Fall Break 2014: Part I

Here in Utah (and some other states) schools get a fall break mid October.  It coincides with the deer hunt kicking off, but you know, if you're not into that sort of thing camping is a great alternative!  We decided to head south to St. George for a few days of camping.  Now this is a big gamble if you don't have reservations already booked in a campground...pretty much EVERYTHING is taken during this long weekend.  But we decided to take our chances and go for it anyway and just hope we found something.

 Road trip!

 And sure enough, when we got there everything was still booked, campgrounds full.  We drove around checking several and found nothing.  Then our last stop (before throwing in the towel and checking into a hotel) we found some primitive camping available in Sand Hollow.  And when I say primitive, we had to pack in our own water, but they did provide a porta-pot thankfully.  Now those out of the know, Sand Hollow is right beside a reservoir and is a prime area for dune buggies, quads and motor bikes.  Not really my cup of tea.  But luckily we found a little spot far away from all the ruckus...and it was actually quite nice!  We thanked our lucky stars and step up camp.

 S'mores...the epitome of camping...seriously.

The weather was perfect, upper 70's-low 80's.  We decided to do a little hiking the next day, and when I say little I mean LITTLE.  Piper is NOT a hiker unfortunately, and she pretty much whines the entire time. But you all know that by now, I think I've mentioned it a million times.

 We hiked down to this dry river bed and the girls found tons of really cool sandstone rocks.  I'm guessing the water created all the cool designs on them.

 They piled all their favorites into one area so I could take a picture of them.

So our second night at this camp spot did not go as well.  We got some new neighbors that owned about 5 quads...now this I have no problem with...it's when they zoom past our camp literally 5 feet away from my children that I don't like!  But you know, I'm the odd one out at this campground...I'm on their turf in a way.

 But luckily, we didn't get back to our spot until the evening so it was dark soon enough and they quit for the day and the evening was quite nice...until...about 9:30.  Our lovely neighbors decided this would be a great time to start playing their mariachi music at an ungodly volume.  Really?!

So yeah, I laid awake for a couple of hours, until I finally dozed off.  I have no idea when they actually turned it off.  It was awful.  I will be very happy if I never hear mariachi music again for the rest of my life.

Since it was Sunday we decided to pack up camp and head to Snow Canyon State Park, we figured people may be leaving the campground and there might be some vacancies.  And if not, we were prepared to just spend the day there and just drive home after.

Morgan was super sad to leave our spot...it was nice to have so much open space for the girls to roam.  Every morning they would wander around and find all the new tracks the animals left from the night before.  Lots of quail, rabbit and lizard tracks.

But she perked up when we got to Snow Canyon and found out we did indeed get a spot to camp!!  Yay!
Part II tomorrow...hopefully.