Everyday is Halloween.

Karate Follow-up

It's been three weeks since starting karate at Bushi Kai.  Since starting I have had a continuous run of aches and pains - from bruised toes to a pulled quad - I guess I'm not in my twenties anymore.  But I have noticed that my balance has definitely improved.  The plan is to continue to take it easy when kicking with the left leg, to get that muscle healed!

I'm at my first belt eval - the test for gold belt.  It requires attendance, attitude, and doing the "Star Set" in front of the class.  I was supposed to do it last Thursday but we ran out of time.  Sensei Lance said I could pass it off just with him, but you are supposed to do it in front of the class and the instructors prefer that so I deferred the eval until tonight.  So it will be Motrin and an Ace bandage before the Eval and taking it easy afterwards; can do!

For years now Corwyn and Devyn have been attending Bushi Ban karate and now Bushi Kai here in American Fork.  I've watched as both boys have progressed from the Lil' Dragon ranks into the normal program and upwards through the belt ranks.  At first I wasn't sure how well they would do, but both boys are learning what they should.  And Corwyn; he's now a brown belt involved in his black belt prep; within a year he could earn that coveted belt.

From early on as I've watched them at the school I've thought to myself, "Hey, I can do that!"  Well finally, after multiple years of putting it off I've taken the plunge and made the commitment; I'm going to get that black belt as well.  It will take at least four years, probably longer, but I will get it.

I had my first class a couple of nights ago and am now realizing that I am not as young as I think I am.  After just one class I have sprained toes, sore hips and legs, but I also have a white belt that will one day turn black.  So in spite of the early soreness the training will continue; and I am assuming that it will eventually not have quite the impact on me.

But who can say for sure...

The Long Drive

We're currently on day 4 of our big trip to the Midwest and have already soon so much. We are in the Hotel Nauvoo getting ready for bed; tomorrow we'll go tour some of the old historic buildings. We've arrived late (day 1's dash from home to Grand Junction where we got in at 23:30), taken a leisurely day (day 2's easy and scenic drive to Denver) where we visited a couple of family favorite food stops: Casa Bonita for lunch and the White Fence Farm for dinner. We've had a long day's drive (day 3 from Denver to Independence) and a day of religious significance (day 4 from Independence to Liberty Jail to Far West to Carthage Jail to Nauvoo). The trip is speeding by; before you know it we'll have to turn to the west for the long trip home. The farther we drive to the east and north the farther we will have to drive back. But we have been having a a lot of fun and seeing some great things. The kids are putting up with their parents and we're putting up with them :)

Summer Vacation 2011 - Part 6 of 6

Thursday was going to be only a travel day; a long way to drive to get home.  We took our time getting ready as there really was no rush; nothing scheduled at all.  The lady at the front desk recommended "The Bunnery"; we got there just in time as right after we were seated a huge line formed.  The food was good, filling, and moderately healthy; there were Oats, Sunflower, and Millet (O.S.M.) in about everything.

From there we pushed north through Star Valley and into Idaho and Bear Lake; stopping in Garden City, Utah right at the junction for lunch and a raspberry shake.  Merlin's was where we stopped; I've been there 3 times now and have stopped at a different place each time.

The Logan river was full but not in flood stage; I guess down in Ogden canyon they had flooding.  The water features of the trip were full; no drought in the north.  I guess we were lucky that the snow had melted enough to do some of the things that we did!  Since it was a Thursday we knew we'd encounter traffic in Ogden and Salt Lake; luckily the HOV lane kept us moving reasonably well.

And now it's Friday; a day of rest and relaxation recovering from the road.  If I could have done the trip differently I would have extended it by a couple of days but centered in the Old Faithful area at the Inn or Lodge.  I would have liked to have spent more time wandering around the Upper Geyser basin; we missed Daisy, Geyser Hill, and the hike out to Morning Glory Pool.  I guess we have to go back!

Summer Vacation 2011 - Part 5

Wednesday - our last day in Yellowstone and a lot still to see.  We hadn't done any exploring of the geyser basins north of Old Faithful and we had a dinner appointment down in Jackson that we had to make.  So that meant we had to get going and early!

Early turned out to be arriving at the Inn at eight for breakfast.  We just don't get moving very quickly on these trips.  After breakfast and a quick supply stop at the store we left Old Faithful and headed north; destination the Firehole drive and Great Fountain Geyser and the Fountain Paint pots.

Great Fountain geyser is currently unpredictable; we were hoping but were disappointed. But just down the road was White Dome geyser and it is very regular and would only require a maximum of 30 minutes to wait.  But right after we got to it it started; what timing!  A nice geyser that shot a jet up out of its dome.  And then a bonus; Pink Cone geyser was erupting and it only goes off once a day.

Across the road from the Firehole drive is the parking lot for the Fountain Paint pots.  And the lot was full; we had to circle around to find a spot.  But there is enough turnover that we found a spot pretty quickly and set off, hoping to see some of the geysers around the pots.  Devyn was fascinated by the mud pots; he has loved to watch them bubble and has wanted to spend the most time watching them.

There are a number of geysers at the pots, but only Twig and Clepsydra geysers were going.  They were pretty awesome; Clepsydra pretty much is always erupting.  It is amazing that such a concentration of geysers exists at Yellowstone; just one of these geysers anywhere else would be a big draw and there are hundreds here.

Down the road from the Lower Geyser basin are Midway, Biscuit, and Black Sand Geyser basins.  At Midway is one of my favorite thermals: Grand Prismatic Spring.  And it didn't disappoint today; the steam rising off the pool reflected all of the colors around the pool, from the orange and yellow edges through the green to the deep blue of the center.  Corwyn really thought it was cool as well and accompanied me around the entire loop.

At Biscuit Basin Corwyn and I walked up to Sapphire Pool which was really deep blue and then found a group waiting at Jewel Geyser.  Since it was supposed to erupt within 5 minutes we waited and were rewarded with a fun eruption.  Jewel is one of the more regular geysers in the park and notwithstanding its smaller size was very nice to watch.

I talked Corwyn into walking the Black Sand Basin trail; it was a short walk but I don't know if I have ever walked it.  Knowing the way I always wanted to hike every trail it is possible that I made Leslie go 23 years ago; if I did I don't remember it, though.

After leaving the geyser basins we headed south through Grand Teton National Park, taking the park road instead of the main highway.  The road gets right up next to the mountains and they are really impressive, even more so from that close vantage point.  Then we drove into Jackson and found our Motel, the Buckrail Lodge, an old log-cabin style motel that was well kept and in great condition.  Just in time, too, as we were going to the Bar T 5 Dinner and show.

Not far from the motel was the old Bar T 5 corral; at the corral you climb onto horse-drawn covered wagons which haul you up Cache Creek canyon to where they do their show.  Along the way we were ambushed by Indians (all they wanted was the brownies we were told) but were chased off by Buckskin the Mountain Man, who later made an appearance at the show and tried to run off with one of the young ladies.  We ended up buying a CD of the entire show so that the kids will remember.

After 3 hours of food, fun, and shenanigans up the canyon we arrived back at the corral and headed back to the motel.  A great day, full of fun, and a good way to end our last full day of vacation.

Summer Vacation 2011 - Part 4

The day after the 4th - could it possibly a bit less crowded as everyone was heading home leaving the park almost empty?  Fat chance there.  Still lots of cars on the road and parked in the turnouts.

I was worried when planning the day that we wouldn't have much to do in the morning.  At noon we had booked a fishing trip on Yellowstone Lake from Bridge Bay marina but we didn't need to get there until half past noon.  So what to do in the morning?  Well, by the time we got breakfast at the Soda Fountain, turned in the Junior Ranger books at the Visitor Center, and got on the road it was 10:30.  Still, it wouldn't take 2 hours to go the 20 or so miles from Canyon to the marina, would it?

Almost immediately after turning south on the Grand Loop road we encountered traffic.  There were multiple herds of Bison in Haydon Valley and as we all know the grass is greener on the other side of the road it was time to migrate.  Some of the herd wasn't quite sure, though, so we sat and watched with everyone else as the last couple of stragglers finally decided to cross.

We road to Gull Creek was closed on the Bridge Bay side (flooded, the water is really high) but we found the other end of the road and drove back to the picnic area.  There we found a really nice lakeside table where we could eat our bagels and drink our chocolate milk and watch the boats on the lake and take pictures.  Of course as we walked closer to the lake to take pictures, leaving our bagels on the tables, the local birds got interested and swooped down to bite off pieces.  Luckily we had broken the bagels into small pieces to prevent anyone from choking.  After shooing off the marauders with some well timed photo shots we headed for the harbor.

Tommy from Tennessee was our guide for the fishing trip, a 2 hour ride to the southern part of the lake, near the West Thumb inlet.  Naturally the kids were quite excited about the ride, and even more excited about the prospect of catching some of the native cutthroat trout and the lake trout that were infesting the waters.  The fishing method was trolling; get close to the edge of the lake in about 10 feet of water and troll some lures out the back.  We were lucky; in the first hour each boy caught a cutthroat which was released back into the lake.  Sadly however Leslie didn't catch anything and Devyn was quite upset about the fact that we didn't catch any of those lake trout.  If you catch lake trout you can take it to one of the restaurants and they'll cook it up for you!

We then headed over the Continental Divide twice on the way to Old Faithful and our lodging in the Snow Lodge cabins.  Instead of checking in though we headed for the Visitor's Center and caught a bench to watch Old Faithful erupt.  Still impressive after all these years!  And the kids loved it!  Then we had dinner, dropped off our bags in the cabin and headed out to see if we could catch Castle Geyser erupting.

The skeeters were swarming badly when we arrived at Castle.  The predictions for Castle and Grand are for a specific time plus or minus an hour for Castle and 2 hours for Grand!  So that meant we could be waiting for 2 hours for Castle.  While we deliberated Beehive went off up near Geyser Hill; that was nice.  As we looked down towards Grand we could see and heard from passerby's that it hadn't gone off yet; even though it was into it's last hour.  Hmm, Castle or Grand?  We took a chance that Grand would go off and we could return to Castle if it went off.  Well, halfway to Grand Castle did go off; Corwyn returned and enjoyed a close-up view of it as we watched from the benches at Grand.  Then Corwyn rejoined us at Grand.  Which was late.  Really late!  And the skeeters were about ready to drive us off and the sun set.  But then...

Grand is very impressive right up next to it.  Bursts way over your head and lots of steam and mist!  It went off for about 15 minutes and then went quiet and caught us off guard with a second big burst as we were starting to walk off.  Wow!  Once it was done though we got out of there quickly; the skeeters had gotten enough blood and it was almost dark.  In the room we thought about what we had done and felt very fortunate to have had a full day!