Capitol Reef

Ah, nature. Don’t you just love nature. Behold



I joined la Familia D in Capitol Reef Thursday eve. We had dinner, lounged around a bit, played with my new headlamp (I heart camping gear) and retired to our tents. I was sharing with Littlest Niece, so we read Mr Sneezy together before bed. (One day the Smithsonian will beg for her unmatched collection of Mr Men books).

I awoke to birds singing and leaves rustling, and felt at one with nature, free from schedules, bereft of limitations and constraints – well, until my brother told me to go and put a bra on.

After fortifying ourselves with bacon and egg sandwiches, and ritual moleskin and sunscreen application, we spent the day hiking. We walked through the streams, drank warm plastic-flavoured water, slid down waterfalls, swam, ate trail mix, and generally had a delightful day.

The kidlets had spray bottles for cooling purposes, and amused themselves by spraying every animal in sight. The deer actually took it very well. One lizard seemed a bit surprised, but we decided that it probably made the lizard’s day, and that he will probably remember that day as when the Miracle of the Cooling Spray occurred, and next year you will see thousands of lizards round the rock upon which it happened, with little lizard crutches and eye-patches, hoping for more lizard miracles.

[Please don’t email me if you’re a member of PETA and want to explain to me that the lizard was trying to get WARM on the rock and we RUINED its day. I kinda don’t care].



Nephew cooling off




Littlest Niece can climb all by herself.



Georgie Girl




More cooling



Rocks



Indian smoke-house



Sulphurous rocks



The Kingdom of Gondor.



The "Sheep Dip."


Georgie and Mikey

We got back to the campsite and were immediately hit by that floppy kind of tiredness that gets you after hiking, where all you want to do is sit around and eat your dutch oven dinner. We played rummy, and argued gently over how many coals should be on the dutch ovens, who needed to get up and light the citronella candles, and whose tent is the best.

Camping is worth it, if only to make you appreciate modern conveniences, like when you go home and wash off the squashed bugs and what you thought was a nice golden tan in a nice hot shower. (Littlest Niece was the only one who remembered toothpaste, otherwise we would all have been even more disgusting than usual). But camping holds additional blessings, including reminding me that this crazy kind of landscape is mere hours away…