Category: Helen

The Wonders We Found in Utah

8/14/2019

My husband and I went to college in Utah. That is where we met. We lived there for the first few months of our marriage. Two of our children also went to school in Utah. So, we have seen most of the well known places to visit down central Utah. On our past trip from Phoenix, AZ to Casper, WY, we decided to take some of the roads less traveled and see some places we had always talked about visiting but never had.

I hope you appreciate how brave I am being showing you this selfie after a long day traveling!

As we headed north from Phoenix, we took US Highway 191 and stayed the first night in Monticello, UT. It is a very tiny town, with only a couple of restaurants. One special thing Monticello does have is an LDS temple, which is very beautiful. Unfortunately, it was Monday and the temple was closed, so we only got to see it from the outside.

The 191 took us up through the Uinta Mountains and Ashley National Forest. These mountains are the tallest and some of the most interesting and beautiful in Utah. Most of the Uinta Mountain Range is contained within the Ashley National Forest, which was established in 1908 by President Theodore Roosevelt. It includes 460,000 acres and is the largest wilderness area in Utah. Activities include hiking, boating, camping and fishing. The scenic drive along the 191 has markers that tell you about the geologic events and fossils to be found in the area. It was gorgeous, amazing and an educational experience.

One of the towns we drove through on the 191 was Vernal. It is such a cute little town. The main street is lined with the flowers I have photographed above. It is so pretty. Not only are the flowers on the sidewalks, but hanging from the old fashioned style street lights. I fell in love with that street.
Also in Vernal is Dinosaurland, home to the largest quarry of Jurassic Dinosaur bones there is.

When we left Wyoming and came back down into Utah. We went through the Uintas and Vernal again and then got on the UT 10 down to the I-70. We headed across the mountains over to the historical site of Cove Fort.
Cove Fort is a beautiful little oasis that was built under the direction of Brigham Young by Ira Hinckley in 1867. It was meant to be a place of protection and rest for people who traveled through Utah Territory. The fort would also include a telegraph station, a way station for the stage coach and a post office. Ira’s family would live at the fort and serve with him. It was built as a defense in case of problems with the Indians in the area, but the Hinckleys developed trade and good relationships with them instead. There was never a battle fought at this fort.
Cove Fort was built remarkably with stones and mortar made of lime and volcanic ash. The walls are 4 feet thick. You can see the ancient, inactive volcano in the distance. The displays of what life was like in the fort are remarkable. There is also a beautiful apple orchard like the fort had when it was active. 2 of the trees are old ones that have survived from that time! There is also a huge garden like those early settlers kept. Cove Fort is definitely worth the stop! Click to see a few of our favorite spots!

Here we are in front of the fort. Look at those amazing walls.

Here is a close up of the stonework. This special mortar of lime and volcanic ash only gets harder over the years.

In the distance between the chimneys you can see the ancient volcano that the ash came from. An interesting thing about the chimneys is that there is one for every room in fort.

This giant barn is a replica of the original. It is built mortise and tenon style. It is a tribute to the craftsmanship of the time, as well as the care that was put into this renovation.

There are 2 ways to enter Cove Fort. We entered off of the I-70, but exited over to the I-15. Since Glen has his senior pass to the National Parks, we decided to use it a bit on this trip! If you are 62 or over, you can purchase a lifetime senior pass that gets you into the parks for free. We were able to get his for $10 before the price went up to $80 (thanks Obama, ha ha), but it is still a great value if you enjoy visiting the National Parks. It normally costs $35 or more per car to enter them, so this trip more than paid for Glen's pass. We used Glen's card to visit Kolob Canyons and Zion's National Park in Utah.

The red rocks and geological stories in these two areas are breath taking. Here is one of my favorite photos from Kolob Canyons:

The scenic drive through Kolob Canyons is just 5 miles long, making it perfect for a short day trip.

From Kolob Canyons, we went further south and entered Zion's National Park. The park was packed and many people park outside of the part and just ride the shuttle to the various sights within the park. We chose just to take the scenic drive through the park from the west entrance to the east entrance on Highway 89. We saw a lot of camping sites and entrances to trails. We were able to drive through the mile long Mt. Carmel Tunnel. We made a little video of our trip!

Here are a few more photos of Zion's:

We had so much fun seeing all of the beautiful sites through Utah! Come back next week for our final installment about our trip when I will tell you about places to see in Arizona, our home state!

PS-I couldn't leave out this photo of the Cedar City LDS Temple! My husband didn't think I could get a good shot while he was driving because there were so many billboards. But, I think it came out pretty good!

If you enjoyed this post, you may enjoy some of these from the past:

Sites to See Near Casper, WY

Doing Disney With Toddlers

Regional Food in Upstate New York

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Sites to See Near Casper, Wyoming! Who Knew?

8/12/2019

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This post contains affiliate links. I will be compensated for purchased made through those links at no additional cost to you. All views expressed are my own. Thank you for your support!

This will be edition one of our trip from Phoenix, AZ to Casper, WY, and back again. Oh the places we saw! I have debated how to best tell you about our trip in a way that would be of benefit to you. We took 2 weeks to travel, visit and see the sites. But, many of the places we went are great destinations to go see for just a fun day outing or weekend trip, depending on your place of departure or your mode of travel. Some are places you may never have heard about, but you won't be disappointed if you go.

To begin, the main reason we planned this trip was because my granddaughter, Jayda, was getting baptized. This is a big event in her life and we wanted to be there for it. The timing was pretty busy for her family because my son had just started a new job in a town about 4.5 hours away from Casper. His wife deserves a giant shout-out for her strength and ability to get their home all packed up by herself, take care of their 5 children and prepare for this baptism with company (lots of family) coming all at the same time. She is an amazing woman.

There is my cute little Jayda all ready to be baptized!
Her Daddy is in the blue shirt getting ready to go to work. It makes me happy to see him switch from lawyer job to being the Dad who is worthy and able to baptize his daughter.
She is with cousins and siblings and her mommy. I love the photo where she is looking up at her Dad.
If you want to know more about our beliefs about baptism, you can click this link.

Sites to Visit Around Casper, WY

As you can see, we did a lot and had so much fun! I am going to make a list and some highlights of the sites we saw in Wyoming.

Ayers Natural Bridge: Near the city of Douglas, and less than an hour from Casper, this is a beautiful park nestled in a red rock canyon. It has camping areas and a playground and the bridge and water are beautiful. Our grandchildren played in the pool right under the bridge. The best part is, this beautiful park is totally free to use! Another fun thing is that the caretakers have made the park even more magical by adding little fairy houses and animals on the trees of the park. My granddaughter was captivated.

Casper Mountain: Just a few miles south of Casper is Casper Mountain. Drive up some winding roads and see a gorgeous view of the city below. There is camping among the tall pines available and beautiful meadows. We visited just after a music festival that was held there. The weather and the skies were gorgeous the day we went up.

Martin's Cove: This is one of 3 historical sites very close to each other along the road between Casper and Kemmerer. This site commemorates the Martin Handcart Company, one of the pioneer groups from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, better known as Mormon Pioneers. The Martin Company left too late in the season and as a result lost many of its members to disease, cold and starvation. In Martin's Cove, a rescue party was able to meet them and help save the remaining members of the company. One of my favorite stories from that rescue was of 3- 18 year old boys who carried the weak pioneers across the freezing Sweetwater River multiple times to safety.
At Martin's Cove, you can pull handcarts around a short interpretive walk, or borrow one for a longer trek of your own. We did that with our grandkids, took a picnic in our handcart and hiked about 4.5 miles. It was a great day, the kids were troopers and it was amazing to remember what those brave pioneers must have gone through.
*WARNING: Wear mosquito repellent!

Devil's Gate: The Sweetwater River flows through this natural gorge. The Pioneers often traveled through this spot into the Martin's Cove area. Again, wear repellent!

Independence Rock: I found out this giant rock with so many pioneer names carved on it was so named because the pioneers had to reach it by Independence Day to be able to have safe travel before winter hit. Unfortunately for the Martin and Willie Handcart companies, they didn't arrive there until November!
My husband climbed up to the top of the rock. I stayed below to take his picture. Yeah, that's why.

Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area: This beautiful red rock area along the Green River is magnificent! There is boating, hiking and camping available.

Have you been to any of these places? My husband and I really enjoyed Wyoming, It

There are antelope EVERYWHERE in Wyoming! We also saw a 4 point buck in velvet right in the side yard in the middle of Casper! It was amazing.

We didn't want to put a lot of miles on our own cars for this trip, so we rented from Enterprise. We rented a Nissan Rogue that was extremely roomy and got such terrific gas mileage! It was really nice.

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Fun Friday-3 Fun Board Games to Play with the Whole Family

8/9/2019

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This post contains affiliate links. I will be compensated for purchased made through those links at no additional cost to you. All views expressed are my own. Thank you for your support!

My husband and I just got home last night from our vacation to Wyoming to visit our oldest son's family! We had so much fun and I can't wait to tell you about everything we did. But, that is going to take a lot of picture editing and writing, so you are going to have to wait until next week. You can get a few hints from the photos above about the fun time that we had.
In the meantime, I thought I would share with you some of the games that we played with our grandchildren while we were there. I don't know if you have noticed, but kids love having adults play board games with them and it is always more fun if they are games that the adults love as well as the kids do. Our grandchildren asked us to play with them as soon as we got there and as a game lover myself, I was game to learn what their current favorites are. I think that I am going to have to get a couple of these for myself now! What made me the happiest was seeing that my son and daughter-in-law took the time to play with their kids and build those lasting memories and relationships.

Some of these games were not only fun, but educational as well. I am including links to them in case you feel like purchasing them.

Qwirkle:

This game is like an updated form of Dominos. In this case players match colors and shapes and try to make Qwirkles (6 in a set) to win! My 4 year old grandson teamed up with me and he was learning his shapes, colors, counting and pattern making as we played. It was also a great exercise in problem solving and cognitive thinking.

Googly Eyes:

Googly Eyes is much like a version of Pictionary except the person drawing the pictures wears vision altering glasses, which makes drawing much more difficult and also hilarious! My granddaughter, Shyanne, and I were a dream team, until she threw me over for her Aunt Lindsey! Ha ha ha. We had so much fun.

Ticket to Ride Europe:

You are probably familiar with Ticket to Ride. There are many versions of this fun game. My son's family recently got this Europe version and I was amazed at how quickly the older 3 kids have mastered it. I love how this game teaches geography, problem solving, planning ahead, math skills for scoring and patience! We all love Ticket to Ride, no matter what version you play.

There is no reason to wait for a family game night to play these games, or any board game for that matter. Now that school is starting for everyone, it is more important than ever to make the time to spend quality time with your kids, giving them time to connect with you and have some fun. School can be stressful and games like these can help them relax while they are still learning without knowing it. What board games are fun for your entire family? I'd love to know.

For other game ideas, here are a few of our past recommendations: