Goblin Valley and Capital Reef National Park

Over the last month, the kids have been learning a lot of fun things in school. Mason did his 4th grade County Report on Wayne County, and Max has been learning about sedimentary, igneous, and metamorphic rocks in Kindergarten. We thought it would be a fun idea to take a quick trip to southern Utah to explore rocks and see Wayne County. We left Friday after school and came back Sunday night. It was a great time. The weather was perfect--about 60 degrees with a little breeze, so when we were hiking we were warm but not too hot.
Because I thought camping would be awful with an 18-month-old (and I hate sleeping with lizards), we stayed in a hotel. Turns out a hotel room with an 18-month old isn't so great either. We reserved a "family suite" which was really just one huge room with 2 king beds, a pull-out couch, and a crib. McKay screamed when we put him in the crib, but when we tried to have him sleep with us he thought it was a party and would just go from bed to bed kissing and hugging his brothers to wake them up. A funny thing about the hotel--when we walked into the lobby, Mason and Myles both said "oh yeah, I remember this place." We have never been to Torrey, Utah and we thought there was no way they had been there. We told them that a lot of hotels look the same but they were so insistent that they had been there, so we gave up trying to convince them that they were wrong. Well, it turns out that a few different times their grandma and grandpa Delta took them fishing near there and they stayed at that same hotel! They have quite the life. 
The kids were pretty excited to see Goblin Valley. On the way there we watched the movie Galaxy Quest, which was filmed in Goblin Valley (as space). The kids were excited to see the "sand monsters."

Little McKay has no idea that he is not the same size and age as his big brothers. While they were crawling on 20 foot rocks, McKay would find his own rocks, climb on them, and then say "cheese!"

McKay only lasted walking a little while before we put him kicking and screaming into the backpack so we could move a little faster. 

This isn;t as dangerous as it looks. The cliffs were all soft rock/sand and the kids loved climbing them. 

It is hard to see in this picture, but Mason is up there at the top of the cliff in the middle of the two peaks. 

After our first hike, I took the Max and McKay back to the car  to have a nap while the older boys and Marshall went on another guided hike with a park interpreter. Max got a little bored when McKay slept longer than him and got out to play. 

I only carried the backpack with Baby Cakes for a little while but sheesh he is getting big. But he was having so much fun and would laugh so hard whenever I complained about how heavy he was. 

A nice guy along the trail  to the arch in Capital Reef National Park offered to take a picture of all of us. McKay is peaking out through the backpack. 

Another picture of the kids climbing. I would say that in Capital Reef the average age of people was 65 years old. Whenever we would pass older people on the trail (or they would pass us) and the kids were climbing around, they would get so worried that the kids would get hurt. The kids really weren't taking any risks and we were watching them closely, so it started to get annoying. Also, EVERYONE we passed would scan our family and then exclaim "God Bless You" or to me "I'm so sorry!" It is funny that we never get those comments in Utah Valley but anywhere else we go, people can't believe our family. 

Another picture of Goblin Valley

More of the kids climbing. 

Myles and Mason were the best of friends on this trip. 



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