Sept '11. That big crack in Earth.

Mike and I spontaneously ended up in the Grand Canyon. We could not have planned it better had we actually planned it. We followed a thunderstorm into the canyon. BEAUTIFUL.

Unfortunately, I'm not fast enough or a good enough photographer to capture any of the lightning, but it was fantastic.

We headed to the South Rim for our campsite.

After dark, we walked down to the Watchtower and watched the lightning flash across the canyon as the storm headed away. The next day, we headed back to the Watchtower. It would be pretty awesome to live in that thing.

Mike and I thought it would be an awesome idea to hike down Bright Angel trail 5 miles down to Indian Gardens...and then back up in the same day without eating. Talking about hurting!! Still super cool though.

The canyon is absolutely beautiful.

Made it to Indian Gardens!



Side note: You need a permit to camp overnight in Indian Gardens. We passed this group of kids heading back up the trail from the campsite, they'd hiked down late in the evening and stayed, got in trouble because they didn't have a permit and were fined, but this isn't what we cared about; what was hilarious was that this group of 6 or so guys and gal were each carrying at LEAST 50-100 lbs per person. CRAZY. Obviously, they'd never heard of backpacking. They were beasts, on our way back up we ended up reaching the top at the same time as them. We had a bit of a bonding experience. They were from Arizona. We always meet people on camping trips.



We have to go all the way back up theeere!



Back at our camp, we met our neighbor, Matthias, who is an artist hippy dude living on the road. He was an interesting fellow. I have his email and he gave us a painting!

Then as we were hitting up photo ops along the road when we were leaving, we met another hippy dude rambling on and on about chem trails. We had him take our picture. It's so magnificent that it looks fake!

Until next time, Grand Canyon (and there WILL be a next time)!

~M~

There will be Vegas. June, 2011.

Since it's so frequent...We'll just throw these in for the sake of pictures and memories. Enter Aaron, Bob, Cherd, Kristen, Mike and meee.

Mike's mom hooked us up with a cabanaaaa.

"O" at the Belagio was a really good show.

Until a very soon next time, Vegas!

~M~



Whoops, backtrack! Memorial Day weekend, 2011.

Camping trip with the boys, Chris and Aaron...and Shelby the pup.

We headed up into the Mountain High area for a little lake called Jackson and a lot of fun! The canoe is once again a character in this story.

Hello, little pond.

So many rainbow trout, we found the ultimate hole!

For the record, every time I catch a fish, I scream my head off.



We discovered the ultimate frisbee golf course that, obviously, we had to play at....and by 'we', I mean Chris and Mike because I hate bee golf.

That afternoon, we launched our canoe....with all of us in it. Mike, Chris, Aaron, me and Shelby! The first night, Aaron and Shelby slept in our smaller tent that we brought, and Chris slept in the big tent with us. He brought not one, but TWO egg crates to sleep on and took up 3 of the 6 person tent spots in our tent. We also brought our camping grill, cooked up rainbow trout, skewers, etc. It was hardly roughin' it.

Yep.

The first day we were there was epic weather. It was beautiful, sunny, even a bit hot at times. Mike got insanely burnt on his legs. I was walking around in a bikini top.

 The second night, it was sooooo windy, we could barely keep a fire going, and we couldn't even sit outside really. The wind howled all night, and we all hunkered down in the big tent: men, woman and pup. That morning, it started up with some baby snow flurries. We cooked up one amazing breakfast of bacon, pancakes cooked in bacon grease, and eggs which we ate with our hands in the tent because it was too dang windy to eat outside.

Until next time, Jackson Lake!

~M~



For the Fourth of July, 2011. We took Texas by storm...

...Or by very near mid-air collision landing in Austin...whichever.

A first time visit to Mike's Grandma Elaine's in Austin, Texas is where this story opens. Our first experience of Austin, was a couple of people romping in the car parked in front of Elaine's truck in the air port parking structure. Stay classy, Austin!!

We took a stroll around his grandparent's property, they have a pretty cool creek with Green Hole, a little swimming hole down below their house.

Elaine rented us a boat for a little Lake Tyler action. It was nice, we looked at all the cool houses along the shore. I drove the boat some, they're brave.

Elaine feeds all the animals on her property and they hang out there.

Sue picked us up in the bug and we headed out to Fairfield where Mike's aunt Kathy and uncle Bob have a couple of cabins. It was hot and humid....hotttttt and humidddddd.

I was introduced to my first use of various weaponry. Watch out!

Happy Fourth of July!!

They don't look anything alike...or anything...

Sue, the mama

On the way to Bob and Kathy's house in Dallas before our departure, we hit up the Dallas Aquarium (yes, we have to go to all aquariums) which is a pretty darn cool place.

Until next time, Texas (and your terrible heat and humidity)!

~M~