Roger's Birthday and Our Trip to Capitol Reef - May 25, 2014

Sunday - May 25, 2014
We woke up early and headed out on our adventure.  It was a long drive, but very beautiful, so we were okay with it. We stopped at a rest stop for lunch.  It wasn't too exciting, but roger took our picture while we were eating.

Our first destination was Capitol Reef.  We forgot to stop and take a picture of us in front of the sign, so we did that on the way out.  This was the scenery when we first got here.  It was so pretty and I just wanted to stop and see everything and take pictures.  We pulled over on the first pull out and I took these two pictures.  Then we noticed that there was a hike a short distance up the road.  So, we got back in the truck and parked at the start of the hiking trail.

Here we are at the start of our hike.  We hiked to Chimney Rock.  It's the rock directly behind Parker.

The temperatures were in the 80's.  We were glad they weren't hotter.  I can't imagine hiking in this area in the summer time.  That would be ridiculously hot.

Alissa and Brinley waiting for us to all be ready to start hiking.  Roger had to change his shoes and we needed to make sure we had enough water.

 The hike was a lot of uphill.  I kept using the excuse that I needed to take a picture, so I could stop and catch my breath.  Hiking this year is much better than last year.  Last year, I was really out of shape and it took us much longer and way more stops to wait for me.  I'm excited that it's getting easier since there are so many trails and hikes I want to go on this year.  Especially when we go to Montana.

Brinley and Roger stopped to pose for me. A lot of the pictures that I took were scenery pictures.  I used bits and pieces from my scenery pictures to create a pretty picture frame for the Brinley Roger picture that I took.

 After a lot of uphill, we made it to a sign that gave us options and pointed the direction of what trail to take to get where.  We opted to do the round trip hike to Chimney Rock.  That meant a lot more uphill.

 We treaded a long for a ways, then realized we might not have brought enough water for this.  We had a great view of Chimney Rock (Which is what we came to see), so we took some pictures and decided to turn around and head back.

 The hike down was much easier and went much faster.

 At the bottom, toward the end of the trail, roger noticed a lizard.  I have no idea hoe he saw it.  It was hidden pretty well.  We stopped to take some pictures of it.

 After our Chimney Rock hike, we headed up the road and found another hike to go on.  This one wasn't nearly as long and it took us to an overlook.  After our hike, we realized that we were way to tired from our waking up early, driving all day, then going on two hikes.  So, we decided to head to the cabin that we would be staying in.

 We remembered to get our pictures on the way out.

 On our way to the cabin, we saw a dirt road with a sign that said 'Hidden Lake' or maybe it was 'Peek-a-boo Lake'.  I can't remember, what it was, but it was something that implied it was hard to see.  Maybe it had blind in the name.  I really wish I had a better memory.  Anyway.... we decided to follow the dirt road and go see this lake.  The dirt road was really long.  The scenery was beautiful.  We were really enjoying the drive.  But eventually the road got smaller and smaller and less traveled on.  We kept going, because we really wanted to see this lake.  Eventually the road got too bad and we decided it would be too risky to keep going.  It was a nice scenic drive, but we never did find that lake.  On the way down, we noticed there was a lot of wood that would work great for building a fire when we got to the cabin.  So, we stopped and gathered some wood before we headed the rest of the way to the cabin.

 I had read on a website that the drive from Anasazi State Park to Escalante was a thrilling drive.  I kept wondering what could be thrilling about a drive.  I had forgotten all about it, until we came up to the top of the hill and I finally understood.  There is a stretch of road that was very thrilling.  We were at the top of a mountain with a drop off on either side of the road.  There were no guard rails or anything like that.  It was kind of scary.  But exciting.  I was so surprised and a little nervous as we went over the road, that I forgot to take any pictures.  We stopped and took pictures on the way back though.  We also stopped at this scenic area not too long after passing the scary part on the road.  It was interesting to learn about how this road was made.

 The entry way to our campground. We did a lot of calling around on Saturday night trying to find a place to stay.  Every where we called was all full, since it was Memorial Day weekend.  We had just about given up hope of finding a place.  Roger decided to call one more place.  This was the place.  They had one cabin available and it was much cheaper than any other place.  So, that was really nice.

 The cabin we stayed in

We sat around the campfire and enjoyed some s'mores.  Before our desert, we decided to go out to eat.  We were just too tired and the thought of starting a fire and cooking a meal, just felt like too much.  So, we went to Subway for dinner.  When we got back, someone had started a fire in our fire pit.  We were a little confused, but also felt like, sweet!  We get to sit around the fire with out all the work of starting the fire.  Soon, some people from one of the fifth wheel trailers came over.  They said that they had started the fire.  They didn't realize anybody was staying there and they were hoping to have some s'mores.  We didn't mind sharing the fire pit for a while.  They seemed like nice enough people.  They lived in Holladay area.  They enjoyed their s'mores and we visited for a while, then they left to put their little ones to bed.  We enjoyed sitting around the fire for a while longer before heading to bed.

We saw a rainbow