Zion

This microwaveless, dishwasherless, butt-ugly kitchen served us well for a little over a year, but it was in serious need of a makeover… and a microwave… and a dishwasher…

Here it is! The new kitchen (some assembly required).

But first, some dis-assembly. Well, we really didn’t plan on taking it down to the studs, but you know how those things go. You can see the improvement already, can’t you?

We just fell in love with the bunny suits; form-flattering and oh so stylish. Pat went with the frameless safety glasses and rust orange work gloves. Nice accessorizing, Sweetie! We are actually making faces at the camera, by the way.

Tah-dah! It took us a couple of months, but well worth the effort. We absolutely LOVE how much more functional the kitchen is and have been cooking fools. The garden was super-prolific this summer giving us an abundance of veggies to cook and freeze. We must have made 3 gallons of salsa verde with the green tomatoes stranded on the vines at the first frost.

Ok, the house is all put back together. Let’s get outta here! A plan was hatched at some point during the summer to take a 5 week roadtrip with our friends Jan and Rich from s/v Slipaway. Our poor little Subaru had no idea what she was in for. I think she started getting suspicious when we put a hat (aka: cargo carrier) on her and named her ‘Butch’.

We left AZ on Labor Day and spent a couple of days in Zion National Park before heading up to Salt Lake City to pick up Jan and Rich.

Butch and crew arrived in Zion without incident. We fought a bit with the tent to get it set up, but by the end of the roadtrip, we were much more proficient!

With camp set up and a libation on board, we took a little walk to take in the nearby sights and snap a few photos.

The rock formations reminded us a bit of Sedona though not as red.

Pat “Ansel” Kinnison taking his new tripod for its first outing.

Wow…. just, wow….

When we got back to camp there was a visitor waiting for us to start happy hour. The deer in the park had no fear of us campers and grazed on the vegetation right in our campsite.

Ahh, happy hour with a view!

Early the next morning we discover that the Coleman stove, a recent Craig’s List purchase, refuses to make coffee when the fuel tank is too cold. Not ideal. You’ve met Pat. You know what I mean. Fortunately we brought our trusty MSR Firefly backpacking stove. Coffee was made and dutifully poured into Pat. We were free to go tour the park!

First stop, Court of the Patriarchs. What a photographic sight! Pat took many, many photos. This one, three actually, is post-processed with a technique called HDR. Pretty neat, huh?

The bus system in the park was great. During the high season, private vehicles are not permitted up the canyon. Buses run at regular intervals up and down the canyon and you are free to hop on and hop off as you please. No parking hassles and neither of us was driving so we both got to look around.

The deer weren’t the only animals not afraid of humans. I am pretty sure the squirrels have been fed from the hand before.

Hey! How did this picture get in here?

The hike up to the Narrows is a paved super-highway up to the point where you have to wade in the creek. You don’t have to go far to notice the walls of the canyon closing in on the trail.

Here we see prepared hikers with shoes for the water and walking sticks heading up into the Narrows. We elected to keep our ill-prepared feet dry and waved at them as they snickered at our footwear.

Here is a look back downstream. It was just us and a squirrel on the beach. Everyone else was hiking in the creek, having a really great time…

Even though it was Labor Day weekend, it seemed like we had parts of the park to ourselves. We jumped off the bus at one stop and walked a mile or two to the next stop. We ran into nobody!

What a nice park!

Back at camp we were happy to find that the Coleman Stove had warmed up and decided to play nice in the preparation of dinner.

We had a few hours in the morning before we had to head up to Salt Lake City to collect our friends from the airport. We jumped on the bus to catch some early morning light. This is the Towers of the Virgin.

A little more morning light.

Pat went to recycle his coffee before we left for Salt Lake City and ran into this guy. Ewwwww! That was close! We made sure fuzzy legs here didn’t hitch a ride with Butch as we peeled out and headed north to hook up with our friends.
Next up: The Grand Tetons