DESERT ROADS

When we officially decided to drive to New Mexico to visit John and Valerie over spring break I knew that I wanted to pick a little adventure for us on the way. You would think that would be easy to figure out, but it was actually kind of hard. There is so much to see and the timing of our trip made a few of my top ideas not feasible. Then I realized we could drive a little bit out of the way and enjoy a day at Goblin Valley, which is a place I've always wanted to visit. It seemed like a good option for Vivi too. So I set off figuring out which dumpy hotels to book (those are your options around those parts, only dumpy hotels) which took forever, but I got them all booked and off we went on Thursday March 29th.

My game plan was to leave around 5 pm and arrive at our hotel with time for the kiddos to swim and us to get a good night sleep. Well, I forgot about traffic. So we ate in Provo and then after driving about 20 minutes from the restaurant, Brent realized he had left his laptop behind, so we had to go back. So when it was 8 pm we were only in PROVO. I was more than tempted to just drive home and get up early in the morning and save money on our hotel, but we just headed to our first stop in Green River. I was delighted to see the adorable sign that welcomed us.

In the room, Stella feel asleep right away, but Vivi would not go to bed until Brent and I went to sleep. I think I told her to go to sleep about 50 times. She would lay down and then in seconds she would pop right up. I also had to share any food I ate with her. Finally we all turned off the lights and got some rest before our big adventure.

We got up and had breakfast and then headed to Goblin Valley. It was probably about an hour drive, but it didn't feel too long. Goblin Valley is pretty cool. They claim they have trails, but there really isn't. You just kind of wander around and climb on all of the rocks. Stella LOVED it. She loves to climb on rocks. Vivi liked it too. I made the bad choice to bring a bunch of water and food that we really didn't need so that was annoying to carry around. If we ever go back I'll know better. Vivi loved it too, but was frustrated she couldn't climb as much as Stella, she was so proud when she finally climbed a small goblin.

It was fun and cool and we spent about two hours exploring the area. It was an absolutely perfect day to be there. It wasn't too hot, but the sun kept us just warm enough. It was great. I feel like there was much more to see that we didn't get a chance to see, but for having little Vivi with us, we did a lot.

Vivi started putting her finger on her mouth and saying: "hmmmm" when I would ask her which way next. She'd say: "dat one, OR dat one." It was so cute. And Stella astounded me with her climbing. I would turn away and then one second later she would be on top of a huge rock!

After our morning of exploring, we got out the cooler and had lunch. It was simple peanut butter sandwiches, but it worked. Soon we were headed on the road again. We were headed toward the north part of Lake Powell. I have never been to Lake Powell before, which everyone finds hard to believe. Before we got there, we were just driving along and then BAM we were driving through the most beautiful sharp red rock I have ever seen. It was stunning. I couldn't believe it wasn't crazy with people because it was so pretty. We maybe only passed two other cars while driving through it. When we got to a viewpoint of the lake we stopped and took a few pictures of the view. Now I've seen Lake Powell...sort of...

The rest of our drive to Blanding, Utah was actually really pretty. We saw some animals and we had a good drive. We got to Blanding and the hotel we were staying at didn't have a pool. We had a choice of three different restaurants. As in the town only had three restaurants. I made the final call of which one to got to and I chose wrong. Lesson learned folks, always trust the Google reviews.

The next morning we had a decent breakfast and started on the road to Albuquerque. Brent had General Conference streaming on on our drive. The service went in and out, but it helped the time pass. We stopped while we were in Shiprock, New Mexico after driving through nowhere for awhile. And this time we trusted the Google reviews and ate at the Chat an Chew. It is a cash only establishment. I wouldn't say that they are very friendly at the Chat an Chew, but the food was pretty good and the building was spectacular. So in order to honor this decision. I took a lot of pictures. We even ended our lunch with a big pile of ice cream.

So that was our road trip adventure part one. We made it to New Mexico at around 3:00 I think. We checked into our hotel and we went over to John and Valerie's and hung out and ordered pizza. Our hotel felt like the Ritz after staying at the two dumpy places on our road trip, and I was thrilled to tuck in and go to sleep. What I didn't know is that I would be woken up a few hours later...To Be Continued....