Moab (Part 2)

These pictures are a little out of order, but we'll go with it.  We hiked to Corona arch after checking out of the hotel.  This train track was at the beginning of the hike and the kids really wanted a picture on it.

Sienna had a walking stick that I made her put down on the way up to the arch so that she could use both hands on the rope (there was an area where you had to hold a rope to avoid falling to your death).  On the way down, the stick was gone and she was so sad about it.  She tried to find a suitable replacement but nothing was good enough.  Then when we were almost to the end of the hike, she found her stick!  Someone had brought it down and ditched it!  She was so happy :)

Corona arch

The rope that you had to hold with both hands.  At this point, Ryan had just helped the kids come down and I was hyperventilating my way down only to see Riley climbing back up the rock.  I'm sure I yelled at him to get down, in fear that he would fall, but he was just trying to give me a flower (weed) that he had found.  Aww, what a sweet boy!

Ryan carried Cassidy down so that I could focus on not dying.  It was a really easy hike with about 3 minutes of totally frightening cliffs...so it was nice that he took her from me for the way back down.

That's us, sitting down on the left side of the arch in this picture.  We ate pb and jelly sandwiches in the shade of this terrifyingly large formation.  I didn't even look up at it from that angle, because the size of it was a little frightening.  I know, I'm a wimp.

On the way up, the kids could tell that I was nervous and Riley said, "Don't cry, Mom!"  I wasn't, and that just made me laugh.

Forest of cairns

Riley and Sienna both built a cairn to add to the forest

Once we were back at the car, Sienna said, "We're team Brave because we were all really brave.  Except for one of us....(she pointed her walking stick at me)."  It was funny.  I explained that actually I was brave too, because I went on the hike even though I was scared to do it.  I love my family!

 Aarchway Inn was awesome because not only did they have a bouncy castle and 3 beds for us, there was a playground in back, a splash pad (for summer), a heated pool, bbq grills, etc.  Ryan declared that we would stay there whenever we come to Moab.

I found this note Sienna wrote :)

Rub a dub dub, two cuties in the tub!

The only bummer was that we only got to stay one night.  We had a lot of fun :)