BHRT--day 9

Saturday, 8/31/13

7:07 a.m.  Leaving cabin.  

8:00 a.m.  gas in Poncha Springs, CO.  $3.56/gal.  $43ish.  Sarah is being very territorial about the goldfish crackers.  Now she’s unhappy with the lack of variety of juice options.

Mike and I are discussing the effect altitude has on boogers.  They dry up and get stuck above the tree line.

9:00 a.m.  saw deer drinking from Rio Grande River at Del Norte, CO.

9:23 a.m  Near South Fork, CO, just stopped at what the kids call “the best rest stop EVER!”  Free lemonade, cookies, brownies.  A little old Mexican lady running it.  I got conchitas, which she said were Mexican cookies.  They tasted a little like licorice.  I had to use the men’s room to wash my hands, because the women’s room was out of soap.  Every little town we pass seems to have a liquor store and a church. 

9:45 a.m.  driving through Rio Grande National Forest.  Beautiful.  Tried to hold our breath through a tunnel.  Couldn’t make it. 

10:00 a.m.  Sarah is rambling about “when I get my bird for my tenth birthday” out of nowhere. She’s never even mentioned it before, and now she’s talking about it like it’s fact. 

10:05  a.m.  Driving through San Juan National Forest..  Didn’t know we had so many national forests. Thought I saw a buffalo or a moose, but it was just a cow by a tree.

10:30 a.m.  gas at Pagosa Springs, CO.  Nice town.  $3.69/gal x 4.6 gal = $17.14.  Mike is getting gas often, afraid of running out in the desert.  I explained disposable toilet seat covers to Sarah, who said, “That’s dumb.  Why would I care if my butt gets dirty?”

11:00 a.m.  Saw a roadside trailer offering free jerky samples.  We tried buffalo, turkey, beef, elk.  Bought a small bag of buffalo for $5.

11:16 a.m.  Making kids watch a Grand Canyon DVD so they know what they’re going to see and how it was formed.

11:30 a.m. I’m handing out the lunches I made yesterday at the cabin.  Just passed Durango Pet Resort.

1:05 p.m.  Mike  is laughing  at me because I had a bimockulars injury.  I had them up to my eyes, and he hit a dip in the road, and I gave myself a couple black eyes.

Mike dubbed this "Middle Finger Mountain."  

1:45 p.m.  Four Corners.  UT, CO, AZ, NM.  HOT.  AZ state line bags had audio books (Magic Treehouse) and AZ trivia (Kerri Strug is from Tuscon.  AZ became the 48^th state in 1912.)  Turned on the AC for about 5 minutes.  Darn hot here in the desert.  Bought some stuff from the Native Americans at Four Corners.  

 Touching four states at the same time.

2:30 p.m.  gas at a horrible little dump called Red Mesa Trading Post in the middle of the desert.  $3.55 /gal.  $16.98.  Waited in line for a long time to pay.  I took a map from a display of maps that sure looked free to me and went to the van.  Mike came out a long time later and said the clerk charged him $4 for the map.  I wanted to return it, but didn’t want to wait in that line again and just wanted to get out of there.  So now we own a $4 map of the Grand Canyon, which anyone can get for free at the Grand Canyon.

3:20 p.m.  Raining.  Temp suddenly dropped to 66 degrees!

3:30 p.m.  stopped raining and is back up to 78 degrees.  Crazy desert weather.  Last night at the cabin, we were looking at the weather forecast and thinking about going home instead of to the canyon, because they were forecasting monsoon rains and nothing but clouds all weekend.  But we decided to declare good weather, step out in faith, and stop focusing on the forecast.

4:15 p.m. Raining again. Some fast little animal just scurried across the road.  Looked like a pale armadillo.

4:40 p.m.  just realized that Sally is not on Mountain Time, so instead of arriving in 10 minutes, it’s going to be an hour and 10 minutes. 

5:00 p.m. gas at the corner of 64 and 89. $3.59/gal.  $23ish.  Kids watching Jungle Book.

5:30 p.m. entering Grand Canyon National Park.   60 degrees and raining.   Just a light rain, not a monsoon.  Praise God!   $25 to get in the park. Stopping at Desert View Watchtower for our first glimpse of the canyon.  Breathtaking! We even got to see the sunset.  Feeling very blessed. 

  Saw several elk on our way to our room.

7:00 p.m.  checking in to Maswik Lodge room #6756, a great room.  $94. Went to the lodge, ordered a pizza. While waiting for it, I went to the desk to ask if there were any rooms available for tomorrow night, because less than 24 hours isn’t going to be enough.  The guy said everything was booked, as I expected.  People book these rooms a year in advance. About 5 minutes later, I went back to the desk to ask if we could have a later checkout time.  Before I could even ask, the lady who checked us in said, “I can get you a room for tomorrow night.”  I don’t know how she did it, but I think it must have been God working through her, because she got us the same room at the same price. 

9:30 p.m.  I’m heading for the free shuttle to take me to the rim to see the stars over the canyon.

10:30 p.m.  I rode the shuttle all the way around and ended up just getting off back at Maswik, because by the time I got to the rim, I was afraid I would miss the last bus back and have to walk in the pitch dark with elk roaming around.

Sarah sleeping diagonally, hogging the bed

BHRT--day 8

Friday, 8/30/13
8:00 a.m.  Eggs, sausage, and toast for breakfast.  Mike and kids are going fishing.

I'm cleaning, washing towels and sheets, making tomorrow's road lunch, washing dishes, organizing, and packing.  Sad.  Don't want to leave.

9:00 a.m.  Listening (loudly) to "All Things Bright and Beautiful" while I work.  The original hymn, not the new hip version.  This place also made me want to listen to my favorite hymn, "This is My Father's World."  Cabin owner showed up while I was rocking out in my jammies. 

12:00 p.m.  Fishers got home about an hour ago, and we're finishing off leftovers for lunch.  Then going to play on the swing and merry-go-round  up the road.

2:00 p.m. Thunderstorm coming over the mountains.  Now the trip is absolutely perfect!  (As long as it clears up in time for our tour of the goat farm at 4:00)

3:30 p.m.  Hauling our garbage down the road to the bear-proof dumpster.

 Jumpin' Good Goat Dairy tour.  We got to sample several different flavors of goat cheese at the store.  I'm glad none of us liked it, because it's very expensive.

 Noah milking a goat by hand...

 and by machine.

 going down into the cave where the cheese is stored.

 Karen the goat woman (who reminded us of our former neighbor Jan) showing us a hunk of cheese that's been aging in the cave since 2007.

 This guy was an interesting character.  He's the stud who mates with all the women.  His name is Troll, and he's missing one eye and part of a horn from fighting the other males.  He loves people though and was very friendly with us.

 Back to the cabin for more cleaning.

 Kids washing dishes the old-fashioned way.  We all miss the dishwasher at home.

 This place is way cleaner than our house now!

Will hopefully go to bed soon, because we plan to leave early in the morning for the Grand Canyon .

 

BHRT--day 7

Thursday, 8/29/13
7:00 a.m.  got up, had quick breakfast, headed out to find Bunny Lake (aka Wrights Lake) to go fishing.  Got lost, asked a friendly Coloradoan, found it.

  I tried to open the chain that held the gate closed.  Unsuccessful.  Mike tried for several minutes before sending the kids through, because they are small enough to fit through the gap between the fence and the gate.  Just as I was determining whether my ample hindquarters would squish flat enough to go through, Sarah grabbed the chain and easily opened it.  It was really quite simple.  Not sure how we adults missed it.

 Most beautiful place I've ever fished.  Mike & kids are on the shore of the lake on the right.  Too sunny there for me.  

 Sarah getting her lure ready. 

 She is a good fisherwoman!  She caught more than anyone else.

 Noah caught several too.  I caught a bunch with my camera, but none with my hook. Mike's one catch was the first of everybody. He would have caught more, but was busy unsnagging lines, unhooking fish, etc.

 Back at the cabin with our haul.  Seven lovely rainbow trout.

 Pan-fried trout for lunch

Spent the afternoon at Mt. Princeton hot springs.  Interesting place! The water comes out of the earth at 140 degrees, but the hot springs are right next to Chalk Creek, whose water is super cold.  So if you arrange the rocks just right, you get the perfect balance of cold water trickling in from the creek to the hot springs.

BHRT--day 6

Wednesday, 8/28/13
7:00 a.m.  Mom and Dad left. I went out to feed my friends.

8:30 a.m. We drove up to Cottonwood Pass and hiked to the top of the Continental Divide.  VERY hard to breathe up there, but the views were spectacular.  Talked to a friendly Coloradoan (whose dog sat down directly on my foot and just camped out there) and watched an old hiker lady take a pee on a rock with no regard for the fact that I was right there.  People are generally a little more laid back and naturey up here.  I love it!

 Noah looking at the road we just drove up the mountain.

 going for the top!

 It was chilly up there!  50 degrees.

The white speck by the upper left corner of the lake is Mike.

11:00 a.m.  Went into town to buy a fishing license (at the High Rocky Store, which had neat stuff at outrageous prices) and some groceries (at City Market, which is the Colorado Kroger).  Back to the cabin for lunch.

12:00 p.m.  Leaving for Performance Tours, where we'll take a van to the Arkansas River to go white water rafting in Brown's Canyon.

On the way there in the rafting company's van, I was praying about having a safe trip. The radio was blasting in the van so I blocked it out while I was praying. The second I tuned back in, Bon Jovi was singing, "Take my hand, we'll make it I swear" and I felt like it was God confirming that He'd heard me and we'd make it. Sure enough, we made it.

 Our guide, Benny D.   Noah and Mike paddled.  Sarah and I rode like princesses.

 View from my seat in the front of the raft.

We saw a moose!  I couldn't zoom in with this disposable water camera, but you can see the moose right in the middle of the picture, partly behind a tree.  Click on the picture to make it bigger.

Mike and kids got out of the raft and climbed this boulder...

 and then jumped into the river!  Above is Sarah.

Noah taking the leap.

 At a deep part in the river, we could get out of the raft and swim. The water was very cold, but it felt good after being in the hot sun.

Kids were excited to ride on a real school bus back to Performance Tours.

4:00 p.m.  Back from rafting, which was awesome!!  Perfect weather, amazing scenery, and so much fun.    At one point, a couple tears of pure bliss rolled down my cheeks. 

5:30ish Drove into town to eat dinner at Eddyline, a place the cabin owner recommended.  It was fantastic!  Across the street was a boulder for the kids to climb, and a wonderful hiking trail that runs right along the Arkansas River.  So we played and walked a little while we waited for our food. Our server actually came out to let us know that our food was ready.  Mike gave her a big tip for that.  

After we ate, we hiked along the river a long way.  It was a perfectly beautiful trail.

On the way home, to top off a great day, we saw several deer. Here's one peeking around a tree.