Welcome To My Adventures
I was lying in bed a few nights ago musing about how different things have been lately and how much I have missed being able to just pick up and go places. I live in Utah, home of five very beautiful national parks and many other scenic natural wonders. My wife and I normally spend as much time as we can each year visiting these magnificent places, but it seems like it has been forever since we were able to. My personal health issues last year forced us to cancel three camping trips and the COVID-19 pandemic has made venturing outside something of a risky experience so far this year. As I was thinking about all this, the thought came to me...write a blog about your love for, and adventures in, the national parks you have visited. My first thought then was, 'Write a blog? Is that still a thing anymore in the world of Instagram and Twitter? Besides, who would want to read about my experiences? What makes me that interesting?'
I answered myself by saying, 'I don't know if blogs are really that big of a thing anymore, but I would be doing this more for me than for any chance of anyone else ever reading these posts.' I have tried doing this before, with admittedly mixed results, and was not sure I could sustain it this time. The big difference now is that so many people are unable to visit these places due to quarantines and social distancing, as well as the parks being closed, that I thought it might help bring a smile to someone else's face as well as keep up my own morale to revisit my memories of these natural gems and share them with anyone that happens upon them. So, after much thought and precious little action, I find myself in front of my computer composing this, what I hope to be the first of many future posts. At best, I hope that someone out there stumbles upon these posts and finds something to help brighten their day, even just a little. At worst, I will have chronicled some of the happiest experiences I have had camping and exploring in this country's best idea ever; experiences I can then share with my family at the very least.
My plan is to post something once a week. I have been fortunate during this pandemic in that I work from home in an industry that has been all too needed lately, so I have had all the work I could handle. I am very grateful that has been the case and I have been able to meet my obligations. It has also meant that I have not taken as much time to do things that help me deal with the stress and stay mentally healthy. I am hoping that this will be one of those things and that I can be consistent in my posts.
Tomorrow, Yellowstone National Park partially re-opens. I have heard that Capital Reef National Park reopened recently, but the other four here in Utah remain closed as far as I know. This is a ray of hope in what has been a rather dark time, though the wildlife in the parks seem to have enjoyed the absence of all the people. Does that make me a day late and a dollar short in deciding to start this blog now? Maybe, if I was looking to gain a huge following and become immensely popular, but since that is not my goal, I think the time is perfect. With that said, let's get started.
I have always loved being outdoors. Some of my fondest childhood memories include a fishing trip with my dad and my uncles to Flaming Gorge. I remember that the only fish I caught was too small to keep and came right as a storm was moving in. I remember my dad's hat blowing off of his head and watching it slowly sink in the lake. I also remember waking to snow the next morning. I remember trips in the mountains with my grandfather, including a family reunion I went to with him and my grandmother in Washington state. I also remember trips to Vernal to the small museum that used to be there to see the life-size dinosaur replicas outside in the garden, as well as visiting Dinosaur National Monument and marveling at the wall of dinosaur bones there. From a very early age, I wanted to dig for dinosaurs for the rest of my life. Sadly, calculus put a stop to that dream, but that is a story for another time. Suffice it to say that I have loved nature for as long as I can remember, though my experiences with the National Parks (not to dismiss those trips to Dinosaur), did not really begin until I was about 10 or 11 years old.
My dad is a retired Marine. He left active duty after serving in Vietnam, but joined the reserves. After some time as a reservist, he decided to go back to active duty and we were soon moving to Camp Pendleton in California. We were there for a fairly short time and my dad was sent to Okinawa without us for a year. When he returned, it was to move us to Albany, Georgia. This move is where my experiences with the parks truly begins.
My parents decided that we would drive from Sandy, Utah to Albany. My guess is that it was cheaper than flying, but it would also give us a chance to see parts of the country we had never seen before. I was not thrilled to be going to the deep, dark south as I saw it in my young mind's eye, but I was excited for the trip because one of the places we would stop was Carlsbad Caverns. I'm not sure how much of that was due to me personally begging to go there, but I would guess it played a part in the decision.
Our first day on the road brought me my first glimpse that I recall of Utah's canyon country. It was late afternoon and the light on the red rock walls outside of Moab was amazing to me. I don't recall if I saw any signs for Arches, but I do recall how amazed I was by the towering sandstone cliffs and the strange rock formations that were visible from the road as we approached Moab. It would be many years before I would see the area again, but that first sight has remained vivid through the years. It includes seeing a panel of pictographs when they were still bright and easily seen from the road; years before a group of teenagers, probably in a drunken stupor, decided to scrub them from the walls.
I remember arriving in Carlsbad late in the evening. We stayed in the parking lot, with me feeling much too excited to sleep. I remember begging to go through the natural entrance to the caverns only to have my parents remind me that it would probably be too much of a walk for my younger siblings, much to my disappointment. I also remember wanting to be awake to see the clouds of bats return from their nightly feasting on area insects, but I ended up finally falling asleep and missing it completely.
I still remember taking the elevator down to the main cavern. I remember the food area and thinking it was funny to see such a thing in a cave. I recall walking through the caverns, marveling at all the amazing formations, the beautiful shapes and colors mother nature had created in this place. I still remember one of the rangers pointing out where a bat had died on one of the formations and its skeleton had been covered by the slowly deposited stone. I wish I could recall everything we saw and all the names of all the formations, but there are just images of magnificent stalactites and stalagmites, colorful flowstone, and a sense of amazement and awe at what I was seeing. At that time, I wanted to see everything there was to see there, but time and tired siblings cut my visit short (or at least it seemed to me at the time), but it has never left me.
I have never been back to Carlsbad. It is one of those places I want to return to, but I am not certain when that will be. I still see it as the first step in what has become a lifelong journey among our nation's treasures. It was an experience that brought pictures I had seen to life and further awakened my love for, and fascination with, the national parks.
And so it begins.
I answered myself by saying, 'I don't know if blogs are really that big of a thing anymore, but I would be doing this more for me than for any chance of anyone else ever reading these posts.' I have tried doing this before, with admittedly mixed results, and was not sure I could sustain it this time. The big difference now is that so many people are unable to visit these places due to quarantines and social distancing, as well as the parks being closed, that I thought it might help bring a smile to someone else's face as well as keep up my own morale to revisit my memories of these natural gems and share them with anyone that happens upon them. So, after much thought and precious little action, I find myself in front of my computer composing this, what I hope to be the first of many future posts. At best, I hope that someone out there stumbles upon these posts and finds something to help brighten their day, even just a little. At worst, I will have chronicled some of the happiest experiences I have had camping and exploring in this country's best idea ever; experiences I can then share with my family at the very least.
My plan is to post something once a week. I have been fortunate during this pandemic in that I work from home in an industry that has been all too needed lately, so I have had all the work I could handle. I am very grateful that has been the case and I have been able to meet my obligations. It has also meant that I have not taken as much time to do things that help me deal with the stress and stay mentally healthy. I am hoping that this will be one of those things and that I can be consistent in my posts.
Tomorrow, Yellowstone National Park partially re-opens. I have heard that Capital Reef National Park reopened recently, but the other four here in Utah remain closed as far as I know. This is a ray of hope in what has been a rather dark time, though the wildlife in the parks seem to have enjoyed the absence of all the people. Does that make me a day late and a dollar short in deciding to start this blog now? Maybe, if I was looking to gain a huge following and become immensely popular, but since that is not my goal, I think the time is perfect. With that said, let's get started.
I have always loved being outdoors. Some of my fondest childhood memories include a fishing trip with my dad and my uncles to Flaming Gorge. I remember that the only fish I caught was too small to keep and came right as a storm was moving in. I remember my dad's hat blowing off of his head and watching it slowly sink in the lake. I also remember waking to snow the next morning. I remember trips in the mountains with my grandfather, including a family reunion I went to with him and my grandmother in Washington state. I also remember trips to Vernal to the small museum that used to be there to see the life-size dinosaur replicas outside in the garden, as well as visiting Dinosaur National Monument and marveling at the wall of dinosaur bones there. From a very early age, I wanted to dig for dinosaurs for the rest of my life. Sadly, calculus put a stop to that dream, but that is a story for another time. Suffice it to say that I have loved nature for as long as I can remember, though my experiences with the National Parks (not to dismiss those trips to Dinosaur), did not really begin until I was about 10 or 11 years old.
My dad is a retired Marine. He left active duty after serving in Vietnam, but joined the reserves. After some time as a reservist, he decided to go back to active duty and we were soon moving to Camp Pendleton in California. We were there for a fairly short time and my dad was sent to Okinawa without us for a year. When he returned, it was to move us to Albany, Georgia. This move is where my experiences with the parks truly begins.
My parents decided that we would drive from Sandy, Utah to Albany. My guess is that it was cheaper than flying, but it would also give us a chance to see parts of the country we had never seen before. I was not thrilled to be going to the deep, dark south as I saw it in my young mind's eye, but I was excited for the trip because one of the places we would stop was Carlsbad Caverns. I'm not sure how much of that was due to me personally begging to go there, but I would guess it played a part in the decision.
Our first day on the road brought me my first glimpse that I recall of Utah's canyon country. It was late afternoon and the light on the red rock walls outside of Moab was amazing to me. I don't recall if I saw any signs for Arches, but I do recall how amazed I was by the towering sandstone cliffs and the strange rock formations that were visible from the road as we approached Moab. It would be many years before I would see the area again, but that first sight has remained vivid through the years. It includes seeing a panel of pictographs when they were still bright and easily seen from the road; years before a group of teenagers, probably in a drunken stupor, decided to scrub them from the walls.
I remember arriving in Carlsbad late in the evening. We stayed in the parking lot, with me feeling much too excited to sleep. I remember begging to go through the natural entrance to the caverns only to have my parents remind me that it would probably be too much of a walk for my younger siblings, much to my disappointment. I also remember wanting to be awake to see the clouds of bats return from their nightly feasting on area insects, but I ended up finally falling asleep and missing it completely.
I still remember taking the elevator down to the main cavern. I remember the food area and thinking it was funny to see such a thing in a cave. I recall walking through the caverns, marveling at all the amazing formations, the beautiful shapes and colors mother nature had created in this place. I still remember one of the rangers pointing out where a bat had died on one of the formations and its skeleton had been covered by the slowly deposited stone. I wish I could recall everything we saw and all the names of all the formations, but there are just images of magnificent stalactites and stalagmites, colorful flowstone, and a sense of amazement and awe at what I was seeing. At that time, I wanted to see everything there was to see there, but time and tired siblings cut my visit short (or at least it seemed to me at the time), but it has never left me.
I have never been back to Carlsbad. It is one of those places I want to return to, but I am not certain when that will be. I still see it as the first step in what has become a lifelong journey among our nation's treasures. It was an experience that brought pictures I had seen to life and further awakened my love for, and fascination with, the national parks.
And so it begins.
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