weekend in zion. . .

logan & i went down to zion national park this past weekend with ted & doris.

for those of you who haven't discovered the beauty of

traveling with your grandparents yet-i'll let you in on a little secret. . .

it's fabulous.

i just want to say that i love them and am so blessed to

have the best grandparents in the world.

anyway, we drove down to zion friday afternoon and settled into the

zion park motel which was about 2 miles from the park entrance.

the motel was great until grandma started getting ready

for bed in their room and discovered a bed bug.

when she showed me what she found i was horrified.

i couldn't help but think that there must be bed bugs in my bed as well.

she showed the manager & they moved my grandparents into

a room that was literally as big as our tiny provo house.

it had a kitchen, two bedrooms, a living room, etc.

before logan & i went to bed i scoured the entire room for bed bugs.

i didn't see any. . .but you can bet i slept with one eye open that night.

after checking into the motel we went to dinner at this real "western" place.

everything was big.

the menus, the glasses, the silverware, and the food!

i got a BBQ chicken pizza and logan got a pretzel burger.

yes.

a burger that was on a pretzel.

the picture doesn't quite capture it-but he assured me it was good.

after dinner logan & i explored the town a little more.

we found a cute sweet shop and couldn't help but go in.

after quite some time we finally made our selections.

i went with a sea-salted caramel that was the best i've ever had

& logan went with this:

ladies & gentlemen this is a ginormous piece of rocky road fudge.

it weighed more than me.

logan chowed on this thing all night, as well as breakfast and lunch the next day.

i had a couple bites and it was pretty dang good- but i literally

couldn't believe how HUGE it was.

saturday morning we woke up at 5AM to catch the free bus into the park.

logan & i made the mistake of doing zero research about what

hike we wanted to do & what we wanted to see, etc.

at 5:30 when the bus got us, we quickly realized that we were

the biggest noobs on planet earth.

in the chilly dark air of the night, we could manage to see that every single

person on the bus was well-equiped with hiking boots, backpacks, flashlights,

walking sticks, hats, sunglasses, maps, gatorade, granola bars, sun block, etc.

logan & i had my cell phone and a water bottle.

we had discussed taking the bus into the park and getting off at an

easy breezy trail that would take us a couple hours.

we didn't realize how cold and dark it was going to be and quickly

realized we wouldn't even have a light to guide us.

we whispered nervously that we would get off the bus when the crowd did

and follow people that had lights and other obvious necessities that we

carelessly neglected to bring.

the crowd got off into the darkness and we asked some people

what hike everyone was getting off to do.

"angel's landing" someone said.

logan & i just looked at eachother.

angel's landing was the one hike that my grandparents made us promise we would NOT do.

apparently it's dangerous and several people have died doing it.

we stood there as the bus drove off and the crowd started up the trail with

their flashlights and head-lamps.

"i guess we are hiking angel's landing" logan said.

and off we went.

we quickly realized we were not going to make it up this mountain alone.

luckily we made some friends, rich & tracy, who had headlamps and

other necessities that came in handy along the way.

rich had done the hike before, so it was nice to have some experience.

we hiked about 2 hours in the dark to the half-way point.

by that time the light was beginning to shine and we could see the beast

of a mountain we were about to climb.

all i had heard about angel's landing was how dangerous it was.

this danger was made evident when we had to hike the last half mile

with the use of chains.

yes-chains.

the chains were in the ground fastened by metal poles for

most of the last half mile of the hike.

some parts didn't have chains, so you literally clutched the

side of the mountain for dear-life and prayed you

didn't take a wrong step.

after pulling yourself up the mountain-side with chains, i'm happy

to report that the view from the top was well worth it.

coming down was scarier than going up for me.

it was sooooo steep and you felt like you were going

to slip at any moment.

in fact, our new friend tracy slipped and pulled rich

down with her.i literally felt my heart stop.

luckily there was a small random bush blocking the mountain's edge

right where they fell.

if it wasn't there then i'm pretty sure i would need therapy right now.

we managed to get down the mountain safely & took some fun pics along the way.

looking back i'm glad we hiked angel's landing & i'm glad we didn't' die.

after our 5 hour hike we got back to the motel

& got ready to drive to cedar city with ted & doris.

we went to the shakespeare festival & saw a midsummer night's dream.

we debated if we should tell them that we ended up doing angel's landing.

we figured they would only be mad if we came back injured

or worse, so we told them about our adventure.

they were shocked but not mad :)

i wanted a raspberry tart before the play began.

my only obstacle was purchasing it from this man & not laughing/punching his face:

as you can tell, this man took his job way too seriously.

he spoke with an old english/irish sounding accent that was obviously fake.

i'm sure it was part of his job-description when he was hired, but it

was just awkward and torturous to listen to.

when he asked me what i wanted i almost told him that he could

take a break for a minute and could lay-off the corny accent.

i've already been to the real globe theatre in england therefore i didn't

need my experience of the shakespeare festival to be enhanced by his antics.

needless to say i ordered as quickly as possible & went on

my merry way with my tart.

it was delicious and well worth the torture of listening

to that awful man's accent.

the play was good & it was fun hanging out with my grandparents.

logan & i agreed that we are lucky to have them in our lives.

overall it was a fun trip.

we didn't die & we got to watch a great play.