Goblin Valley

Woo-ee. There are a LOT of pictures in this one. I probably should have done this in a couple parts, but I didn't. It's pictures combined from my mom and dad and me. So they aren't all in perfect order. But there's some winners and despite some challenges, this was a great vacation and I want to remember all the moments (I didn't really take any pics or videos of the VERY frequent Lottie meltdowns and Harvey's whining).

Anyway...I'm getting ahead of myself. Tanner planned to go to the US Open this year and since I needed to be off with the kids anyway, I thought it would be fun to do a little camping trip. I thought Goblin Valley would be cool, since it had been a while since we had been there and I thought the kids would like it. And since most of the mountainy stuff by us would be too snowy the middle of June. But then I started stressing it was going to be way too hot. It was hot, but not nearly as bad as I was thinking it would be. It was very tolerable. The annoying thing was the millions of biting gnats. NOT cool. 

Again...getting ahead of myself. We left early Thursday morning. We drove down from Layton and had breakfast with my parents and then finished loading up the truck. We all rode down in one car which was great. The kids actually did really good in the car. We had some movies going on so that was nice. We stopped in Green River for Subway and then took it to a park to stretch the legs and have a little break. It was TOASTY. 

We made it to camp. We had two sits kitty corner from each other. We set up most of our stuff at our campsite which was conveniently located to water and bathrooms :) The campground was REALLY pretty. Not a lot of trees, obviously, but the rocks were amazing. They had covers over the table for some shade which was nice. There was a cool little rock section that Harvey dubbed the "climbing station" and wanted to go over there almost constantly when we were in camp. 

This is the climbing station. I tried to get Lottie up there but she was having one of her many moments and wasn't gonna do it.

This picture makes me so happy!

After we got camp all set up, hung out and ate dinner, we drove over to Goblin Valley to explore. This part was one of my favorite memories. Everything was good. The bugs didn't seem too bad, it was cool, the kids were happy and LOVED running around and playing in the dirt and picking up rocks and climbing on the rocks and finding the cave and playing hide and go seek. Just thinking about it now fills me with joy :) haha. But really. It was a perfect evening.

These stairs are right at the beginning. From about the first step Lottie started picking up rocks. And as soon as she picked one up she found another one she wanted. It was SO funny. She kept trying to fit them all in one hand and pick up more and hold my hand. This is kind of her thing. Not very efficient but super cute :)

These pictures aren't perfectly in order, but they are all part of the glory...

I'll point out that this picture makes me smile too!

Handing me all the rocks.

 

She kept going back and forth sitting on each of these rocks saying cheese.

You can kind of see Harvey sitting on one of the rocks throwing some rocks.

Greta ran ahead with my mom as we were walking out and my mom told me she kept stopping and posing by the rocks and asking my mom to take pictures of her. This one is about the cutest ever.

The next morning we woke up and had breakfast and packed some lunches and made our way over to the Little Wild Horse trail head, which was like 10 minutes from our campsite. (Side note about the night - Lottie was AWFUL and screamed her head off for two hrs. Didn't want to be in the pack and play, but when I took her out she just goofed off. It took forever for her to go to sleep. It sucked. But when we woke up, Greta spontaneously said how much fun the day with Gram and Pop was, which was really cute!)
The hike was toasty and the gnats were really bad when you stopped moving, but overall it was a fun day. The kids loved climbing on all the rocks and were so proud of themselves whenever they did an obstacle or got up high on something. We stopped A LOT in the first couple of hours, to climb on EVERYTHING and pick up ALL the rocks. Greta kept saying how much fun it was and how she loved hiking. But it was kind of a long hike and it took us like 3+ hours to get to where we stopped. I was so nervous about getting back out because they were basically all DONE. Luckily Lottie actually fell asleep in the carrier and my dad booked it out with her. She was hard. Didn't really like being carried but obviously not a fast hiker. Harvey and Greta were also done and just wanted to be carried and they were heavy. So my mom and I kind of took turns with them walking and on our backs etc and we made much quicker time but it was hard and we were all very tired by the end. I think we ended up hiking 5.5 miles. They walked at least 4 of them I'm sure.

This picture kind of makes me laugh because I have a pack with no kid and two packs that should be carried by kids.

We took a little break and hung out in the tent for a bit to have a break from the bugs. It wasn't as sweltering as I thought it would be. We played a few games.

That night I was going to shower all the kids. But ended up only doing Lottie. It started raining and so I put her in the tent to just let her play while I ran and showered. Then it started POURING. Didn't close all the windows...oops. But when we came back in this is how she was. She transferred nicely which was GLORIOUS and we all went to bed pretty early.

Looks like a steam engine, I think.

The next morning after breakfast we thought we'd try to go back to Goblin before taking down camp. It wasn't nearly as fun as the time before. Kids were way too whiny. Well, at least Harvey and Lottie. We tried to play some hide and seek but didn't stay that long.

Lottie didn't want to get out of the car seat when we got back so we left her in there while we took down camp and she fell asleep like that.

We stopped in Price at this yummy shake and burger place. Then headed the rest of the way home. It was so fun to have my parents with us and I'm glad we went. Harvey asked the next day when we could go back. I love the age of these kids but it will be so fun when they can do a little more hiking and don't need naps so desperately still :)