Travelling...

I hate hate hate trying to buy tickets to go back east (why do I say going 'back east', going 'out west'?). It seems to be so difficult now days, especially if one doesn't want to take time off and fly out at night. Almost every flight arrives sometime in the morning. Which means that the in between flight is sometime in the obscene early morning. I hate those. I'm grumpy as all heck. But, since I have not seen my family or most of them in over a year.. it's time. So, over Labor Day weekend - we're going back east and hopefully the weather will be nice. It'll be just in time to raze one brother on his 4-0th birthday. Yes, I kid you not. It's time to get those black balloons out boys and girls! I can't be too harsh though, my sister in law is turning the same and I like to be nice to her. *G* My other brother is turning 38.. and my niece and nephew are growing a year older as well. EEK, K. will be now in her teens. That's scary. What's scarier is that I remember when my mom turned 43. That seems like yesterday.

Darn all the fall birthdays. I mean really. Can't people be born in the summer??!!! Literally, just counting family - we have at least seven birthdays from Sept - Nov. (not including yours truely). Thankfully, Mister LD2 is born AFTER Christmas, as well as his brother and my parents... yah! Why am I yahing? No idea, nevermind.

In the meantime, we're going up north this weekend.. and possibly going up north again to see Mister LD2's dad and family.

...and Sam, I'm sorry. I'm lousy .. and I mean lousy at planning anything. I suck. Literally, almost everything I've tried to plan ..something happens or comes up and doesn't work out. Where's my chi? Why is it not working for me?! Ok, I'm babbling and whining.

Peace out.. (side note: The Brats are winning the League.)

Father's Day..

For all those Dad's out there.. Happy Father's Day!

Havasupai...details

Originally, the trip was going to be four days. We'd leave Thurs. night, stay the night in Kingman, AZ and hike down early Friday morning. This would also include a quick breakfest at Denny's or some other fast place (i.e. Carl's Jr., etc.). Then we'd have Friday night, Sat. night, and Sun. night down there.. and hike back up Monday and drive home.

Anyways, the trip ended up getting trimmed down to Thurs. through Sunday. We started late late late Thurs. night. Some people had to work, since they had a trade show up in SF that they had to fly out on Monday morning. So, we didn't leave our friend's place - where we got the van, until after 6-7ish pm. Due to leaving so late, it wasn't worth staying at the hotel; so we cancelled. Which to be honest, was good; my bad, I accidently reserved the rooms for Friday. So, that got me off the hook off my mistake. We then decided to hit a Wal-Mart for water and some breakfest items. That was a bit interesting. I think we ended up sleeping on the side of the road somewhere until around 5:30ish am. Got up, packed our packs, filled up our Nalgene/Platypus and started hiking down around 6:30am.

The last time we did this hike, it was hot hot and we hiked late in the day, so we definately stopped during the 10 miles down to the campground. This time, it was early enough that most of the hike was nice and cool. So, we didn't stop really until 8 miles in, when we got to the village. We got a Gatorade and cooled off for a bit. Plus, I had to check -in and pay the rest of the permit amount. Due to the length of the hike and the different hikers involved and the amount of people we had; we divided into two groups. Some were a bit nervous that we wouldn't get a good site, due to the amount of people we were passing on the way down. That, and the fact that it was "sold out" until July, made people nervous that there wouldn't be a nice campsite available. The early group got there about 30 min earlier than us and got a great campsite for us. Unfortunately, our group accidently double paid for the permit. T. and I both checked in, normally they'd give tags; but they ran out and just gave us reciepts. We ended up getting a refund on the way back up. Anyways, I'm rambling...

So, we got there; took off our shoes and waded in the nice cool water .. our site was right on a stream. It was sweet! We did all the stuff we wanted to do - checking out and swimming and taking pictures at Havasu, Mooney, and Navajo falls. The decision was made to hike back up Saturday night. We knew we had to get home at a decent hour on Sunday. Three of the guys had to be up quite early Monday.. and we also knew we wanted to hike when it was cool. So, we started the hike around 4:15-30pm. Got some food at the cafe in the village and started the 8 miles back up to the top at around 6:00-30pm. We made it back around 10:00-30pm. Drove to Kingman, stayed the night and had a late late late late night snack. After that, it was a nice relaxing drive home on Sunday.

Here's some pictures that our friend took.

Havasupai..

It happened to be the shortest long trip I've ever been on... It was only 2 days, ten miles in and ten miles out.. but we did almost everything that you can do down there. It was a good trip though and I had a lot of fun hanging out. I do have to say that I'll never plan a trip there this late in the year. It'll be May next time. It was so freakin' HOT! I'd say at least in the 90's. Which isn't too bad when you're hanging out in cool waterfalls and rivers, but when you're walking around in it.. you're sweating up a storm!

Here's the long and short of it...

• HOT HOT HOT HOT!


• Beautiful Waterfalls!! (Mooney, Navajo, Havasu)


• Good company, good exercise (20 miles in 2 days)


• Good dehydration experiment (food wise)!


• Got van that slept and fit 7 people and 7 packs comfortably (ok, not sleep comfortably)


• GREAT .. shower Saturday night/Sunday morning.. and Denny's

ok..more later.