Visiting Victor (Number 20)

So this past weekend Larry and I drove up for a little weekend getaway to visit my Aunt Cindy and her family now that they live up in Victor, ID. I have to say I wasn't expecting it to be so fun, but I had an absolute blast! I wish it could've been longer, but I think we made the most out of the few days we had. When we got there Friday night it was pretty late, so we just relaxed, watched a little "When Harry Met Sally" (awesome movie, if you ask me), and listened to Larry play with my cousins.
On Saturday we all got up and ready and went to eat breakfast at a place called O'Rourke's before we hiked Grand Targhee (which seems a lot like Snowbird/Park City to me) to a place called Mary's Nipple (yes we ALL laughed at the name at least once and made more than enough inappropriate jokes along the hike! We were hilarious! Haha). It was a nice little 1/2 mile that we got a lot of pretty sights on (and left some skid marks on haha)

Just some of the views, I think have like 60 more pics of the hike on my phone

Then after the hike we went over to Bear World (YES!!) and it was even more exciting than I think I could have imagined it would be! We drove through once and all the bears seemed to be dead asleep towards the end (although some were up and moving around). Then we went and walked through the petting zoo and pet some deer and a hog and a couple goats (that were not the least bit shy to steel the food from the "pet food" quarter machines). Then we drove through again and the bears were MUCH more active this time around.  They were so funny. They actually stopped a bunch of cars by lying in the street. Then once we passed them they actually tried to climb the car behind us and eat their Toyota decal on the car. If I haven't mentioned before, I absolutely love bears! They had me very entertained. They even seemed to try on more than one occasion to stop us from getting out of the park (you go through a gate and they have electric fences to stop the animals from getting out and they stood in front of our car for a bit just staring outside and not letting us pass).

Oh yeah, there are more than just bears there. We saw Buffalo (or Bison, whatever!), wolves, and an albino deer among other things. It was a really fun day. That night we just went back to the house to relax and Larry played with the girls more. After he tired them out some, they went to bed while we watched the UofU VS BYU game and I can say we were not disappointed by that :) by the time the game ended we were all worn out and went to go to bed. The funny part of that night is we went looking for Abby (she normally sleeps in her mom and dad's bed, but she has a crush on Larry so she wanted to sleep in her room with us and we weren't sure which room she went to that night) and Cindy ended up finding her passed out under the laundry basket on the floor of their room. We all laughed, got our pictures, and then they put her to bed while we went downstairs to pass out.

Sunday morning we woke up and had a yummy breakfast (scones, eggs, and bacon) that Cindy made for us (and where I also learned being a mom is a total thank-less job! You're amazing Cindy!!) and it was INCREDIBLE! We got all packed up and then headed home around 11. Larry was able to get us home on one tank of gas in my car, I was pretty impressed! I can honestly say it was one of the funnest weekends I've had in a while, I love my family and spending time with them is always entertaining.

Thanks Cindy for showing us how fun Victor can be :)

One more summary picture collage:

Yes that's Abby in the top left picture

Now to get ready for our cruise/Florida trip next month :)

Kings Peak Attempt

So it's been almost a whole two weeks since we've done Kings Peak and I won't lie, it's been hard to figure out what to say in this post. Here's a quick recap of our hike (because I know I can't post anything else till I do this one):

We didn't make it to the top, even though we were really excited at the thought of doing so, I had even pictured in my head poses we'd do and how we'd position the camera to get a shot of us both at the top. We made it about 5-6 miles up (thinking we were really only 3) before we turned around mostly because the rain was really scary up there (I think we might have gone too late in the year), but also because I hadn't prepared myself as well as I thought and the pack ended up being more than I could handle carrying (I hadn't done a single hike with a  pack before and I think that was the problem). The only wildlife we really saw was chipmunks and squirrels (oh and the occasional butterfly, if that counts), but we did run into a ranger that assured us a bear sighting up there is really rare.

For anyone interested, don't be scared of my experience, Kings peak is a gradual incline so if you're used to carrying packs than this one should be no problem for you. I felt bad making Larry turn around (because it was my neuroses that got the better of me with that thunder and lightning), but we talked to his brother about doing it next year with him and it sounds like that will be in the works. I just hope I can convince him to take a picture of them at the top for documentation purposes :)

I'm very sad we didn't make it, that I had to admit it was a little too hard for me. Even more sad that we were way farther then we thought, but didn't realize till we were already on our way back. We got back so sore and tired that we drove home and just passed out. It was good to see the kitties and nice bed again, though.

So that was our experience where the mountain beat me and I convinced Larry it was too much. Hopefully I have a better post of it next year. Oh and that I can get over my blah-ness of nature (that one really took it out of me).

Till next time...