Hiking, Exploring, and Hot Tubs - a day on the road

Today was one of those days that remind me why we are on this trip.

It began with an average morning and chores.  Whether in a house or camper - there is plenty to do.

We worked on school subjects until my husband could take his lunch break.  He and I jumped in our Kawasaki Mule and road up to the Red Bull Mountain Bike Track in Virgin, Utah.  We like to hike for our daily exercise and this place had some really steep hills to help me with my backside.

He and I spent an hour climbing up and down the red, crumbly cliffs and slopes weaving through the mesas and buttes west of Zion National Park.  With the gorgeous formations in the background and no one around, it was wonderful.

We had to head on home so he could get back to work.  We pealed out in our Mule at its top speed of 23 mph.  

Later in the day, I told the kids we were going to take a ride up the mountain to Kolob Reservoir.  The kids are all almost done with a bad cold and I figured a ride in the van would be fine.  We just wouldn't let them get out and run too much.  Shae was able to go with us, thank goodness.  The road covered in  snow at the top, which he insisted on driving in the deeper parts.

I told him, "Honey!  We don't have 4 wheel drive!"

He replied, "That's what tow haul is!"  

We always joke that our 15 passenger van has turbo, can go in 4 x 4, and do just about anything my husband wants - all he has to do is push that tow haul button!

We got quite a ways up the road when we came to the road closed sign.  The park doesn't plow the snow and it was too deep past that point.  Oh well, we don't cry of the little things, so we just turned it around, attempting to avoid the deep, thick mud in the ditch behind us, and headed back down the mountain.

Shae decided to continue our adventure by going to Grafton, Utah - a ghost town nearby.  I will write more on that later, but let me tell you, it was a very interesting place to stop.

Since I had made a big breakfast and lunch, I decided to have Hanna make sandwiches for dinner.  Before that, her and I took a dip in the hot tub and then I went to a wine tasting party at the Lodge.  

Quite a day!

Keeping my mouth shut is proving very difficult!

My husband and I have a really great marriage. Oh sure, we have our hard times. But, most of the time it is good. Well, lately we have been disagreeing on a few things. One of them being his driving. If you read an earlier post about his driving at Mt. St. Helens, then you have a clue about what I am talking about. His driving has always been an issue for us. His driving and money are the two main things we have argued about. Of course there have been other topics, but money and driving seem to be the most frequent. Now, I must mention again, we really don't disagree very often.

Well, driving around the mountains can get scary. I was very daring before I had kids. I'll tell those stories another time and some I can't tell because they are illegal. Since I have had kids, I have no desire to die! So, when I see those mountain corners and deep ravines fly by me, even at 45 mph, it freaks me out some. Also, I sit in the back seat with the baby. I nurse him a lot while he is in his car seat. When Shae takes a corner a little fast, my breast feels like it is going to rip off! Now, he would tell you he drives fine. He does not go fast at all and purposely drives slower for me. He really is an excellent driver. He has gotten us out of many potential accidents. I totally trust him, just sometimes I guess I get scared. Now, who is wrong? I guess we both are. I need to trust him more and he needs to be more sensitive to my concern for my feelings.

Now, let me make something clear, he is not a bad driver.  In fact, he is an excellent driver.  I just get a little scared sometimes.

The other day we kind of got in a fuss about this subject. He said he is trying really hard to drive slower for me. He is sick of my griping about his driving. He wants me to keep my negative comments to myself. I feel like I should speak up if I don't feel safe or need him to slow down when I am nursing the baby. He said I just need to say it different. So, I want to change and please my husband. So, I have been silent. Not too silent so I am being a smarty pants, just trying to keep my comments to myself. I have to try to chose my words more carefully. So, yesterday we decided to go to the lake near where we are camping. We were driving down the road and passed at little side road that led to the lake. Now, up ahead there are numerous roads to the lake, but Shae wanted to turn around and go back to this particular one. That is fine, nothing wrong with that. He is driving back the way we came when suddenly he cranks the wheel and we start to race towards a little dirt road. Now to me, all I see is dirt, a ditch, and our van flying off the road. To him, he saw the road and turned the wheel. We made it. It just scared the pants off of me! I yelled, "Shae!" That is it. I didn't say another word. We made it fine. We drove down the rough dirt road for quite a ways when suddenly, the van stopped moving. We were stuck in the dirt. Our big ol' 15 passenger van was stuck in the dirt by the lake. I tried to control the thoughts I was having, like, "He deserves this. He shouldn't of gone down here." I tried to just laugh and hope he could get us out of this mess. Otherwise it would be a long walk back to the camper to get our huge truck to pull us out. He hit the gas and then would stop and put it in reverse. Forward, Reverse, Forward, Reverse. I had Cody get out with the video camera. Shae didn't give up and finally got that van out. We weren't stuck anymore. He said, "I hope we can make it out to the main road!" That was reassuring. We parked it and hiked the rest of the way to the desert beach. It was beautiful. We had a great time. I tried not to laugh or make a negative comment, after all, we were alive and not stuck anymore. Shae drove us out of the sandy road and to the pavement. We made it out with out any damage to us our the vehicle. He is a good driver and I am going to be a better "not griper" while we travel.

The Buffalo Around Our Vehicle at Custer State Park, South Dakota

Custer State Park in South Dakota was an awesome experience that I highly recommend and cannot wait to go back to...

It was such an incredible experience. Seeing the buffalo from inside the safety of our van was wonderful. They were all around our van. We couldn't even move! The traffic was backed up for a long ways waiting for them to move off the road.

There were so many cute baby buffalo and some HUGE male buffalo. The buffalo are allowed to wander freely all over the park.

We went hiking on Creekside Trail. It is considered the easiest trail in the park. It is 2 miles long, which for us, with all of the kids, takes us a llllooooonnnnnnggggg time. I called and asked the park ranger about it and she told us that she had seen a mountain lion on that same trail just the morning before! There is a lot of wildlife around there, buffalo, mountain lions, mountain goats, elk, pronghorn antelope, and more. This trail is the handicap trail. We kept our eyes peeled. We saw many huge piles of buffalo scat, but no buffalo on the trail, thank goodness.

Pronghorn Antelope, only about 30# of meat

A few days later, we drove around the wildlife loop. We saw two enormous herds of buffalo. They like to wallow in mud and dust, I'm sure for mites and fleas, our chickens used to do it..

We found the second herd on a side road, way out. After looking at the buffalo, everywhere, Shae announced, "We are almost out of gas!" We were out in the middle of nowhere in the middle of Custer State Park, on this side, back dirt road! We sat there awhile longer, enjoying the buffalo roaming...and then turned around and hoped we would make it back to civilization and not have to sleep with the mountain lions. We did make it, and had a wonderful time.

For some great facts on Bison/Buffalo - go to our online magazine - The Lemonade Digest