ROAD TRIP!
Daddy had an opportunity to take two weeks of leave, so we decided to hit the road and head to Colorado! We spent a week at Spring Canyon, an OCF camp in the Rockies, with several days of traveling on either side. Once again the entourage proved themselves stellar travelers.

Happy travelers showing off their Navajo  hair accessories!
(This didn't happen til the way home,
but it's the cutest picture of them in the car.)

En route they occupied themselves with the usual road trip forms of entertainment: playing with figures, drawing with Magnadoodles and the Etch-a-sketch, reading books (particularly fun now that Monkey and Bug can actually read books with confidence), watching Little Pim Spanish videos and a few movies (Lion King, The Incredibles, The Princess Bride, Star Wars), and coloring. Of course, a lot of entertainment can be found simply looking out the window: We went from a coastal area to the mountains around Tahoe, through flat desert and mountainous desert, to the Rockies of Colorado and back again. So many things to see! Solar farms, wind farms, regular farms, vineyards, orchards, ranches, oil derriks, trucks, trains, Army convoys, fun-shaped clouds, different kinds of buildings, rivers, lakes, and waterfalls. The list could go on and on! And obviously, with this crowd all these things had to be discussed in detail as we went. On the way home, I also pulled out a list of "100 questions to ask your spouse" that I printed off of a blog somewhere to occupy Daddy and I. It didn't take too long for the girls to realize what we were doing, and they wanted in on the action too. We managed to spend several hours discussing favorite this or that and "what if you could . . . " kinds of questions.

(L) You can see the salt flat past the parking lot.
(R) Up to their knees in the Great Salt Lake!

(L) Look! It's Balancing Rock!
(R) You can see Delicate Arch in the distance.

On the way to Spring Canyon, we first did an overnight in Reno, NV. We didn't actually do anything touristy there, but we did get to visit a college buddy and his wife and two kids. Next stop, the Bonneville Salt Flats (really unbelievably flat and white; this is where the land speed records are set) and Great Salt Lake (we toured the small visitor center to learn the history and current stats, then went wading into the lake itself). Our final stop was Arches National Park where we drove through some truly amazing rock formations and completed a short hike to see Delicate Arch.

We eventually reached Spring Canyon itself, and the girls had a blast with the kids' camp activities (a combination of VBS and nature camp) during the times the adult sessions were going on. They went on nature walks and collected items for crafts, learned Bible stories and did a few crafts related to those, went canoeing and fishing in the pond, had a bonfire and made s'mores, and played in Critter Gulch (an awesome western-themed pretend-play space) and at a couple of playgrounds (complete with a climbing wall--highly popular).

(Clockwise from top left) The girls navigated a canoe without a grown up paddling! (It's a tiny pond, and Daddy was out there in a kayak.) Monkey taking a quiet moment by the pond. Goose loves the climbing wall! The girls enjoyed HUGE slices of watermelon after a cookout. Monkey and Bug are intrigued by watching their teacher gut the fish they caught (The camp cook fried up the trout and served them to the girls for dinner--they were so excited!)

We had the afternoons to do with as we wished as a family: We headed to the nearest town to poke around the historic downtown area (and mostly to get laundry done). We visited the Mt. Princeton Hot Springs (the family-friendly section was really just a big swimming pool; the girls loved it, but we realized it was probably more of a novelty for locals since the only way to comfortably go swimming at that altitude is to get in a hot spring). We hiked a piece of the Continental Divide; we attempted to get all the way up on the ridge, but kept running into impassable snow banks (!!!) despite trying three different trails. We also spent an afternoon hanging around the camp practicing with the air rifle and archery and canoeing.

Hiking the Continental Divide! This was the one passable snowbank; we really couldn't get through the others. We finally found a small peak we could get to the top of, but poor Monkey was suffering from a cold that day, so Daddy offered to carry her up (she was miserable but wanted to keep going so badly, she never complained once!)

They've gotten a lot stronger since the last time they pulled out their bow! Monkey also got several arrows in the target, but wasn't up for having her picture taken.

Spring Canyon's schedule gave us one free day, so we got in the car again and made the relatively short drive up to Colorado Springs, CO. First, we drove to the very top of Pike's Peak! Only one little girl freaked out a bit about the winding road up the mountain. Fortunately, Monkey was sitting in the middle, so she could pull her knees to her chest, cover her eyes, and pretend we were just on a regular road. Everybody enjoyed the views from the top though! Perhaps the highlight of that adventure was getting to see all the race cars on hand for the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb. The race happened later in the week, but the cars had been practicing before the tourist arrived. We got to see the cool race cars going back down the mountain as we headed up. Next we headed for the

Garden of the Gods, where we got to see more amazing rock formations, watch a teenage girl climb the face of one of them (our three little girls are now looking forward to being big enough to do that!), and of course doing a bit of scrambling around on the rocks themselves. Before heading back to camp, we stopped in at the Air Force Academy, where we did a quick tour of the visitor's center, viewed a Boeing B-52 on display, and

did a walk through of the Chapel (a really amazing building--Bug in particular was very excited about getting to go into "the spiky building").

Yep, this happened.

When our week at Spring Canyon was done, we decided to spend a couple of days in Durango, CO, before heading home. On the way there, we discovered Treasure Falls, a beautiful waterfall you can see from the highway. We decided to stop and do the 1/2 mile hike to get to the best viewing spot. From Durango we spent one day exploring Silverton, an old mining town. We wandered around the historic downtown, then headed out of town on a gravel road to take a tour of an actual gold mine that was in operation until the 1970s. We arrived at the mine, unloaded the girls, and discovered a punctured tire so bad I could actually hear the air rapidly escaping the tire. Fortunately, we made it back down the mountain and across town to the gas station before it completely deflated. The girls then spent a good part of the morning picking dandelions and watching Daddy change a tire. We decided to eat lunch at a local saloon, then explore our options for not driving our car back up that gravel road. What we found was a local shuttle service: we piled into a beat up suburban driven by a 60-something weathered Coloradan (complete with cowboy hat, ponytail, and wiry goatee) who gave us the insiders tour of Silverton (including waving to the Sheriff while she grilled in her backyard and seeing the remnants of a number of abandoned mills). He got us safely to our tour of the Old Hundred Gold Mine, where we (properly suited up in jackets and miner's helmets) descended into the mountain in a tram, then did a walking tour to learn about the conditions, methods, and machinery involved in gold mining over the last hundred years.

(L to R) Our little miners are all suited up and ready to get into the tram and down the Old Hundred Mine. After the tour we panned for gold (that's our local guide on the right).

The next day we explored Mesa Verde--the 700-year-old cliff dwellings of the Pueblo peoples. We opted for the most adventurous guided tour and got to explore the Balcony House, including climbing a 32-foot wooden ladder (along with some shorter ones, all of which the girls loved), scrambling up hand and foot holds cut into the rock, and squeezing through narrow tunnels in and out of the complex (Daddy barely fit through the last one!). Next we watched a short film about Mesa Verde, viewed the detailed dioramas in the museum showing what life was like at different stages through the millenia, and went on a short hike to the Spruce Tree House, where we did a self-guided tour of a different cliff dwelling. At the Spruce Tree House we even got to climb down into a restored kiva (subterranean meeting room).

(Clockwise from left) This is the 3-story ladder that our little adventurers climbed with more confidence than some of the
teenagers on our tour! Goose and Daddy ascend the last few rungs of the ladder. The girls head into one of the tunnels (yes, Daddy managed to squeeze his broad shoulders through there). Daddy and Goose follow the big girls and I up the hand and toe holds.

Outside and inside the kiva

The following day, we piled into the car again to spend two days covering the remaining 15 hours of driving home. We had just one touristy stop on the way: Four Corners. Monkey and Bug were particularly amused by being able to stand in two or more states at the same time. A number of Native American crafters had set up shop around the monument, so we got to see people beading jewelry, decorating pottery, and carving arrow heads. We also decided to sample some Navajo fry bread (yum!) while waiting for the arrowsmith/fletcher to finish an arrow made with a blue goldstone arrowhead for us.

After such an incredibly busy and exciting two weeks, the girls actually seemed to enjoy the quiet hours spent in the car on those last two days, and we were all glad to tumble into our own beds when we finally made it home!

I think we wore them out a few times (and yes, the top left photo was taken when Goose fell asleep in the dining hall).