Arches - Day 2

Friday, October 19

MJ's sleeping spot on the floor.

After a super healthy breakfast of doughnuts and some fruit, we headed back to Arches.  We decided to start with a hike up to Delicate Arch (3 miles round-trip).  The parking lot was super full and busy but we just happened to get there at just the right moment when someone was backing out so we got a good parking spot.  It was quite the climb to get up there.  At one point when we had stopped for a water break, Kay asked how much farther we had to go.  We said that we were almost to the top of this part and then probably had a little more beyond that.  She then said, "Well, when we get to the top I'm going to need to take a nap before we finish."  There was a lady standing near us who had stopped to rest as well and she just started laughing at that comment and said that she needed to take a nap too!

See the line of people in the picture above?  This was the middle part of the hike to Delicate Arch.

Wow the arch was massive!!  In the pictures that you see of Delicate Arch, it looks small.  That is our family, minus DH who was taking the pictures, under the arch.  It was quite the production because it was fairly crowded there and everyone wanted a picture under the arch so we had to take turns walking over to it and having a picture taken.

It was a little scary walking over to the arch with the younger kids.  I made sure to keep a tight hold on MJ and M&M was holding onto Kay for me.

The picture above is DH under the arch with MJ on his back.  As you can see there is someone walking over to get under the arch who was totally clueless as to what was going on with people taking turns...

A picture with no one under the arch!

This bowl in the picture above is where Blondie lost her water bottle!  When we got up to the top of the hike where you can finally see the Delicate Arch, there was a ledge to climb over and then this large, steep bowl that you had to hike on the upper edge of to get over to the arch.  When Blondie climbed over the ledge, her water bottle slipped out of her hands and rolled right down into the bowl.  Luckily it was just a disposable one, but someone who was up there said that it was the third one he had seen fall down there since he got up there!

Petroglyphs on the rocks - a side trail on the way up to Delicate Arch.  We were planning on stopping at this spot on our way down from Delicate Arch, but at this point Blondie and I had left the group to hurry her to the bathroom.  While we were finishing up at the bathroom, M&M came hurrying up with Kay in tow - who apparently also needed to use the bathroom...

After Delicate Arch we got back in the car and headed off to try and find a picnic table to eat lunch at.  After driving to the end of the park and finding nothing available, we drove back to the parking lot for Sand Dune Arch and ate lunch in the car.  Then we hiked (short hike) to Sand Dune Arch and were surprised to find a little sand, play area for the kids.  It was really fine sand and the kids (especially MJ) loved playing in it.  It was nice because the whole area was in the shade.

Sand Dune arch (the kids are all making funny poses in front of it)

After we finished up playing at Sand Dune arch we went back to the trail to hike to Broken Arch.  Some of the kids sat down on a little step on the trail to take off their shoes and get the sand out of them.  Kay was sitting there putting her shoes back on when all of a sudden she yelled out and started crying.  I looked down at her finger and there was an ant clinging on to the end of it.  I quickly grabbed her hand and brushed the ant away, but Kay was still crying about it.  (We think it was a fire ant.)  We all started walking down the trail and I was bringing up the back with MJ who was walking really slowly and kept stopping to play in the sand on the trail.  Kay was walking up front with her dad and just kept crying and whining about her finger so I called up to him that I would take the two little ones back to the car.  MJ was walking really slowly back to the car so I finally picked her up and put her on my shoulder and then had Kay walking beside me.  Kay kept telling me the whole way back to the car that I need to protect her from ants and things like that - that it was my job to protect her...  When we got back to the car I took a look at her finger and cleaned it off and put a bandaid on it.  I also got the girls a snack to eat while we were waiting for DH and the rest of the kids to get back.

This is Broken Arch which is another side trail off of the Sand Dune arch trail. 

Balanced Rock

The leaves were gorgeous in the park!  It was really beautiful seeing these bright yellow trees against the red rock - although hard to get a picture of that shows the beauty...

By this point the two little ones had had enough so DH took the 4 oldest on one last small hike before we left the park.  They hiked the one mile Park Avenue trail which is a one way hike past the Courthouse Towers.  Apparently there were quite a few steps that they had to climb.  All in all it was a good family trip and we got home at a decent hour Friday night.