Spring Break Moab First Part of Day 1

Since we don't live near our families we usually spend our vacation time traveling to see them. For Spring Break this year we decided to take a full family vacation. Aaron even had the week off. We wanted to go somewhere close so we decided on Moab Utah, only about 7 hours from us. I even found a hotel with 3 queen size beds for $76 a night! I usually have to get 2 rooms to fit our family, so we don't stay at hotels that often. I was excited because I have wanted to see Arches National Park.

We spent two days hiking around, about 6 hours each day. We hiked every trail and saw every arch that the map had listed. We all have water back packs so it makes hiking easy. The boys loved it because they are boys and they like to climb. The girly loved it because her daddy carried her almost every where. The weather was perfect. The first day was a little warm with 70 but the second day was cloudy with a small breeze. Not too hot and differently away from freezing temps.

This was the start of our first hike. Heading into see Landscape Arch and Double O. The Double O hike was around 4 miles round trip.

Landscape Arch
In 1981 while someone was taking a video of the arch, a section of the rock fell off. It broke off from the part that is the thinnest. There are warnings up that tell you to run if you hear cracking and popping.
A view of some of the formations along the way.
Along the hike you have to walk along some rock fins. This is just a great picture of Aaron and my oldest looking off the edge of the fin.

Double O Arch, not the best picture. One on the bottom and one one the top.
Us inside the bottom O.
N climbing around. He has no fear of heights.
C finding a way down. He has a small fear of heights that was tested the next day.
The Big D, our monkey, absolutely no fear. He was making an older gentleman a little nervous.
The Pres. making his way up a rock.

Daddy with his excellent skills of hiking and climbing with a hump on his back. He is was the best carrying and extra 30 pounds. He also deserves a metal for putting up with her talking in his ear all day long. She never stops talking or singing.
I am a sucker for a fabulous view of snow capped mountains. My absolute favorite thing to see in nature.
The girly trying to carry a bunch of rocks. We finally narrowed it down to one.

A side note: As we all know, boys have an easier time in nature when nature calls. Girls, not so easy. They were finding hiding spots and doing there business quite a bit. When you have a supply of water strapped to your back, it is easy to have to "go" a lot. The girly ended up wetting her pants because we didn't help her in time. One the way back down, we were talking about how much the boys where "going" and how she wet her pants. Aaron commented on how we went up the mountain and peed and came back down. The girly says, "Yep. And that's all we did." We just thought it was funny.

Second half of day one to come later. We took a lot of pictures.