Living a Little Hippie Life

Over Spring Break the institute here in Flagstaff takes an annual backpacking trip. This year we were able to spend three nights in the beautiful Escalante, Utah! Before packing up, Mckaylee and I received a personal two hour tutorial on tents, sleeping bags, food, clothes, jackets, packs, shoes, water, stoves, and wild animals from my aunt who is pretty much as pro as you can get. She saved our tushies! It was a long drive up to Utah where we camped out so we got some sleep, slept in a little late, but we were up and ready to get going by lunch!


Before all the dirt and sweat...


(me, Marlee, Kelsi, Kayla, Mallery, Mckaylee)



The first day a few of us got a little lost. Not lost, but took a wrong turn.. After a while of exploring we figured everyone was probably back at the cars so we headed back and started eating lunch. It wasn't until about an hour later that everyone else came back wondering where we were. Oops. So our hike that day was cut short.

The next two days we hiked to Jacob Hamblin's arch, and it was beautiful! Another bonus was that most of the hike was sand so we were able to walk barefoot and be cooled down every time we crossed the river. How's that for hippie??



The hike was so fun! Everyone that came was wonderful and so much fun. I love meeting knew people and being able to share fun memories like this one!



I am allowed to show off a little right?



So this mountain was pretty steep. And that's me, Spiderman. Brother Kilgrow handed me down the rope but as I started climbing I realized it was angled enough to simply go with momentum. I ditched my pack (making one of the boys take it up) and mountain goat-ed up that little mountain. It was a rush, made me think that I might actually start mountain climbing. But when I got to the top I definitely could not get my knees to stop chattering. Looking down I realized had my shoes not had very good tread I could have rolled right on down. But I survived and enjoyed the confidence boost.