A field trip with Grandma P

Today was a special treat!

Since Grandma Phyllis

doesn't watch Tucker anymore,

SHE got to come on my field trip with me!

We headed to Deanna Rose Farmstead.

There were baby goats to feed.

And bigger goats to feed.

There were lots of animals to see,

talks to listen to,

and trails to explore.

My friends and I all had a good time!

Thanks, Grandma!

Lots of wheels

After bike riding in Zion,

we've been doing a lot of riding at home.

Bikes,

scooters

trikes

if it has wheels,

we'll take it for a spin!

World's Best Dad

Our dad is pretty amazing.

He runs us to our stuff,

cooks dinner,

sings crazy songs,

jams in dance parties,

has to single-parent when Mom's on call,

and puts up with all of our grumblings.

So how can we say thanks?

Jack made him a cool project

with all the things he loves about him

and we made him a bunch of cards

and a new morning cold brew coffee glass.

And clearly just let him relax today.

Thanks, Dad!

This day's for you.

Utah Day 6...Razors and Caves

We're riding ATV's today?

All day?

Boy, did we save the best for last!

Everybody load up!

We have hundreds of miles of trails

and the entire Dixie Forest

to explore!

Our first stop was

the Ice Cave

It's this cave that has

sheets of ice and icicles

all rear round.

From inside looking out

It was COLD in there!

We did a lot of driving that day

We kicked a lot of dust up

Frankly,

it was exhausting

Beck and I slept through

the next stop...

Strawberry Point

It was a bit like

Cedar Breaks and Bryce

with some hoodoos

And the HUGE fin you could walk out on

Mom didn't brave it--

she couldn't even watch Dad do it

He said it was an awesome view,

but only about 18 inches across

on the fin in some places.

Yikes.

We woke up refreshed after our nap.

Had some lunch,

palled around

And hit the road for one last stop

Mammoth Cave!

This one was

enormous!

It's actually a lava tube

We hiked through a lot of it

(it's about a 1/4 mile long)

We saw a lot of stuff along the way

but one of the best parts

was when we had to crash through

Strawberry Creek

We got a little wet!

It was a heck of a finale

for our Utah trip!

Grandpa and Gigi,

where are we headed next year???

Utah Day 5...Lava flows

We noticed all these piles of black rock

EVERYWHERE in Duck Creek.

We looked it up--

they are lava flows from

ancient volcanos.

We had a down day today

so we decided to go explore them.

Weird, right?

The piles were HUGE!

We had to work together

to climb over them

They were impressive to look at

And more impressive to climb!

Sheesh!

We are real hikers!

After an eventful lava hike,

we headed to the backyard

for some happy hour games

and playground time

For some reason,

carrying the rings around like this

was my favorite thing to do...

Ah! 

We needed a relaxing day.

Utah Day 4...the HooDoos

Hat-check

Sunglasses-check

Junior Ranger lanyard-check

Let's go exploring!

Today we headed for Bryce Canyon.

Here is a little preview of what's to come

(this was on our drive into the park...)

These are known as hoodoos.

They start as a fin,

gets a little window in the wall

and eventually the arch on top erodes away

and then you have a hoodoo.

Cool, right?

We definitely wanted to see more.

We stopped by the Ranger station

to get our Junior Ranger books

And headed out!

We were a bit disappointed

because they were doing roadwork

on the only road in the park.

So we had to stop at mile 9 of 18--

Farview Point 

It was impressive

We had some lunch and enjoyed the view

and then climbed back in to explore 

the 8 miles we could reach

We stopped a few times

and it really started to get good

in Bryce Amphitheater--

the main section of the park.

Here's Inspiration Point

And Sunset Point

That view calls for a family picture!

We did a bit of walking around

Grandpa took a turn packing me

And then we loaded up

Me and Mom

Beck and Dad

And we started down into the canyon

from Sunset Point

on the Navajo Loop

We saw the infamous Thor's Hammer

and descended into Wall Street

It was amazing

Gotta love a slot canyon

Pausing for a pic

The infamous Wall Street tree

Lots of cool formations

To earn our special

"I Hiked the Hoodoos" badge,

we had to hike 3 miles

and find 2 trail benchmarks...

we earned them!

Again,

pictures just don't show the awesomeness

Keep going!

We called this one

ET rock--

do you see it?

A little window...

a hoodoo in the making!

Wow.

We scored our

"Hiked the Hoodoos" badges

AND our Junior Ranger badges today!

Bryce Canyon,

"hoodoo" you love?