Last Day with the Bodhaines:(

Our first stop that day was Mammoth Caves, which are pretty cool caves, they are kind of short ,I think there are a total of 4 different caves that are known for the bats that live in them. 

 Then we drove about 20 minutes to a place called Cedar Breaks which  give you the chance to stand above 10,000 feet on a cliff edge surrounded by lush forests and flower-covered meadows looking into a desert amphitheater 2,500 feet deep, covered with incredible, multi-colored hoodoos. (yes I copied this from their website:) hehe

 For some reason this was the place for piggy back rides...

 and shoulder rides.. 

We miss you Bodhaines! Thanks for coming out and seeing us!!

Lake Powell

 Our next stop was Lake Powell, we thought we would stop on play in the water... Which in lori's mind meant renting toys.. The funnest day of the trip! The kids had a blast! Thanks LORI!

 She was a crazy boat driver. Her main goal was to throw everyone off the tube. She succeeded most of the time..Except in the picture below. VICTORY! What a stud:)

  I'm talking about D not Cameron:)

  

 AWWWWW!!!!

SOOOO SOOO MUCH Fun!

North Rim Grand Canyon with the Bodhaines!!

 North Rim of the Grand Canyon!

 Yes someone was being really grumpy.... I bet you can't guess who it was..

The DO's

Meet up with the Bodhaines,even though there craziness scares me to death, they make everything ten times more fun! We LOVE this family! They were so nice to drive all the way from Cali to The North Rim of the Grand Canyon to hang with us for a few days.

DO go to the North Rim its beauty is spectacular. Very green and not very many tourists. We stayed about 40 minutes outside due to the fact that that was the only place that had RV hookups. The drive to North Rim was gorgeous. The park it self once you get inside is probably only worth a day out of your vacation fyi.

The Dont's

Don't go with the Bodhaines to the Grand Canyon!:)! They are crazy! Every time I turned around, I thought for sure they would fall! They are not afraid of heights!.  I think they got sick of my nagging voice.. Actually maybe that's why they did it to hear my pleas to  back away from the edge:)

Don't plan to meet up with someone in the middle of nowhere where cell service and internet is nowhere to be found.  The only pay phone was a mile walk to the phone and a mile back.  We got a lot of exercise going to that stinkin phone to make sure we found them. It was of no use in the end. We thought we were staying at the same place, but when midnight rolled around and the Bodhaines were nowhere to be found we realized they were not staying where we were. We tried to call the next morning but no luck they were out of cell service as well. Luckily they have the biggest bluest truck, as we were driving to the Grand Canyon we happened to see their truck at an INN about 25 miles south of where we stayed. So we were able to meet up:)

Brennan with B and T.

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I love Kelsey, she always plays with the little kids and makes the older ones swoon over her.. This girl knows how to work it:) At one point in our families life's together my boys literally got in a fist fight over who was going to get to marry her.

My Good friend Lori, love this crazy lady! 

Ready for a our hike...

I think some pinky promises were being talked about in the picture above::)

Who's this handsome hiker:)

Kelsey...

Please come away form the edge, please!

Cam found a horny toad, I haven't seen one of those since I was little!

Lori screaming her head off...

Relaxing after a long day of hiking .... 

Zions

Zions was our first stop
on our  National Park month long adventure.
We were in awe at how beautiful it was.
Definitely a site to see.

The Bucherts, who have been our friends since we were first married and  my brother Jay and his family met us here.
We were so happy my brother surprised us, he was headed home from Lake Powell and decided to stop for a couple of nights.
 We were so glad they did, it was so fun to see them!

My brother had a great idea, he said I should do
  the do's and don'ts of our travels..
So here's an attempt to make this interesting!


DO's at Zions...


The Narrows.
( a hike in a river between narrow, very high rock walls)
We were kind of worried about how the little kids would do on this hike.
We worried for nothing.
 They all loved it. 

Below is my sister in law and cute nephew.  

A lot of the hike was about shin deep.

Other parts of the hike were over our heads.
If you navigated well you could avoid those parts.

D and Martin..

Some more

Do's

 Hidden canyon hike
which was straight up the side of a mountain/cliff.
It was super hard, well at least it was for a pregnant, altitude challenged woman.
I thought I might die:)
The kids flew up the trail, yes I felt like a wimp. 

Towards the top of the mountian/cliff there were chains you had to hold onto so you didn't fall off the side of the cliff to this... below..

"B" is not holding onto the chain! 

I am afraid of heights so the entire time,  I was the annoying mom freaking out and yelling," hold onto that chain! Get away from the edge, etc etc!"

 I'm sure they ONLY survived because I screamed at them the entire time, haha...

( I left this on the DO's because I will do it again I'm sure, even when they are grown men with children of their own.)

He's holding on now! Good boy!

This is towards the top of the hike.

"Lil B" did awesome, he really didn't want to go after the first hike but once we got him going he didn't complain once, well maybe he did complain on the way down when we were almost done, but he made it through the worst of it. He was a trooper.

WE finally made it to the Hidden Canyon.. 

It was pretty darn cool that at the top of this mountain/cliff there was a very quiet beautiful canyon. 

The canyon went on for about another mile. The kids and dads went on,  while I took a little nap waking up every so often thinking a snake was crawling on me. It sounds terrible but it was really peaceful. 

In the canyon the kids were able to rock climb all over the place.

The crew in the "Hidden Canyon."

 DO Smores' to top off the perfect weekend.

and of course

ROOK

 I can't even remember playing, I just remember laughing and laughing! 

Fun times in Zions! 

Don'ts at Zions...

Buy cheap water shoes for 5$ at Walmart,
 they do not have enough support on the bottom, you are walking on big rocks the entire time. Feeling  every rock was not fun not to mention they were falling apart after the hike
. 

Bring anything in your pack that you don't want to get wet.

Leave any little kids with "D" because he forgets they need water,

and you end up with a dehydrated little girl who threw up all over the rv bed in the middle of the night, poor thing! 

(we actually are not sure this was why she threw up, its just something  to tease "D" about it)

Thanks honey for cleaning it all up and doing the laundry in the middle of the night!

You are the best! 

 Honestly he does make lil kids forget they are hiking and and turns it into a fun adventure.

Love you honey:)

Forget to take a picture of the entire group you are with.

SO sad I don't have one of us all:(

 Emerald pools, it was a lame hike on a paved path.
The kids were bored. It is a short half mile hike there  but with lots of people on the trail it took away from the beauty at least for me it did and the emerald pools aren't very emerald:)
That's probably not why they are called that is it?:)