Arches

Some of you may recall that we visited Moab for the first time last spring. The weather was definitely better then, making for some nicer photo conditions, so if you're curious about that trip, click here. I was 20 weeks pregnant with Jonah at the time!

Wednesday and Thursday of last week we went on a little trip to Arches National Park. Sure its a five hour drive even if you don't stop anywhere, but we had such fun last year that we wanted to go again. Plus, Elora had been begging to have a picnic with Grandma for weeks, and we thought it'd be funner to meet her and Grandpa here-where they've never been before- rather than driving to Grandma's house where its probably colder than where we live! We would also pick up Uncle Thain in Provo, since Elora and Josh adore him so much.

We'd been watching the weather forecast for Arches all week, and knew the days we were going were supposed to be the coolest, and perhaps wettest, of the week, but the possible conditions in Moab were still better than what we were leaving behind! Here was the road as we left town Wednesday morning:


We arrived in Moab around four that afternoon; the sky was overcast and it was windy, but it wasn't too bad. That weekend was the Moab Jeep Safari, which is apparently the biggest tourism weekend in the city all year. We were sure glad we'd reserved our rooms early, as there were jeeps and people all over the place. After checking in, we decided to check out a few short trails in the park- only five miles from town- just in case it was raining and cold the next day and we wanted to leave early.

Last year we took our kids on the 3 mile round-trip hike to delicate arch, quite by accident. We had fun, but I knew there was no way we'd take our kids on that hike this time, especially since Josh was no longer in diapers, and it was pretty cold! So we went to the viewpoint hike instead, which leads hikers to a point just across from the arch. When I say " just across" I mean just across a big canyon. But hey, it worked for us. The hike wasn't very long or strenuous at all, at least for most of us. Here we are resting on the way up:



And Grandpa even came on this hike with us! (Grandpa isn't a big fan of hiking.)



Here is an idea of how far away we were from the arch when we reached the viewpoint:


Can you see it way over there? Grandma took a picture of our family from the viewpoint; unfortunately, my head happens to be blocking the famous arch in question. It's hard to tell, but we're actually on a little ridge...our legs are braced that way because it felt like the wind would blow us over! And the crack a ways behind us is actually the canyon I mentioned before.




On the way back down, Elora and Uncle Thain began what would be their practice for the rest of the trip: stopping at every large boulder and cliff and climbing to the top! I was glad Thain was there, or I'm sure I would've spent the entire time yelling at Elora to climb down from everything. There they are, way in the background. (Don't you love how Jonah is actually a faceless blanket in all of these pictures?):


Next we went to a viewpoint to see an area known as "The Fiery Furncace." There are no trails into this area, and you have to get a special permit to hike in this maze of sandstone. You can also go on a guided tour with a park ranger that is supposed to take about three hours. Sounds like fun if you don't have kids with you. Maybe another time.



Here's Josh posing for me. Josh, as you may recall, hates the wind, and hates being cold. He was being a good sport for my picture, but he was already begging to go back to the car where it was warm! Joseph had left his jacket at the hotel for some reason, so he actually did stay in the car for this little jaunt.



At this point it was already about seven at night, so we headed into town for dinner. Grandpa was sure all the dining places would be empty because it was so late, but I was almost certain he'd be wrong! As predicted, The Moab Diner was very busy. When we'd come last year, we were practically the only ones in the whole restaurant, but this year the place was completely packed.

Jonah, who loves eating out, was thrilled to be sitting at the table with us, and was happily eating his snacks and slapping the table at all the excitement in the room.

The other two, however, were acting like typical preschoolers who are hungry and tired. Josh was throwing a huge fit, screaming and running around, while Elora wouldn't sit down on the bench, and I was incredibly flustered at the huge crowd present to observe this behavior. Finally everyone calmed down and we were able to enjoy our meal. When we finished it was around 8-8:30. Grandma, Grandpa, and Thain were all getting ice cream, so we thought we'd get some for our kids too. (I know, what were we thinking?)

The server came to our table and I tried to explain that I wanted "half a scoop" for my kids, just because the whole serving was way too big. He started telling me that it would still cost the same, and again I explained I didn't care about the cost, I just wanted less ice cream. Then Joseph started reading the flavors to Josh, and the server said, "I'm sorry, I need to go take care of another order, I'll be back."

I was soooooo mad! I was already feeling self conscious for my kids acting up earlier, then this guy had just made me feel ten times worse. If we hadn't had my parents and everyone there, I would have wanted to leave right then. When he finally came back, we started giving him the rest of our order again, and he said he didn't have anything down about "half an order" and acted like he didn't remember the conversation we'd had five minutes earlier. Needless to say, he didn't get much of a tip.

Back at the hotel, everyone was fine, and Elora and Josh actually were asleep by eleven. Elora loves staying at hotels, but Josh always wants to go home. This was the first time they actually slept in the same bed together instead of one of them laying with us. Too bad our bed was so uncomfortable I didn't sleep most that night! The next morning we woke bright and early and headed out into the park. It was only in the 40's (brrrr) but at least it wasn't raining or snowing yet. Last time we were here we only went on two hikes, so this time we tried to hit all the short trails so we could see as much of the park as possible. First, we went to this viewpoint not too far into the park. Josh was freeeeezing, and Joseph stayed in the car with Jonah:



Then we went to the Balancing rock that we visited last year. Again, Josh, Daddy and Grandpa stayed in the cars. The hike started out pretty sunny.....



But by the time we'd circled the rock the clouds had almost filled the sky! This was the story most of the day: constantly changing skies, with temperatures never above the high forties. Some of us still had fun seeing the sights anyway!


Next we went to the North and South Window arches. Josh was all set to go on this one with us, but then we had to wait ten minutes outside the bathroom while a ranger cleaned it, which resulted in my having to change Josh's pants, which ended in him wanting to stay in the car.

Joseph had already got Jonah in the baby carrier, so we convinced Josh to stay in Grandpa's car with him. We set him up with his water bottle and snacks, and he seemed pretty happy about it.
At this point, I had put Grandpa's heavier jacket over my own, Joseph had on his winter hat, and Elora too had on one of Grandpa's spare jackets! It did make the hike much more comfortable. Here is Elora in front of one of the window arches on our way up:



And this is me standing in that same arch pictured with Elora. Up here, the wind was vicious! I was glad to have the lined jacket on, and felt like I would get blown right out of the arch. Oh, and no I'm not pregnant again, my camera is under my jacket!



Just down the trail from here was the Turret Arch, obviously named for the turret-like structure jutting up next to it:



Thain and Elora were way ahead of us climbing all over the place and having a great time!



(Here's the close up.)



As the clouds rolled in once again, we headed back down to the parking lot. In the distance you can see where we will hike next...I think its called the Double Arch. I liked how the majority of the hikes are pretty close to one another, and easy enough for kids. Doesn't Elora look cute with her swinging arm in Grandpa's big jacket?


When we got down to the car, we found Joshua sobbing. We'd been gone for probably 45 minutes, and Grandpa said Josh had started crying about two minutes after we left! When I asked him what was wrong, he sobbed, "Grandpppa lllocked the doooor!" It seems Josh had wanted to follow after us, and wanted to be with mommy. Poor little guy. And poor Grandpa!

Over at the Double Arch, the weather turned ominous. Joseph offered to stay in the car with Josh and Jonah, but this time we remembered that we had brought some walkie-talkies with us, so Josh was much happier being able to talk with me while I hiked with Grandma, Thain, and Elora.

As you can see, I'm sure they were glad they'd stayed in the car! The snow flurry only lasted the duration of this hike, which was one of the shorter ones.


Grandma and I went over to the arch, while Elora and Thain went off another way. At first I was worried, because you're not supposed to go off the trail and kill the cryptobiotic soil, but I saw that the way they'd gone was all loose sand and slickrock and had lots of other footprints going the same way, so I stopped worrying about it. That's them, over there on the left:




When we got to the arch, it was a pretty steep climb up into the opening, so my mom waited at the bottom while I climbed up to take a picture. Again the wind was nasty, and on the other side of the arch was a steep drop off! I opted to stay sitting to take my picture, as it was a pretty precarious perch:



At this point, it was around one in the afternoon. That morning we had purchased to-go sandwich lunches at the diner in anticipation of a possible picnic- remember the whole reason we invited Grandma-but it was obviously too cold for that. We opted instead to eat in our cars in the parking lot. Exciting, I know. Elora got to eat in Grandma and Grandpa's car, and she told Grandma, "I wish we were at your house, it would probably be more exciting than your car." This was the view out our windshield as we at our lunch:


Oh yeah, just waiting for crumbs.
After lunch, we headed for the end of the park to see the entrance to The Devil's Garden, where some of the longer trails (like seven miles long!) are located. We saw on the map that there were a few shorter trails too, so we decided to check it out. Josh had fallen asleep in the car, so again Joseph and Jonah stayed with him in the car while Grandma, Thain, Elora and I went on the trail. Poor Joseph didn't get to see much! He took out the walkie talkies again so at least he could talk to us while we hiked.



Judging by the entrance between these sandstone fins, I thought it might be a cool maze-like place, similar to what we'd seen at the viewpoint into The Fiery Furnace....




So we were surprised to find that it opened up quite a bit once we went inside.



First we visited the "Tunnel Arch". We thought maybe we'd get to go in a tunnel or something, so were a little disappointed that it was just a hole way up in a cliff, and this was as close as we were going to get. Elora was still happy to pose for a picture though:





Then we trundled the short distance to the Pine Tree Arch. Its interesting how pictures don't really capture scale here. In this picture it seems to be quite a small arch:




But this is us walking inside that very same arch a minute later!




Here are Thain and Elora doing their thing:




Joseph wasn't able to reach us with the walkie talkies here, not because we were very far but because there was so much stone between us! We took our time going back, because we knew this was probably our last hike of the day.



On our drive back down to the visitors center (our last destination) we stopped a few times to take some more pictures. My camera was having a hard time this whole day because I'd forgotten to charge the battery, and everything was turning out way too pixilated. Grrr.



We hung around the visitors center and looked at displays. The sun kept peeking through the clouds and I kept trying to get a picture of Jonah on the animal statues outside like we had of the other two last year, but every time we'd set him down, the sun would hide and Jonah would start crying! Thain said it was the sun playing an April Fool's Joke.



Around five we all said our goodbyes, Grandma tearful as usual. Of course at that point the clouds cleared up and the sun came out. We got home around 12:30 AM (there was a pretty scary snow storm in the mountains on the way home.) Oh, and don't ever eat at Ricardo's in Price. It's horrible, and I don't know how they can call it a Mexican restaurant. Anyway. All it all, it was a great trip!