Zion National Park

It's President's Day weekend, it's cold so logically we should get away to the warmth of southern Utah.  Of course, everyone else in northern Utah was thinking the same thing.  The drive down went fairly well till we got just outside of Cedar City.  There was an accident but not too big of a deal.  Our destination was Springdale, Utah, just outside of Zion National Park.

Saturday morning we got up and went into the park.  Springdale is literally just outside of the park.  I think our hotel was less than a mile from the entrance gate.  I've been to ZNP before but not with the family.  It was fun driving around.  At one point we got out and climbed up one of the many monuments.  Later, we even went for a hike (walk).  I say this because we're a little lazy when it comes to hiking.  It was nice though.  Here are some pictures from the adventure.

Saturday was also Travis' birthday.  As we were hiking around he kept saying "this is the best birthday ever!" I hope he really did feel that way.  I know he loves being out of doors and climbing.  He has so much energy.  I kept worrying that he'd get going so fast he couldn't stop and go off a cliff.  He was careful though.  We managed to explore and have everyone come home in one piece.

Later that night after dinner we celebrated his birthday as best we could with ding dongs and candles just like we used to do when we were away on Rachel's birthdays.  We could have gotten a cake I suppose but wouldn't have been nearly as fun.

Sadly, on Saturday afternoon Rachel started to feel sick.  By Sunday morning Travis was really sick.  It was hard being in the same hotel room with sick people and not having everyone get sick.

Matt and I went to the local ward.  It was really nice.  It reminded us of the branches in Australia and New Zealand.  We both hope that someday we will be able to go away somewhere and help a small branch function.

On top of people getting sick, a storm was coming in.  This was turning out to be quite the weekend adventure.  When we left we could see the storm rolling in....

by the time we got to Utah County it looked like this....

We drove the backroads from Nephi on.  The freeway was shut down from there to Payson. Apparently, even though this was a major inconvenience we found out it could have been much worse.  The freeway was closed just out of Cedar City right after we passed through.  I'm grateful we were able to make it home in one piece.

Despite the illness, bad roads, loudness in the car, it was a great trip.  I'm glad we were able to go and make some memories.