Glorious Fall Colors on Cedar Mountain!

 We took our annual leaf looking drive on Cedar Mountain and it was wonderful as usual!  Such vibrant colors making a feast for your eyes!  I don't think I can say anymore than that!

Sister's Reunion in Washington

 We planned a little get together for us sisters, Janet, Marilynne and me up at Janet's cabin in Washington.  Of course we had our husbands come too!  Paul and I got there Friday late afternoon and left Monday  morning.  Lynn and Marilynne got there a bit earlier on Friday and left Sunday afternoon. Janet and Tony left when we did on Monday.  We had a leisurely time visiting, eating, going to church and playing a few games.  Mostly we visited.  Tony brought up some Walleye fish and pheasant that a friend gave him and cooked it up for us one evening.  I thought it was very good!  Marilynne and I brought the rest of the food so Janet would not be stressed about it.  She's in early stages of Alzheimer's and says sometimes she can't remember how to cook things.  And besides, they provided the wonderful accommodations  at their cabin! I think attending church was very interesting.  They have such a small ward there.  I think there were 50 people their in total including us.  They kept saying they wished all of us could find a way to move there!  There used to be some very big food processing plants in the area and when they closed them down the town (and that ward) lost so many people who just had to move away to find new jobs.  But, they were a nice friendly ward and I enjoyed the maybe 10 people Relief Society group and the great lesson that was given.  Sunday afternoon we picked lots of apples to bring home for Janet and Tony to can and just for us to eat.  There are so many different kinds of red and yellow apple trees growing all over their property.  Some are wild and not as good they say.  I liked all of the ones I tried.  We made an apple pie with some of the Granny Smiths and it was very good.  It was a very relaxing time.  It's hard to see Janet struggling sometimes to remember things, but sometimes she amazed us with remembering things and names of people from long ago better than we could.  It was a long drive of about 1800 miles.  It took 2 days to get there and two days to come home.  We weren't up for making it in one very long drive each time.  I am having some really bad back problems (found out I have a herniated disc) so Paul did all of the driving, so we wanted to break it up.  We stayed in Jerome, Idaho, in the same hotel going and coming.  I'm glad we could get together while everyone can still make the trip. None of us are getting any younger.  There were beautiful, big, cloud filled skies all the way there and back.  We got a bit of rain a few times.  We listened to some good books along the way.  OH, while we were out picking apples, I looked down the path ahead where Janet and I were going to pick some other apples and there was a black bear down there eating black berries we think.  I was so excited I yelled to Paul and Tony that there was a bear...and scared it away.  We only saw the rear end of it, but it was pretty cool!  They have seen a mother bear and two cubs on their game cameras around the place, so it was not that surprising.  They said they've seen a bigger male bear.  I was glad not to see him I think.  I didn't feel afraid, just excited and sad that the men didn't get to see it.  

Labor Day drive over the mountain

Since we now  have our truck back and can do the dirt again we decided to take a drive over Kolob Terrace and down for Labor Day.  I'm having back trouble so I had to lay back in the seat most of the way, but it was still a beautiful drive.  The leaves aren't turning yet, but it was good to see what there was to see.  We stopped in at Centro in Cedar and used my pizza coupon for a great lunch. After that we drove down through New Harmony, Pinto and Pine Valley to finish up our dirt road fun for the day.  It was just a relaxing day for a drive.  

Bean's #38! Brians Head Peak, Bunker Creek, etc.

 Today we did some birthday celebrating with Bean for his #38.  His birthday is actually on Sunday, but you can't party too much that day, so we did it today.  We took a beautiful drive in our newly fixed pick up on Cedar Mountain.  We went on the dirt roads we hadn't been able to go on while the truck was in the shop and enjoyed a cool day on Cedar Mountain.  We ate a little brunch at Wood Ranch, we took the beautiful short hike to Aspen Mirror Lake, we drove over to Mammoth Springs and walked there too.  Then we took a new drive up Bunker Creek Road to check out some camp spots up that way.  There were some beautiful ones once we got past a lot of burned out areas.  We drove over to Cedar Breaks and then up on top of Brian Head peak to see the restoration work they had done on the old CCC structure up there.  Then we came down and went to an early birthday dinner at Texas Roadhouse.  After a little nap we made chocolate chip cookies and had them with ice cream...Bean's chosen birthday cake. Then he opened presents - lots of nice new shirts.  We hope to celebrate a little more tomorrow and then maybe a little more at a family dinner on Sunday after Stake Conference. Happy Birthday Bean! We love you dearly!

Temple and picnic

 Friday evening Lou and family came down to do some baptisms at the temple and then go to a play at Tuacahn.  Bryan's folks came with them.  It was fun to go to the temple with them and then have dinner.  After the play they spent the night because it ends so late.  We had fun visiting with them for breakfast.  

In the afternoon we wanted to get out, so we took Bean and went for a picnic at Duck Creek and then enjoyed a short hike and a beautiful drive down the mountain.  We listened to an interesting book too!  We got quite a bit of rain this week finally!  It has been wonderful!

Rain on Cedar Mountain...Grafton!

 Thursday we got the get out of the house bug.  It was looking like rain on Cedar Mountain so we made a picnic lunch, picked up Bean and headed up there.  We stopped off at the Bristle Cone hike and Paul did his first, after surgery hike!  It was only a half a mile, but it was wonderfully fresh from the recent rains up there!  It felt so cool and clean!  We ate lunch at Cedar Breaks picnic area.  We felt a few raindrops while we ate, but got all done and on our way before it started raining pretty hard here and there along the way!  So wonderful to see the rain!  We next drove over past Panguitch Lake and then on over to come down through Zion.  It was not raining there, but the skies were beautiful.  After Zion we drove out to Grafton, an old ghost town from the Pioneer days.  They have done a lot of restoration work there and it was pretty amazing to think how hard those people worked to make a "subsistence" living.  They finally left and moved down to Hurricane when times got better down there than where they were.  Flash floods were constantly taking out their irrigation systems and making life very hard.  The fear of Indian attacks was also a reason people finally left.  

Thank Goodness for Cedar Mountain/Lava Point

 We are so thankful that we have Cedar Mountain to get away to.  Pine Valley is pretty much on hold for the next year or more while the figure out how to put the campgrounds, picnic areas and lake/dam back together after the fire and then, even worse, the erosion it caused afterwards.  So, when we need to get away, we head for Cedar Mountain.  Today was one of those days.  After we got our morning stuff done, we picked up Bean and with a stop in Cedar for a KFC meal we drove up to 5-Mile Picnic area just out of Parowan and had a great lunch.  Paul and I did a little exploring around the site and found some sort of old stone oven. We also drove up to see Yankee Meadow Reservoir.  It's really low, but still very beautiful.  It made me want to go kayaking.  After that we drove over the mountain and enjoyed the beautiful display of meadows of purple flowers in Cedar Breaks.  We stopped there at the picnic area for our candy bar dessert.  We also stopped in at the Visitor's Center.  We saw lots of other flowers along the road, at the picnic spot and also at the Visitor's Center.  Their annual Wildflower Festival is going on right now!  After that we drove down the mountain and back home.  It was good to get to the mountains!  I kind of nodded in and out on the drive home.  

On Friday we went on another picnic...this time at Lava Point which is up by Kolob Reservoir.  It's actually a part of Zion National Park.  There's a beautiful overlook, a picnic area and a campground.  It was a nice day for it being a little cooler than here and especially in the shade where our table was. Afterwards we drove over to Kolob Lake but only as far as the road was paved since we were in our rental car.  Out truck is STILL in the shop.  Paul's foot has graduated to where he can now wear a regular shoe for part of the day.  It's making good progress, but we between the foot and the truck we are feeling like we are sort of wasting the summer away a bit with not any very exciting adventures.  I think it's time to take a trip...somewhere!   (The sunrise shot was on my morning walk on the Red Hill today!) 

Getting out on Cedar Mountain - Paul still has his boot on!

 I'd rather be camping...but the check up only gave Paul another two weeks in his boot.  So, Friday we were ready for a day away.  Cedar Mountain is close and cooler, so we opted to go there for a drive and a picnic.  We first drove over to check on Navajo Lake.  It is lower than I think I've ever seen it, but still beautiful!  We saw lots of flowers blooming and found out there is a little lodge/general store and little rental cabins.  Who knew?  Not us!  We checked them out and enjoyed the find.  

Next we drove around the the mountain and stopped off to see the stream by Aspen Mirror Lake.  I love that spot.  Then we continued on over to a great little picnic spot near some ginormous lava piles.  It was a peaceful, unhurried picnic...so nice.  More beautiful flowers there.

 Next we drove on around and to Cedar Breaks.  I always love to go there.  They have the best store and it is just so beautiful and awesome!  Paul took a little nap in the Chessman Overlook parking lot, and Bean and I took a little hike along the ridge trail there.  Then we went to the Visitor's Center. I got a Jr. Ranger book this time.  We walked a tiny trail and saw lots more flowers!  

Then it was time to head down the hill.  We took the Brian Head way.  We drove some side roads and discovered a historic steam engine from Brian Head's past.  It was used to power lumber mills at several sites around the area from 1903-1939.  Very interesting to see it sitting there among today's giant "cabins".  Then we went down the hill to Parowan and stopped in for shakes/root beer float at the Dairy Freeze.  Then we headed home.  It did us the good we needed to be up there in the cool mountain air and among the forest beauty!  And, it made me want to go camping.  

Fire Tower and Elbow Canyon ATV road -BLESSED!

 In February of 2025 we tried to drive to the Black Rock Fire Tower out on the Arizona Strip.  It ended up being too wet and muddy to make it to the top and turned into a pretty slippery, scary drive down.  Today, we had thought about taking a drive up to Beaver, but realized we may not make it back in time for Bean to be home for his med drop.  We decided to try to make it to the fire tower instead...and it turned into another harrowing adventure, worse than the last time. I was driving since Paul is still in his boot and we made it to the fire tower just fine other than some pretty bumpy parts of the dirt road there.  When we got there a lot of workers were there and said we couldn't come in while they were working.  It was still cool to at least get a look at it and the forest around it and the views from up there were amazing.  It was tricky to turn around on the narrow road to go down, so Paul said he do that part...and then decided he'd just go ahead and drive down.  We drove on a few other little roads up there enjoyed seeing a bit more.  Then we saw a sign saying one of the roads went down to Mesquite.  We thought it would be fun to take a different route home and started down that one...after not too long we found that this road was not as good as it looked like it would be.  We actually got to a  point where steep, slick rocks made it impossible to go further, so we tried backing up and turning around and got into some soft dirt on the roadside and got stuck.  We found the jack and jacked up the stuck tire and put rocks under it and were able to get out and get turned around.  We realized that going back the way we came was probably not going to work.  We didn't think we could make it up some of the steep rocky places.  We came to another fork in the road and could go down either the Cottonwood Canyon road or the Elbow Canyon Road that were heading down the mountain toward Mesquite.  Elbow Canyon looked like the better road.  So we were off again...and pretty soon we saw some markings that let us know this was actually an ATV road...but we couldn't go back, so onward we went.  It soon got very difficult.  The road had many elbows and it was steep and it was very rocky.  It was so rocky that we had to stop often to get out and figure out how to navigate around or over the rocks.  Sometimes I just walked ahead down the road moving sticking up rocks out of the way ahead of time and also to not watch how they had to drive to get over the rocks.  Lots of praying was happening and lots of stress was being felt.  It was turning into a very slow, harrowing drive.  There were some steep drop offs since it was a canyon.  The dirt and small rocks made it slippery and hard to walk when we needed to.  And then...we got to a place where a stream had washed out one side of the road and the other side had BIG rocks to get over.  We would have to do a lot of building up to and down from them to get over.  We stopped for lunch and then went to work putting in the rocks.  Then we heard an ATV coming down from above.  It was a couple in a pretty fancy ride, and luckily we weren't blocking the road for them.  They stopped and after looking at our situation they said they had room for two of us to ride down if we wanted to.  We didn't really want to do that.  Paul and the guy talked about how we could get over that spot and figured out what might be the best route.  They went over it first to test it out and it worked.  Then we did, and the truck got stuck on top.  The guy said they would pull us a little to get us over that spot.  That worked!  Then he said they would go on down the trail and if they came to a spot that looked like we'd need help they would stop and wait for us.  They did, and ended up giving us another pull to get us unstuck.  Then they went on.  They guy thought that was the last of the really bad places.  There were not more that we got stuck on, but there were still lots of rocks to navigate around and move, but it finally got to be just a mostly dirt road when we finally got down into the foothills and then to Littleton.  We had to stop and get drinks.  We had just finished up all of our water on the way down and it was really hot and we were so thirsty.  We were SO THANKFUL that we didn't have to walk out with no water when it was very hot.  We were SO THANKFUL that we got down at all!  The step rails on the side of the truck got so bent that the doors are hard to close. The air dam under the front bumper came loose and is halfway off. Oh, and we got a flat tire on the way down too from the sidewall getting scraped on rocks.  It would puff air out of the scape every time we went over a bump.  We had a good spare, but the valve cap was old and broke to pieces and it started puffing air out of the valve stem over bumps too.  We took the cap off the flat and put it on and that helped but didn't entirely stop it.  Thankfully, it held out to get us home being just a little low.  After the fact Paul told me the truck had gotten a little stuck on a steep place and he and Bean both pushed it to get it over a rock. Then, even though it was in park, it started sliding down the road driverless! OH NO!  Paul, with his clumsy boot foot and slippery road was still able to open the door and get back in and STOP IT before it careened down a cliff.  I was glad I didn't hear that story until we were out and on our way home!  I am not feeling too excited to do anymore dirt road exploring at this point.  Pavement sounds really good right now!  I took no pictures on the way down.  Just too stressed and busy moving rocks and not in the mood to feel like taking pictures.  Feeling very, very blessed that things fell into place for us to get out. Blessed even though we made a less than wise choice.  Blessed to not have more damage to the truck.  Blessed that no one got hurt. Blessed that people came along to help us out.  BLESSED in those and so many other ways!  Many thanks to the couple who turned out to be our guardian angels yesterday.  They blessed our day!  

So, this week we did find out that the truck won't be totaled!  Glad about that because we spent a morning looking at what trucks we could afford if we had to replace it, and there weren't many and they weren't too great. The only real nice thing that would have happened was that we could have gotten one with 4-wheel drive, but not to be.  The truck needs $6,000 of repairs! Thankfully the insurance will pay all but our $500 deductible.  That's a relief.  Because the truck is in the shop, it has been kind of a stay at home and wait and not go anywhere unpaved time.  We've had to scrounge up things to do.  Maybe it's a good thing.  We are finding some interesting things to do and I am getting some things done I would probably have put off otherwise.  Here's the week's activities. I take nice morning walks at different places, I defrosted the freezer, I deep cleaned the kitchen stove, we went to a really great patriotic concert at the Tabernacle that one of our ward members sings in.  I just try to enjoy any little excuse to get out.  Paul and went searching for ant killer that we had run out of and enjoyed just looking around at IFA and Cal Ranch.  Just leisurely walking around when we went to pick something up at Costco was another thing.  We were those people you hate to be stuck behind at Costco when you're trying to hurry up and get your shopping done.  We have been acting old is what you'd call it I guess.  I'm happy to get some of these things done and enjoy some new things, but I hope this won't last forever!!! Another thing I  found to do was to clean out my genealogy briefcase and clean out a whole basket of genealogy stuff and get it sorted out.  It was actually kind of  fun to look through so many things that I hadn't seen for a long time.  Good work, if I do say so myself.  

June fun!

 Drive to Pinto - we just had some time in the afternoon and wanted to get out of the house and see some pretty.  Driving to Pinto did it for us.  Loved the old homes, scenery and history of this little place.  The stones in the monument are from the old chapel that was built in Pinto in the beginning years of the little place.  

Memorial Day 2026 - Cedar Mountain Picnic/Cedar Breaks

With the burning down of our regular Memorial Day picnic site at Pine Valley and people having too many other commitments, we decided to postpone to another year our regular visit from Jay, Brynn and family and just get together in a couple of weeks at Family Camp.  That left us to find something else to do with the day.  Paul, Bean and I went up to Cedar Mountain via Parowan for a picnic and visit to Cedar Breaks.  We stopped in at Parowan to add some jalapeno poppers from Smokin' Joe's to our picnic lunch and then drove up to look for a site.  It ended up being really cloudy and cold up by Brian Head/Cedar Breaks, so we drove down lower to Uinta Flat area to find a warmer spot.  Along the way it started to rain pretty good!  It stopped for a bit and we found a nice  spot and had a great picnic with some Earnie's chicken along with chips, cottage cheese, beans, poppers, rootbeer and Oreos.  Then we drove over to Cedar Breaks Visitor's Center, got more rain along the way, and enjoyed seeing the beautiful sites there.  It was about 37 degrees up there at the top!  Our picnic site had been around 59 degrees.  And then back in St. George it was around 85 degrees!  Glad we have Cedar Mountain for a great cooling off get away spot!  It was a beautiful drive up there and so good to see the rain and there were still some snow drifts up there too!