Day 5-Hole in the Rock and Bonfire

We had a fantastic Wednesday; I think if I had to pick it was my favorite day of the trip, hence all the pictures. We woke up and played a lot of rounds of Nertz.

Allie hung here with Papa while we took over the floor for Nertz

We did a lot of playing outside. Allie and the girls were having a great time in the sand. I was laying out in the sun soaking up some rays

I was also busy keeping my eye out for these little guys that were everywhere; hoping one wouldn't come crawling across me on the rocks

The girls were having fun playing kitchen. They enjoyed mixing water with the sand to make a muddy mixture so they could in turn make their food

The cookies are baking in the oven

Later in the afternoon we went to hike Hole-In-The-Rock. It is a 1 mile round trip hike on a rocky path that leads up to a narrow crack in the canyon wall

Blake climbing with Allie on his back. A little tricky at times but they succeeded

All of the kids at the top . Once you make it through the crack in the wall it is just wide open space all around

We decided to let Allie do a little rock climbing on the way back down. She just loved it and made it a majority of the way back down. I think it made easy for the little kids because they were so close to the rocks and just held on with their hands.

The little troopers, Allie and Cam

One family shot to say we all made it

Later that night we decided to make use of our fire pit and all of our cardboard in the trash. We were anxiously awaiting the boys to come and help us, but they were busy organizing the toys and repositioning the anchors on the boat. We girls couldn't wait any longer so Grandma Julia started up the fire

We got out the roasting sticks and made us some s'mores

Allie enjoying her chocolate treat

I ended up managing this fire for the remainder of the night. I'm glad that it stayed contained because every time I would through card board on top it would go crazy and ashes would start flying every where

To top the night off, all the girls took off down our canyon for a little skinny dipping.

Day 4-Exploring and Tubing

Well we woke up to a few visitors. Luckily they were dead. The boys were into catching things on this trip, the fish, and now the mice. They laid out a few mice traps the previous evening and this is what we got to see in the morning.

Really disgusting if you ask me. There were two total dead mice this morning

We headed out for a late morning ride on the jet ski. We went all over this morning and were gone so long that Allie fell asleep on the jet ski

Katie packed along her Jillian Michael's work out DVD. We all got a kick butt work-out a few of the mornings

We had a lot of fun playing tons of games. Nertz was the all-popular favorite once again, with Speed coming in second. I am not sure what these guys were all playing but I thought it made a great picture

Allie and I did some tubing in the small round tube. She just loved this and didn't want to stop. I finally was the one who called the shots to cut it

This was shortly after Blake found Allie scaling up the wall. I had taken Allie back to try and retrace her steps, but we were unsuccessful

A night watching one of the final basketball games. Cam had grabbed a sleeping bag and curled up on the floor to watch the game with the boys. To cute!

Day 3-Indian Ruins

Well we woke up to a beautiful morning and the water was glass. What better to do than head out on the jet skis. The Given's joined us on the other jet ski and we took off exploring. Luckily for the kids, we found a frog at the end of our ride.

The canyon we explored was so narrow, the sides were so high, and the sun was just coming through. It was beautiful!

Here is the frog before we took him back with us. He was an interesting frog. He appeared white on the rocks and then when we picked him up he changed colors. The kids thought this was so cool.

Getting ready for a dip in the water

And we had success. Allie and I had a fun time swimming around. She loved using her floaties out where she couldn't touch. I am glad Allie enjoyed the water with me because our dad is a party pooper when it comes to swimming

Lovn' It!

We brought the frog back to the boat to show everyone our encounter. We let him hang around in the bucket and swimming pool for awhile before we returned him. Allie enjoyed letting the frog hang out on her floaty

Later that day we headed up to the Indian Ruins. These are quite impressive. You have to think back to how in the world these Indians lived so high up in the rock. I'm glad things have changed

The kids discovered how to make their own slides out of the chairs. They got quite creative and enjoyed this the entire week

Getting ready for Movie Night. Steve never fails in bringing his giant screen that we put on top of the boat. We wait until dusk, pop up some popcorn, sit back and enjoy!

Day 2-Hanging Out

We had a nice relaxing day getting things more organized, blowing up the water toys, setting up satellite TV, and hanging out

The posse for the week

We got the pool inflated and filled up with water. The kids enjoyed spending many hours on top of the boat playing in the pool while the adults were laying out soaking up some rays

The boys got all of the water toys blown up too. Allie just couldn't pass up the opportunity to climb right on top of one of the giant tubes

What kind of vacation is this....setting up satellite??? The boys just had to set it up so they could watch the Basketball games that were going on

The fishing spear brought so much entertainment for the boys. They spent hours in the mornings and in the evenings trying to lour the fish in with our dinner leftovers. I think Rod ended up getting the closest to catching a fish...he caught a few scales off of one

We decided to see how many people we could fit in the raft. We probably could have squeezed in a few more, because we didn't even sink. Unfortunately the raft got a hole in it, so we never got to use it again

The boys and their spear fishing caught on to the little kids. They had their buckets in hand trying to scoop up the fish that evening

Cousin Payton's bumbo chair brought so much entertainment to these two. I just love the look on Cam's face here; I only wish I knew how to take better pictures in the dark

Oh the things the kids were able to entertain themselves with. One thing these two grew fond of doing was jumping onto the air mattress got blown up each night.

Day 1-Departure and Docking in Escalante

We arrived down in Lake Powell on Friday evening and stayed the night in Defiance Lodge at Bullfrog Marina. In the morning after we waited around for the boat to get fixed, we got loaded on. We immediatly headed South to find a spot up the Escalante River.

We immediatly got organized aboard the boat and busted out the water toys for the kids to keep them entertained on the ride

Everyone enjoying the ride down. Allie got introduced to her new best friend for the trip...her life jacket.

The dad's hopped onto the jet ski's and took off ahead of the boat to find a great spot for us to dock. I'd say they did a fabulous job! This was the first year we had a spot to run around on land....great work

Allie sure loved the fact that she could scale some walls while we were here. One of the days she was out playing with the little girls when they came running back to the boat telling us that Allie was stuck. We're not quite sure how she got up the 15 feet wall she was on, but she couldn't get back down. Daddy helped rescue her down

The family taking am evening jet ski ride

This is a view from the back of our canyon as the sun was setting. We were able to get a spot in a little canyon all to ourselves.

Farwell

We just wanted to say Farwell.  We are going on a 10 day trip with the Hansen Family to Lake Powell.   I can't believe that it's been 2 years since we last went.  It also marks our 2 year anniversary to the blog.   Hope to bring back lots of fun pictures.

Allie received her first Cornrows today.  Thanks Tarah for Allie's cute hair and for putting up with the struggle to braid her hair.  She has gotten tons of compliments as we have been running around grabbing last minute items.