Vacation, part 2, in which we go hiking!



In this telling, I skipped our landing and initial drive through Lost Wages, err, Las Vegas, the drive to St. George, and the rental car to get to the important stuff. When we arrived in St. George, we couldn't get into our rented condo. The info all seemed good, but the combination wouldn't work on the door. So we found a phone and called the rental guy, who said, "Oh, didn't you get the e-mail? That condo wasn't available this week, so we moved you."



Turns out the move was an upgrade from a basement (2 br, 1 bath) condo to a 2nd floor (2 br, 2 bath) condo in a different section of the resort... with a balcony with a beautiful view of St. George (maybe I'll find a picture for a later blog entry).

So anyway, on Wednesday morning, we headed to Zion National Park, where the whole gang of us set out on the Emerald Pools trail. At first, we teased Tara's mom ("Nanny" to Jonathan) about her Chicago feet going up the trail, but she did well and even seemed to enjoy herself.

The next picture is a nice family picture. Note the borrowed backpack in which Andy gets to lounge for the duration of the hike (except when I let him explore on foot at the upper pool). And note the new Camelbaks worn by Tara (loving the women-specific Helena) and Jonathan (the mini-Mule he's wearing is supposed to be for kids 5 and up, but it fit him well and he loved it) as well as our family-matching Keen sandals (unfortunately, Andrew's fat little feet won't fit in those of his size, so he got different shoes).

Jonathan loved hiking maybe even more than he did when we went last year when we were in SW Ohio at the Hocking Hills. He especially liked playing in the water.

This next picture is pretty representative of the scenery we saw all week.

After the 3+ mile hike was over, the intrepid hikers got to enjoy some ice cream at the lodge. Jonathan hiked the entire way without complaining - and he still had energy left by the time we made it down.

The first full day in Utah was quite a success!