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We got up, had breakfast and went to a fun zone place near the hotel. We didnt take any pictures but we had a good time. We then met with the Gutierrez family for a final meal in the area.

We had a good night sleep and got up to return the car we borrowed from Adam. He gave us a ride to the airport and we settled in for a long flight home. We got home to some great welcome signs from friends, a happy dog, and some nice flowers blooming on the patio.

2021 Kaplan Epic National Park Tour Vacation in the books. 

Next year Hawaii! (Julie doesn’t believe me, but going to make it happen)

This morning I had to take the RV to get the propane filled, I managed to back into a very tight alley and get the propane filled up. Then got some gas and had it back at hotel by 11 am for the Outdoorsy people to come pickup the RV. 

We went and got some lunch and then just a short 1+ hour ride to conifer, Co. It was great seeing our friends, great playing some games and just spending a little time together. Not much else to say.

Tomorrow we will do some fun and adventure around Denver, meet up with the Gutierrez family for Dinner and then get ready to fly back home

 A long 8 hour drive with plenty of detours to avoid the mudslides and smoke from the fires. We finally arrived at the hotel around dinner time. The wait for dinner at the near empty restaurant was quite long and lets say the service and food were enough to get us through the evening. But the nice beds and the hot shower and the prep emptying the RV are a sign we are close to the end.

Tomorrow we go to see some friends

 All we can say is MOAB and Arches do not disappoint. Today we began the day with an early start. We really didn’t know what we had in store for us but we got picked up from the Campground at about 9:30 by the MOAB Adventure Center for our Slick Rock Humvee Tour. By 10:10 we started to climb straight up Slick Rock in the Humvee and if looks could have killed I would not be here and Julie would be in trouble. Julie was quite surprised by what we were doing for sure! 

The Humvee started climbing straight up slick rock. We went up and down the rocks, sometimes nearly straight vertical, sometimes really close to the cliffs edge, sometimes slow, and sometimes fast. The girls made a lot squeals and squeaks, Julie and I both were white knuckle at times. We made a stop near a slot canyon and got a story of the para jumper who got stuck in the canyon and it took people a long time to find him because of the echos. We got to all yell into the canyon and hear the echo. We made our way to Hells gate and overlook over the Colorado River. We swapped from the seats at the top of the Humvee to the seats inside, for the way back. We stopped at the dino tracks at the top of Slick Rock and got some more information about selfish people and how someone stole one of the tracks about 7 years back. After the tour we made our way back to the campground and had a simple lunch.

We then packed up and made our way into Arches. We stopped at the visitor center for some merch and then climbed the hill in the RV. Arches is mostly a driving park, with some hiking that can be done as well.

We Stopped at a lot of points along the way

Baby Arch, Sheep Rock, Unstable Rock, North/ South Windows, Tourette Arch Delicate Arch (desi walked to upper view point), Sand Arch, Sky Arch, and Tunnel Arch. The arches were just beautiful and with the partly cloudy day gave some amazing views and pictures. Everybody was a bit on edge, tired, very hot, and grumpy. So we had to keep all hikes short < 0.5 mi.  Desi lost his sun glasses, bad day for that it was quite windy and the sand in the wind was hard on the face and eyes. Caroline and Ellie were both ready to be done!

We left the park just before 6pm. We had some pool/hot tub time for all, made dinner with the last of the bread and hamburgers/hot dogs. We cleaned up the RV a bit. Everyone showered. Ellie not feeling 100% girls swapped top and bottom sleep arrangements for last night in case Ellie got sick.

Tomorrow the ride back to Denver and a hotel! 

We got started with a 7:30 am departure from the campsite. Desi and Caroline made their way from the campsite to the Visitor Center. We took the Orange line to Kaibob Trail and began our 1 mile hike down into the canyon. On the way down into the the canyon we met some workers who were hammering rocks, and chiseling rocks into shapes. We learned that workers make rock fill to fill in the holes caused by waiter and regular use and then cut the rocks into shapes to help continue to remake stairs. After about 30min nearly all downhill we made it to Ooh Ahh Point. There was construction going on right there so we didn’t event realize we were there. After some good pictures we turned around for the hike out of the canyon. The hike back up was a lot harder than the way down. Caroline decided to run up part of it and Desi followed when he could. We made the round trip in about 1 hour and 4 min, which was great! After the hike we went to Yaki point and Pipe Creek Vista. From the vista you could see the Oooh Aah point and where we hiked it in the featured picture to the left of Caroline and Desi. the 45 degree slope down and at the end of that is the ooh ahh point. After getting back to the visitor center we made our walk back to the trailer village to head out to MOAB.

We learned that while on the hike, Ellie slept in quite nicely. While Julie was sitting outside drinking her coffee she saw some Elk walking through the campground. Julie got video and photos of them. After Ellie woke up Julie and Ellie packed up the camper. Desi and Caroline arrived back around 10:30am. Desi and Julie finished packing up the RV and by 11am we were on the road to MOAB, UT.

We drove for an hour and stopped at Cameron Trading Post. There was a nice Navajo Restaurant where we had lunch. They had Navajo fry bread which was similar to fried bread in NE. Desi had hot roast beef with gravy over fry bread and it was really good. Julie had a taco salad, Ellie had a cheeseburger (she always likes a cheeseburger now) and Caroline had a club sandwich. We got some apple pie and pecan pie togo for dinner desert later.

The drive to MOAB was pretty un eventful but took us about 6 hours. We stopped at Wilson Arch and took some pictures along the way. We made it campground  around 7pm local time. There was enough time for Ellie to get in some pool time. It was a nice pool with a great view of the red rocks and the abandoned gondola. After the pool we had dinner, a game of munchkin, the pie dessert and then bed.

Tomorrow Hummer Tour of Slipper Rock, Arches, and settle in for last night of camping. Then on our way back to Denver.

Grand Canyon full day. We start with a horseback trail ride from apache stables. Riding 4 horses (rider), Brown Jug (Ellie), Raton (Caroline) , Beau (Julie), and Ben Kay (Desi). The highlight of the ride seemed to be around the bodily functions of the horses. Beau, ridden by Julie, often wanted to stop and take a pitstop. At one point all of the horses stopped and basically urinated in unison, never seen anything like it. We gently rode around for about an hour or so looking at the Kaibab forrest. We can honesty say there was not much to look at. This was the girls first horseback riding experience. Ellie liked the ride and Carrie’s response when asked if she liked it was “mmmm hmmmm”. 

After tipping our trail guide we made the short trip back to the visitor center, had lunch, and went to pick up our merch. We got some shirts and nice artwork.

After the merch we got on the blue line, to the end, to pickup the red line. There are 9 stops total on the way to Hermits Rest. We only skipped the Hopi. Each time we would get off the bus go and look over the canyon view, take some pictures, and then go wait back for the bus again. It took us about 4 hours to do the hole trip from end to end. We made it up to Hermits rest for a pit stop, some pictures, a snack, and some unique merch. To quell some young hearts, after we got back down from the red line we walked to Bright Angel Lodge for some Ice Cream with a View. After almost having a melt down everybody enjoyed some ice cream.

We then made out way back on the blue line to the visitor center, picked up the RV and headed back to trailer village. After simple dinner, we headed out for a night walk to Mather point for some star gazing. It was a clear black sky with very little moon light so we had some great star gazing, could see the milky way and it was just amazing.

Tomorrow we are going to divide and conquer. Desi and Caroline will take 1 mile hike down into the canyon while Ellie and Julie sleep in and pack up the site. 

Today we took our time getting up and getting going as we have a long drive from Hurricane, UT to Grand Canyon National Park in AZ. The drive was amazing, the views were inspiring and breath taking. We stopped several times for pictures at various points along the route. We made it the Park around 5pm and got our first real views of the Grand Canyon at the Dessert View point. We then made out way to the Trailer Village and setup camp for the night. 

We had a nice dinner of chicken stuffed with asparagus and then Desi went for a run. After he got back we decided to take an evening hike to Mather Point to watch the sunset. The walk wasn’t bad only about 20 min. On the way back we saw a tarantula!  That might give some nightmares. We then got back and setting in the for the night.

Tomorrow a horseback ride around the rim! Lets see wonders tomorrow holds.

Today we made our way to Springdale, UT to get into Zion Park. We found parking for Thor, the massive RV. We went to go catch a bus but they kept all being full so we took a walk to the entrance to the Park. From there we caught the shuttle to the Zion Lodge. The lodge was really nice with a green park and trees for shade where people were having picnics. 

We made our way across the street to start the hike up to the middle emerald pools. After a lot of long hikes, Ellie voiced her desire to be done hiking. Ellie bounced back and made her way with Julie to meet up with Carrie and Desi at the middle Emerald Pool. From there we hiked down to the lower Emerald pool. the water falls from the middle to lower pools were just awesome! After the lower pool we made out way back to the lodge for a nice lunch on the green.

After lunch we took the shuttle up to the temple of Sinawava. From there we did the river walk and made it to the end where people forge the river. We decided against it as the day was already long and we didn’t need to get wet.

We walked back and caught shuttle back to visitor center to pick up some merchandise. We went back into Springdale and had Pizza, Pasta, and Stromboli for dinner. After dinner we went back to the campground and prepared for a relaxing evening. Everyone was still hungry for more so we decided to make a 0.5 mile hike to the Dairy Queen down the street for some treats. What a day!

Today we are at the Barstow/Calico KOA right outside of Yerma, CA. We needed to get some laundry done, the girls wanted to get in some quality pool time, and we needed a rest day. The staff was really awesome at this campground. Desi spent sometime while doing laundry talking with the owner and Julie and the girls hung out at the pool. After getting rested, cleaned, and packed up we hit the road again for UT. 

We stopped at a crazy rest stop with about 50 Tesla charging points and had some DQ before hitting the road again. We made it to Hurricane, UT at the willow wind RV park around 7pm, in time for dinner. Everyone was pretty tired with the time change so we hit they hay. 

iOur last day of hookup free camping. I would say it was a pleasure cruise but that would be a like. Each night for the last 3 nights, we have shut off all power to the RV so the alarms didn’t go off and let the fridge and freezer slowly heat up.  Then when we get up in the AM run the generator and start things cooling back down. The electronics of the RV clearly not working!

We hit the road by 8:30 am for Mariposa to make sure we had parking. Normally there is a shuttle to take you up the hill and then you can hike around the giant sequoias, sadly due to some COVID those shuttles are running. We hike 2 miles up the top of hill and then we could hike around to see the amazing trees. We learned that back in January there were some 100 mph winds that nocked down over 25 giants and more than 1000 other trees shutting down parts of Mariposa. It was breath taking to see all the damage but at the same time pretty amazing seeing mother nature regenerating itself.

We saw the Giant Grizzly and the California Tunnel as well as many other sequoias. They really are amazing trees. We got had lunch a top the hill before making the trek back to the RV. 

We did some research last night and we found out that the place we are staying at the southern end of Sequoia national park has a shuttle but it’s shut down due to COVID. This means we can’t go see the national park easily because the road that takes us in we cant fit the RV. So since we saw some great trees today we decided to bail on our plans and head to Zion a little early. We went about 6 hours of the 10 hour trip and stopped for the night outside of Yermo, CA. Along the way we stopped in Fresno at a Walmart to stock up and then at Champs BBQ outside of Bakersfield, CA.

Tomorrow we make the trek to Zion National Park. Here we come!

We got up early and hiked to mirror lake. It was about 4 miles round trip and took us about 2 hours. Mirror lake turned out to be more like a puddle, but we had an amazing perspective of El Capitan from the back of half-dome. After we got back, we had lunch, packed up and headed for Yosemite Village. We did a little walking around, hiked to Yosemite Falls and then headed back to the RV to head to Glacier Point and Wawona. Yeah it was pretty crazy, 2 hikes in one day.

We got to the turnoff for Glacier point but the road had a 30ft vehicle length limit and we had to bail on that plan. We made it to Wawona and struggled to level the RV. After settling we got on bathing suits and went to the river for a swim. 

For dinner there were hamburgers, cheese burgers, salad, and steak then the bee’s came to try to steal some of our food. One of them wouldn’t fly away from Ellie’s plate. Finally she moved to Daddy’s spot and the bee went to Caroline. One bee actually flew away with some hamburger meat. We gave the rest of the steak to our neighbors. We started a campfire and that made them go away but it took a few minutes. Time for some smores, games and relaxation. Tomorrow is Mariposa Grove Park before heading to Sequoia National Park.

Today we went hiking. We did a nice hike up Vernal Falls. It was a pretty steep hike up nearly 1400ft. After a 2 mile hike there is still a very steep 650 step climb 0.3 miles to the top. Julie waited for the Desi and the girls at the bottom of the steps. It was just amazing at the top of the climb and we’re really proud of the girls for doing the climb with Desi. The view out over the falls was amazing. The climb down was hard on the joins but after a total of 7 miles and 4 hours we made it back to the campground just before it started pouring rain. After the rain settled down we had a nice tri-tip steak for dinner and then settled in for a few rounds of Munchkin. Overall and amazing day.

Tomorrow we leave the valley and head to Wawona campground in southern Yosemite.

This morning we got up and tried to make our way to Emerald bay. Sadly there was no parking for the RV and we drove there and had to make a U-turn to come back. After a few heated moments we decided to make a stop and look out over emerald bay. After some nice views we hit the road again for Yosemite. 

The drive was not too bad. We made a stop by Lake Mono for some pictures and then stopped in Walker, CA at Chick & Waffle for lunch, it was very very good!! 5 stars! After lunch we got back in just before the rain came and then entered Yosemite for the hour ride down into Yosemite Valley. Made a few stops along the way for pictures and made it to our campsite just before dinner. Desi had some stomach problems and sacked out early for the night. Julie made some chicken kabobs, corn, and salad. Julie and the girls took a walk, threw some rocks in the nearby river and then bedded down for the night. Tomorrow we will go nowhere and hike in the valley.