Beautiful Zion National Park

The 4th of July was spent looking a hiking at some of God's creations. Zion National Park. We had never been there and the only thing I knew was that their was a lot of red rock cliffs. Our first evening at the condo we had a coupon for a free movie and Larry picked out a movie where a adventurous young man was exploring caves and such. He went down into a canyon and was hiking in something called "the narrows". The narrows are like paths in cliffs. You're hiking into long trail like caves. This young man was hiking by himself and a big rock fell onto his arm and trapped him. He was in there for days and finally he cut off his arm so he wouldn't die and to get out of the cave. So needless to say I wasn't keen on hiking into any narrows but I did go into one, it was a wide one.
See... Lots of red rock cliffs.

  

On the road to Zion their is an amusing site. A shoe tree.

We hiked along some short trails here and there through the park. Red cliffs, red dirt.

Linda and Larry.

Our good friends Toni and Kal came along with us. It was fun to have them along.

While we were exploring on the trails we saw some interesting creatures.

A snake.

A bird trying to get free handouts.

Lizards slinked along the trail.

Crows. Crows remind me of Indian stories I've read. On how they are spirits of Indians who have passed on. In this desert place it seemed fitting.

The deer or in this case buck liked to hang out close to people. Doing his part of trimming the trees.

I bet we saw 100 squirrels. They were ALL over the place. They were not afraid of people. The park had warning up all over the place warning us not to feed the squirrels and a picture of what I hand may end up looking like if we fed them. Not a pretty site.

Weeping rock.

I love being able to be active. Just saying...

Our last hike of the day was into the narrows which weren't very narrow. And no rain or flash flooding was forecast so we headed in.

The rock walls were beautiful.

So here we go...

The rocks in the water were beautiful. The water was so clear.

Is that a rock or a steak?

Larry is such a carnivore. I would say it was on the tough side. Teeth breaking tough.

Larry and Kal went farther in the narrow but Toni and I stayed out because we had the camera among other things that couldn't get wet.

We would like to go to Zion National Park again and take some longer trails. It was a fun thing to do on our nations birthday.

Hot golf in Nevada (July)

We met up with some friends Kal and Toni Kennedy in St George Utah. You know that friends are real friends when it's years between seeing each other and you pick up right where you left off without any awkwardness. The first thing we did was head to Nevada where one of our former Young Single Adult, Jake is 1st assistance on the prestigious Wolf Creek Golf Course. A beautiful but difficult course.

I walked up to the top of the blue tee and got a great picture of Jake, Larry, Toni and Kal.

Did I mention it was HOT!

Now for a few photo's of the course.

Misty let me borrow her DSL camera for the trip. The camera goes click, click, click and takes a lot of pictures in just a few seconds. We were able to record pictures of our golf swing. Which is far from being very good so don't look too close.

My turn!

Thanks to Jake we didn't even to pay to golf. It was great to connect up with him again.

It's a good thing we didn't keep track of how many balls we lost. The intrigue of golf is the occasional great hit you get. That's what keeps you coming back. The funny thing is years ago when Larry and I would drive by a golf course we would say what a silly thing that looked like to do. I for one can tell you that my husband really loves to golf. I learned to golf for him. He has taken dance classes with me, for me. I think I'll keep him.

We're going to the temple and we're gonna get married...

Oh wait! We already are. 

Larry and I 34 years ago.

Larry and I same spot not quite 34 years later.

Wow! We hadn't been back to Manti Utah for sooo long. Well ever since we got married.

I'm very happy we went back. The Manti temple is more beautiful than I remembered it.

Larry and I were able to do a session at the temple and later that evening go to the Mormon Miracle Pageant in Manti, Utah  I was a teenager of 14 when I accepted the gospel and about a year after I joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints our youth group went on a huge trip to the Idaho Falls temple to do baptisms and on to Utah to tour the visitors center in Salt Lake City and then attend the Manti pageant. After I had that experience I wanted to be sealed in the Manti temple because it was beautiful. Larry wanted to be sealed there also because he loved the architecture.

 We attended the temple to do a session.

The view from the camp ground we stayed in.

We are waiting for the pageant to start.

Showtime! The Mormon Miracle Pageant is three intertwined stories - Joseph Smith and the Restoration, the coming forth and the message of the Book of Mormon, and the pioneer trek west to Utah - with a miraculous vision of God the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ.

Sunday Larry and I went back to walk around the temple grounds and get some more pictures.

Loved it! So peaceful!

I thought I was being artistic taking a picture with the temple reflected in the water.

We won't wait 34 years to go back again.