Escaping Winter Doldrums

With new snowdrifts threatening to swallow my truck lurking just outside, I escaped to the yearly routine of planning our upcoming vacation. For those of you who know me well, I am a planner - right down to the quickest route to get where we are going, what we'll do when we get there, the good places to eat and where we will stay. Does everything work out as planned? Not exactly - but it makes me feel better and gives me something to look forward to and be excited about. We always manage to throw in something fun and unexpected - like last year - Ryker, Kai'le and I took a float plane ride. As most of you know I'm not the biggest fan of flying, but I did it and it was awesome. Sadly, just a month later that very same float plane and very same pilot crashed into the very same lake we'd landed on. Out of the 5 people on board 3 survived including our pilot but it still struck home pretty hard. Either someone is telling me to keep my ass out of planes or we are just very lucky.

Sadness aside, I began to plan this years adventure. We were initially going to go to Sequoia/Kings Canyon and on to Yosemite (and throw in a visit to my grandma who lives very close by). We were also going to take our future vulcanologist Kai'le to Mono Lake to look at the cool tufa formations and then on to the ghost town of Bodie - where I haven't been since I was three - in the hopes of recreating a famous picture in our family (and the Sorenson's) on the double-seated outhouse. However Ryker's electrical final, 22 steers and a multitude of other going's on in the month of May has postponed that trip. We needed something a little farther south if we were going to travel in April.

We decided on three of Southern Utah's National Parks. We are going to visit Zion, Bryce and Capitol Reef. I have never been to Capitol Reef and I haven't been to Zion and Bryce since that fateful trip to Bodie - so 30 years give or take - and Ryker has never been at all. Kai'le cried when she found out she wasn't going on the aforementioned trip to Yosemite, but once I showed her all the cool sites - she lit up like a Christmas tree. If you'd like to check out what Utah has to offer - here are some sites of the Parks and where we have decided to stay. I'm looking forward to a fun vacation and getting out of the cold and snow for a little while.

http://www.desertpearl.com/

http://www.redriverranch.com/

http://www.brycecanyonlodge.com/

http://www.utah.com/nationalparks/zion.htm

http://www.utah.com/nationalparks/bryce.htm

http://www.utah.com/nationalparks/capitol_reef.htm