Havasupai

Well, Im back from hiking Havasupai in the Grand Canyon. I had an amazing time! Everything from waking up at 2:30am and driving 3 hrs to get there, to the hike, the camping...it was all a lot of fun!! Not having to take care of kids, I felt like a kid again.

The hike in wasnt bad at all. Its 10 miles and the first mile is practically straight down, the switch backs. Then after that, its just a LONG walk. It was a beautiful walk though and I didnt get any blisters at all. Im sure not having to carry our packs made a huge difference.


The campsite was amazing! A large creek running through the middle and lots of little brooks and creeks all over the place! The spot we got was surrounded on both sides by creeks. We were right against the canyon walls and there was a really cool cave right up above us that had 4 tunnels that went back about 200 feet. The water falls were the most amazing waterfalls Id ever seen. They blew anything Id seen in Hawaii out of the water. Havasupai falls was nice, but the 2nd day we hiked to Mooney Falls and wow, it was so awesome! We had to go through this crazy little cave, and climb down latters and hold onto ropes and chains to get down. It really was one of the coolest spots Ive ever seen in my entire life.


Everyone hiked out, but my mom and I took a helicopter out. Aside from waiting forever, it was really cool. When you are in the bottom of the canyon, all you can see is the walls right by you, so the canyon doesnt look as big. But flying out, I saw all the other canyon walls that were set back and I was like, wow this really is the grand canyon! There is a village down at the bottom that 300 natives have been living in for over 1000 yrs. It was crazy seeing houses down there. The only way in is to walk, horse back or helicopter. They all keep their cars at the hilltop and fly in. I cant imagine living down there, totally cut off from the rest of the world. We saw horses carrying mail bags out.

Anyways, the whole trip made me realize how much I need to get back outdoors and starting camping and hiking again. I really enjoyed the rock climbing as well. It was scary but when I was down and saw what I climbed, I was so proud of myself. It was amazing being in a spot where there were no cars, no music, no noise at all but the creek. You couldnt even hear the other campers. It was really neat.

Here is the link to an awesome slide show that Carl made if you want to check out more of our pics:
3sevens.myshowit.com/havasupai2009

Have you ever gone backpacking??

Because I havent. And Im doing it this weekend for the first time. Carl and I are hiking to Havasupai with Tiffany and Luis, Leslie, and my mom and Randy. We are dropping Sam and Charlie off in Prescott to spend the weekend with my dad.

Packing for a trip like this is hard! Ive never had to include everything in one pack before. We each get 35 lbs and that has to include our tent, sleeping bags, clothes, food, dishes and everything else we might need! They dont allow fires down in the canyon, so we are bringing freeze dried meals and little bunsen burner stoves and mess kits that we cook with. We got beef stroganoff, beef stew, and bacon and eggs. We actually already tested out the eggs and they werent half bad! A bit salty and porky for my tastes, but the texture was fine, so I know I can eat that stuff for a couple days. I will take plenty of pics of our food and post them to my other blog

Its going to be 95-100 degrees down there, but the water is cool and it cools down enough at night that its tolerable. I feel like even though we will be roughing it, it will still be vacation because I wont have the kids. My load will be lighter because I only have to worry about myself, and that will be nice.

We will take tons of pics and I will be sure to share them all!

Dirty Jobs with Mike Rowe

Dirty Jobs is a show on Discovery Channel and they are doing a show about my parents dirt shirt factory in Kauai. They did all the filming yesterday and today. The show will air this fall.

Pictures from San Diego

Carl made a pretty cool slide of our pics from San Diego. It includes all of our friends we were there with. Its really good! There are a lot of pics, but it goes really fast. Check it out!

San Diego Slide show

San Diego

We went to San Diego for July 4th this year. We were invited out by our friends Nate and Stacy and their 4 kids. They rented a big house right on the boardwalk of Mission Beach. We also met up with our old friends Jim and Elisabeth and their 3 kids too. There were 10 kids in one house. It was loud and crazy and everyone had fun. We had a really neat fire pit on our patio and we got to make smores. Each family was in charge of a dinner and everyone grilled and made really yummy food. We mostly stayed at the beach but on the last day we went to Sea World. We had a great weekend with our friends. Cant wait to do it again

Crazy Hair Day

Sam went to vacation bible school this week at our church. Yesterday was Crazy hair day. Since Sam's hair is so short, we decided to dye it any color he wanted! This is how it came out!

Swimming Lessons

Sam has been taking swim lessons this summer. His swim teacher, Harrison, comes to our house and gives him a lesson twice a week. We love Harrison, he is a 17 yr old kid that is wonderful with kids. Sam loves him and is always painting him pictures and stuff. Sam is doing great with swimming. He can doggie paddle all over the place, go down the slide, jump in from anywhere. Charlie is right behind him. Here are a few pics of the boys having lots of fun in our pool and the last one is a close up of Sam, with all his adorable freckles he is getting!