town in Rhyolite, NV. The people would take the train from Las Vegas.

Glass Bottle House

The old ruins of the Bank. Cost 90,000 to build.

After that stop we headed into Death Valley National Park but just before we crossed the border into Cali, we realized that the fireworks we’d bought were not legal to bring into California, so we had a little impromptu fireworks show on the side of the road. Each day we wake up and have NO IDEA what that day will involve, but it’s always interesting.

Death Valley was unlike anything I’d ever seen. It was so hot, so dry, so dead. Very little green, that’s for sure. And a National Park without trees is so odd-looking. There were these amazing sand dunes though, so we pulled over so I could bike to them and explore. I loved climbing to the top of them and jumping down into the soft sand and I loved seeing the patterns that the wind had created on the sand.

Sand Dunes in Death Valley National Park, CA

Can you spot my bike and the R.V.?

SAND...so beautiful.

 

Now we are in a small little western town called ‘Lone Pine’. Andy wants to climb the highest peak in the continental U.S. (Mt. Whitney), and this town is the portal to do so. This town is tiny; the kind of town where there are signs on the shops that say “Gone to Bank, Be right Back” and where the lawyer’s office has the high school volleyball team’s game schedule posted in their window.  Apparently it is also a town where they filmed lots of Western movies. After we leave here, we’re headed to Coastal California. The R.V. got in a fight with a gas pump yesterday when we were leaving Vegas, and the R.V. could use some time getting repaired.  Something tells me that Lone Pine doesn’t have the kind of repair shop we are looking for.

If only everyone thought like Utahns do

A quick detour over to Colorado, and we’re already back to Utah. This state is awesome…but, I’ll talk more about that later. On the way to Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado, we stopped at the Wilson Arch (which is in Utah). And, I know I am only a Wilson by marriage, but this Arch was amazing. We thought it was better than any of the ones we had seen in Arches National Park. You could climb on it too, which you aren’t allowed to do in the National Park. I only wish there had been someone else there who could have taken a picture of all the Wilson’s on the Wilson Arch, but we had it all to ourselves, as usual.

2 Wilsons in the Wilson Arch. Can you tell which ones?

We've seen some amazing purple sunsets in Utah.

Mesa Verde is unique, in that, it is the only National Park in the U.S.A. that exists to feature something that is man-made rather than God-created. The park features ancient cliff dwellings that the Anasazi Indians built right into the rock. We were very impressed with these architectural miracles and even paid extra to go on a tour of one of them (Cliff Palace). 

You could go underground into the cliff dwelling...very neat.

Kai and I at Spruce Tree House.

Anasazi Cliff dwelling..Mesa Verde, Colorado.

However, we ran into a glitch on that tour because Kai had a bathroom emergency, and not the kind that you can deal with on the side of the trail. So Andy and Kai had to miss the tour. And I had to convince a rambunctious 2-year old, a baby, and Miss Annika to sit quietly on a cliffside while our long-winded Park Ranger taught us all about the Anasazi. Soren was remarkably well-behaved, and thankfully he never fell off the cliff, but I was very thankful when the Ranger finally wrapped up his talk. Sometimes you can be TOO passionate about something, and this guy felt a deep connection to the Anasazi. Plus, there’s always the people in the group that are just WAITING until the end to ask questions and hear themselves talk. We survived; Andy came back to rescue us, and we headed out of Colorado, back to Moab, Utah. We stopped again at the Wilson Arch, because I wanted more sunset pictures of it.

Wilson Arch and Purple Skies.

The Wilson Arch.

We spent another wonderful day in Moab, picnicking, homeschooling outside in the sun, shopping for souvenir stickers and used books, playing in the park, and waiting for Andy’s bike to be fixed. When the bike was finally fixed, we headed South towards Bryce Canyon National Park. We stopped in this town called Richfield for a playground break and Soren happened to notice the public swimming pool  next door. He was asking us to go swimming, so we peeked in to see if it was public swim time. Turns out, it was. And it was only 1$/person. And there were only 2 kids in the pool, so we had almost the whole thing to ourselves. It was dinner time, and we didn’t get out of the pool until almost 8 p.m., but the spontaneity and fun was totally worth it. We fed the kids sandwiches and put them to bed late, but they were blissfully happy about how their evening had played out. That is one of the things I have really enjoyed about this trip: when the kids ask to do something, we can usually say ‘yes’. We don’t have anywhere we have to be, and for once we have an abundance of family time available to us. It is such a precious gift.

Checkmate.

Spontaneous Family Swim.

Bryce Canyon National Park knocked my socks off. I was considering skipping it because we had already done one national park in Utah and were going to do Zion National Park as well, but I am SO GLAD we didn’t. It was breathtaking. We did a difficult, yet amazing hike down into the canyon and walked among the huge hoodoos. Annika earned her 5^th Jr. Ranger badge and a great day was had by all. When we left the park, Andy graciously agreed to watch all the kids at a playground while I went for another epic bike ride. It was one of the best road bike rides of my life. Tonight we are staying right outside Zion National Park, and this is probably our last night in Utah. What an awesome state this is! They just seem to LIVE for recreation, and definitely know how to take full advantage of their beautiful surroundings. We have loved it here. The only thing it needs…more waterfalls!

Sawyer standing on the salt flats.

Sawyer and I at the Arch.

Weird Hoodoos.

Looks like a fake back-drop.

Checking out Bryce Canyon.

Rock tunnel. So awesome.

One of my favourite pictures of the day. This was from the bottom of the canyon.

Thor's Hammer

Oregon=Green, Nevada=Brown, Utah=Red

We’ve been hanging out in Nevada and Utah over the last couple of days. We had a day in Reno that was pretty much all errands: we got our oil changed, went to Costco, stocked up on new books at a thrift store, and got lots of groceries. The next day we headed to Lake Tahoe, a giant lake that rests on the border of Nevada and California. Tahoe was gorgeous. The water was a blue like I’ve never seen before in the deep parts, but as it got shallower it was emerald green, like the waters of the Caribbean. It was so clear, too. You could see right to the bottom even if it was 30 ft. deep. We rented a boat for an hour so we could get out on the lake, and enjoyed the gorgeous sun beating down on us as we drove around. If the water hadn’t been quite so frigid, we probably would have rented a wakeboard as well. At the end of the boat ride, Kai and Soren were completely passed out.

Our handsome tour guide on Lake Tahoe.

How would you like to have your cottage here??

After Tahoe, there wasn’t much else we wanted to see in Nevada, so we zipped along the state to Utah. We did get to see a beautiful desert sunset as we drove, and some coyotes running across the road in front of us.

We crossed into Utah, into the salt flats. It is literally white on the ground because of all the salt. This is where the fastest speeds ever recorded on earth took place, when a man rode a rocket-powered car over 600 mph across the salt flats. Our first day in Salt Lake City was amazing. We went downtown and took the kids to a place called ‘Discovery Gateway’.  It was the best children’s museum/indoor play place I have ever seen. They loved it so much, we couldn’t convince them to come eat lunch at 2:30 p.m. The only way we got out of there was promising we would come back. We did a little shopping in the outdoor mall, visited the planetarium, Sawyer had a nap in the RV, and then we headed back to Discovery Gateway until it closed for the night. We were definitely one of the last to leave.

This guy took his job VERY SERIOUSLY.

The water play area. Sawyer LOVED it.

Planetarium.

What?? You didn't know that people on Mars scratch their bums, too?

We walked over to see the Mormon temple and where the famous Mormon Tabernacle Choir sings. We came out un-converted. I loved the city of Salt Lake. It was so quiet and slow-paced for a capital city. It had beautiful fountains, green grass (which they must pay a fortune to water), and amazing mountain backdrops.

So strange...a church without crosses.

Going to check out the inside.

After Salt Lake we spent a day at Thanksgiving Point which is in Lehi, Utah. It has a ton of attractions, but we were too cheap to pay for each one. We did a quick visit to the children’s garden and then spent a lot of money going to Cornbelly’s, a play farm. It will forever make us disappointed with places like Chudleigh’s or Springridge. It was amazing! There were endless amounts of playgrounds, inflatables, pig races, pumpkin guns, haunted mazes, wagon rides, etc. We went back to the RV for dinner, then came right back so we wouldn’t miss the pig races. Andy shot pumpkins and the kids fired corn cob guns. Once it got super late, Andy and I reluctantly left to put the kids to bed.

Andy, not as good on the horses as he thought...

Hilarious fun. Look how filthy my feet are.

Andy and Annika on the inflatable pillow.

Soren, on the wagon ride.

The next day we went to Arches National Park. The red rock formations were amazing. Unlike anything I have ever seen. We had a couple great hikes, but the park was getting dark and we didn’t feel we were done, so we came back the next day to see more. 

Can you see the little Wilson's way down there?

How awesome for a kid...endless tunnels and climbing.

Windows Arch. Very very beautiful.

Annika, Junior Ranger times 3.

Arches is located in Moab. Moab is like Utah’s version of Squamish…it’s a recreation paradise. The city was insanely busy with weekend warriors from Colorado, Nevada, and California. We went mountain biking at Slickrock, a very famous mountain bike area where you get to ride on the rock cliffs. It was very technical for me, but amazing. I pushed myself until I almost puked-it was THAT fun. Andy’s bike broke, so we went back to Slickrock 3 days in a row for him to bike it. Finally he ended up renting a rear wheel so he could do the whole loop. It is supposed to take first-timers 4-5 hrs. to complete it. Andy did it in under two. Not to brag or anything…but he’s awesome.

Daddy, mountain biking on Slickrock.

Tow Mater.

 I went on an amazing 30 km. bike ride this morning, sandwiched in between gigantic red rock cliffs and the Colorado River. I even saw ancient Indian petroglyphs on the rock. Very cool. Oh, and about 50-60 bolted climbing routes that I would love to climb some day. Moab is definitely a repeat destination for us. The kids were not quite as enthralled with Moab, but we still did lots of playgrounds, went for 2 family swims (one indoor, one outdoor), ate dinner at Denny’s, practiced dirt-biking, had a campfire with chocolate cake, earned another Jr. Ranger badge, saw a real live Tow-Mater, and played in a wonderful little creek.  So, they weren’t exactly bored, either.

Tonight we’re in Colorado (our 7^th state visited on this trip) and tomorrow we are going to another national park, Mesa Verde.

Thanksgiving in the Forest

Redwoods are breathtaking and frustrating all at the same time. You want to be able to capture the sheer magnitude of their size, and yet, it is almost impossible. They are just so massive. Our ideas of big trees are just little stems growing out the side of them. We went to this one tree called ‘The Big Tree’ and it’s diameter was 21 ft. Try and picture that. Some of the redwoods are big enough to drive through. We brought Annika and Kai to California back when I was pregnant with Soren, and they loved the redwood forest, and this time was no different. It is one of those things that everyone should see before they die because it reminds us of how big our God is.

The kids with the "Big Tree". Diameter = 21 ft.

Redwood National Park

View from INSIDE the redwood...still alive but burned out in the center.

We stopped off at a giant Paul Bunyan and Babe statue, which was so big that once Annika and Kai climbed up on Paul’s boot, they couldn’t get down. Babe’s  ‘manhood’ had lipstick marks on it.

The gateway to Redwood National Park is a city called Crescent City. We were very on guard in Crescent City because it has a disproportionate amount of sketchy people. In our research online we found out that a lot of sexual predators live in this area and you are supposed to watch your kids extremely carefully on playgrounds. So, when we headed into town to visit the playground and the beach, there was no sitting down on the bench and relaxing for Andy and I.

Andy is a big dude...so Paul really truly was a giant.

Babe's berries

However, we had a blast in Crescent City. We played in the tide pools on the beach (catching hermit crabs, finding starfish, avoiding the dead sea lion and birds that had washed up, etc.). Then we headed over to the harbor to see the alive sea lions. You were able to walk right out on the dock that they lay on, so we got close enough to touch them (but we didn’t).  The kids didn’t want to leave the beach/ocean because they were having so much fun playing on the rocks and watching the surfers.

Sea lions...close enough to be National Geographic.

Kai looks a little nervous.

California coast

The next day we headed East, across Northern California. We stopped in Redding to visit Turtle Bay Exploration Park. At turtle bay we enjoyed the reptiles, the aquarium, the museum and art gallery, the children’s garden, the gigantic bridge, and the turtle pond. There was lots to see so we spent hours there.  After Redding we headed into Lassen Volcanic Park and went spelunking. There is an old lava tunnel that we could hike through called the Subway Cave.  So we put our kids headlamps on, and headed underground. It was very cool (literally). They weren’t scared, we didn’t have any walls crumble in on us, and we learned lots about lava tubes and volcanoes. A good time was had by all.

Soren in his head lamp...hilarious.
Our little spelunkers.

Sawyer at Turtle Bay.

The beginning of the lava tube.

When we came out of the cave we had Thanksgiving dinner in the forest, and were reminded of how truly thankful we should be.  We ate turkey sandwiches (that counts, right?) on turkey plates. It was a wonderful time, but a little bittersweet not being with our big families.

After that we headed to Reno, NV for the night. We’ll let you know how gambling with 4 minors works out.

Happy Thanksgiving from the Wilson's!