Moab Vaca and a Plethora of Pics

Our trip to Moab started out on Thursday night after everyone got off work. We packed the cars and I mean packed the Cars! They were loaded. Sara, the Sorento was packed to the brim. We were hoping to arrive before dark so we could set up camp while it was light, but as usual we were running on Robinson Stardard Time, and we arrived after dark. We had to be quiet, because we arrived at "Up The Creek Campground", I guess we were up a creek, but I never saw one, and it was actually a campground that someone had set up in their backyard, it was nice with the trees and all, but we were only on street off of Main street, kind of wierd camping right in town, but hey, it was cheap, and that was the name of the game! Here is a pic of our campsite. We set up quickly and went right to bed, because the next day was our river rafting trip down the Colorado river. Now it has to be said that this was all my idea. Two years ago when I was in the Young Womens Presidency we took the Young Women on this same trip and at the time I kept thinking that I wanted my family to experience all the fun and adventure we had. Not to mention, I was feeling like we needed to do some things that would take us out of our comfort zone. Well, I must admit that I was quite nervous, I didn't really tell the fam this, but I started having MAJOR second thoughts about the whole river rafting business.

Friday morning we woke up and had a quick muffin breakfast and dressed in our river rafting finest. We headed out to the pick up point to sign in and meet our guides. I headed into the office to sign up and was greeted by some veeeeery interesting characters. By then my nerves were SHOT! I was introduced to our guides, Justin, who had long dreads, and Colin, who had bed head and smelled like he was picketing the deoderant companies.

We all piled into a little van along with 4 other people, a couple from England and 2 other men. I thought that when we booked a trip we would have it to ourselves, but that wasn't the case.

The drive to the put in spot was about 30 miles, and Colin decided it would be fun to tell off-color jokes on the way up, my family was giving me the "what did you get us into eye" and I was thinking the same thing, but the money was spent and we were on our way. We arrived at the put in spot and we put our life jackets on and watched as the guys put the rafts in the water. We all climbed aboard and the journey was on. It turned out to be a lot of fun, Justin amazingly knew a lot about geology, and botany and the river and he was quite entertaining. We didn't get to get in the water much, because it was too cold, which was a big disappointment, but it was still fun, we got to go through rapids that tickled our tummies and float lazily in other spots. At lunchtime we stopped at a beach and our "lovely" guides made us sandwiches, The Caboose caught a frog and a couple of lizards that we played with. One of the lizards sat on Jane Fonda Chicks shoulder for quite awhile. It was cute. We returned to the rafts to finish the rest of our journey. One of the rapids we went through had rocks that they called the "fangs" two pointed rocks that were quite close together and poked out of the water. Justin told us he was going to take us between the fangs. It was scary looking, but we made it. I wish we could have had pictures of the rafting trip but we were afraid to take our cameras. I want to go again, but when it's warmer so we can swim, and probably with a different company, but all in all, it was really fun!!

That night we went to a Mexican restaurant, it was pretty good and the service was great! We were sooo sunburned!

After eating we went downtown and walked around the shops, then we went back to camp to go to bed, we were exhausted. Mine and John Waynes inflatable mattress kept deflating, and we would end up on the hard ground and it was really uncomfortable, so we would get up and re inflate. Saturday we got up and showered and got ready, the girls got a education and Europeans and how they are not so modest, they came back to camp telling me that there were naked women in the bathroom and "they didn't even wrap a towel around themselves" It was to funny. We spent the day at Arches National Park exploring the arches and hiking up to them, and trying to be creative photographers! The arches were so beautiful and amazing.

That night we went to a museum about all the movies that have been filmed in Moab, it was pretty neat. It was at a ranch that was beautiful, but very expensive to stay at. There was a wedding going on upstairs from the museum in the ballroom, and the band was playing Micheal Jackson, ok, who plays Micheal Jackson at their wedding????

Sunday we got up and went to the Szcewan restaurant for a buffet breakfast, it was sooo yummy! Then we headed off to CanyonLands National Park. It is different from Arches because you are high up and you look down on the formations, and I mean Down, so obviously I stayed back a ways and gasped every time the kids got close to the edge. It was beautiful, but terrifying!

That evening on the way home we stopped at Goblin Valley, this had to be the highlight of the trip, the kids explored the Goblins and then we played hide and seek tag among them, it was so much fun.

We got home tired and late, but it was a great trip!!