It's amazing how much you appreciate your home when you've been gone for a week camping. Suddenly the very basics seem like luxury. I SO Enjoyed tossing myself on top of my overstuffed bed when we came home, and to have pillow!!!! OH MY GOODNESS... DEVINE!!! LOL

And to take a shower in COMPLETE privacy... is AMAZING!!!
LOL

The trip was great though! I have no regrets, Ryan & Elf were fun to be round. We all had a moment or two of slight crabbiness or irritability.. but it never got bad or too uncomfortable.Hell, I'll go on another week long trip with them :-)

So the destination was eastern Utah. We stopped in Price & visited a Dinosaur Museum. That night we slept in Moab & had AMAZING Cornbread at the Moab Brewery, went back to our camp site & "slept" through an INSANE storm... The lightening was so close that it lite up the tent with a brilliant sometimes blinding white light. Now I'll have you note that I LOVE Thunder & lightning storms. And have felt a sense of awe and privilege everytime I witness one. This Particular night was no different in that regards.... However THIS was a HUMBLING experience.. and I was truly feeling slightly frightened? Silly you say? Lets see if you feel the same Way when your only protection from the hard downpour of rain and winds is a piece of nylon being held together with plastic clips & aluminum poles. And you could see through your tent EXACTLY where the lightening was striking and FEEL the ground beneath your sleeping bag rumble. I'm not ashamed to admit that I felt a bit frightened. Apparently ALOT of people got out of their tents and into their cars for the night including Ryan and Elf (elf is terrified of storms). We stayed in the tent

The morning was spent getting showered and then drying up the outside of our tents which were soaked and caked with red mud. Thankfully, the morning was clear (you never would have guessed that there had even been a storm that night) and already hot, so everything dried off rather quickly.

We got a later start than what we had planned, but that was fine, we still had plenty of time to spend in Arches National Park. Which was AMAZING. We got to do some hiking (not as extensive as Joe and I would have liked) but at least we got to see most of the main sites.

On the way out we took a recommended scenic route now heading towards the southwestern border of Utah. We saw more vast and amazing landscape... which is good considering that we WERE on the scenic route. *wink*

anyways, while begining our drive out to Cedar City we managed to stay just on the outskirts of another storm that was directly over Moab it was equally as frightening to witness it from the distance we were at as it was to have slept in it. The lightening flashed for seconds cross the sky... sometimes spreading out the width of two hands. and the coloration of the sky... was jaw dropping. (I get shivers just remembering the view of bright yellow-orange with a ring of red then dark purple and black-blue all spread out, with the sharp fluorescent white strobing forks of lightening, zapping across the sky...again, very humbling).

it was about 1 or 2am when we arrived in Cedar City, setup camp & went to sleep bout half hour later.

The next day we drove through & walked around Zion & Bryce National Parks. All I can say is WOW... and GO THERE! now. They are "small" parks, but SOO worth the time.

Two more days driving, one more night camping... and after stopping at little Stonehenge in Marysville, we were home.

I cant wait for us to go back and do some serious hiking.
Mood: relaxed