On Friday, September 4th, after the kids were home from school we jumped in the car and headed for the airport to pick up Charles. He was flying in from Seattle and his plane arrived an hour late. By then rush hour traffic had set in and we got right in the middle of it. Charles was little tired from his trip and really just wanted to be home relaxing, but I talked him in to driving down to Bryce Canyon instead. We stopped at Culvers for dinner and slowly inched our way south. It was a pretty rough drive but we made it, and the hotel was really nice so that helped. Everyone was much happier after a good night's rest. Doug had reserved rooms for all of us at Ruby's Inn, and Matt's family joined us. On Saturday we got up, had a nice breakfast at the hotel, and headed into the park. I am going to let our pictures tell the story of Saturday, and there are plenty of them. I just couldn't leave any out! We hiked the entire day and we saw so many amazing things. We stopped for a picnic lunch and then we were right back to hiking and sight seeing.
We started the day with the Navajo Loop trail. This trail takes you down the rim from Sunset Point, then you hike through some little slot canyons called Wall Street. You hike along the bottom for a bit and then it's straight up a bunch of switchbacks at the end. The view was absolutely incredible.
This tunnel was awesome.
 |
| The window. |
 |
| I love this lady sitting on the log with Caleb. |
These next pictures are of the switchbacks out of the canyon.
 |
| This lady asked us to take a picture with her camera. I thought she was asking us to take one her, and then she grabbed my kids and pulled them into the picture with her. Uh. |
We found this arch at a little pull off, we didn't even have to hike in. Super cool.
We braved another hike at the end of the day for this view. Everyone was pretty tired but it was worth it.
We hiked until we could hike no more, and then we went back to the hotel. Our hotel was by this little outlaw town so we went for a little walk to check out the shops.
After a quick dinner we headed to the pool.
Needless to say, everyone slept well that night! We had such a nice time seeing Bryce Canyon. I would love to go back and spend some more time there.
Sunday was Charles' birthday! We got up and had breakfast at the hotel, and then packed up and headed to Richfield. On the way we passed through Panquitch which is where Charles was born, on that very day just 38 years ago! I've never actually been there!
When we got to the Balch's house Joe had arrived, and we all went to church. Caleb had fun playing with Taylor while he should have been listening.
After church Sarah came over and we had a big family dinner with everyone to celebrate Charles, Joe, and Doug's birthdays. It was so nice to spend time with everyone! Charles' parents gave him a pretty cool coin.
After dinner we headed home to Heber. Charles was anxious to be home in his own house, as he had been gone for 2 weeks. We celebrated his birthday on Monday, Labor Day. We went to Provo to do some shopping and went to a movie. That night we had dinner and cake. Charles' got his birthday gift before PCBS, a new iPad, and we gave him a few little things while we were in Bryce so there was no present opening that night. We sure love this guy and we are happy he is ours.
