Easter Sunday

 Riverton, Utah High 70 Low 45

Here I am working on the window.

We have been busy since we got home. I started some of the repairs to the truck and fifth wheel. I got one of the windows in the 5er out and got it ready for the stained glass. Yesterday we went grocery shopping and in the afternoon picked up Cindy's Christmas china that we had bought at the estate sale in St. George in January.

4 kids that usually don't like pancakes.

Today was Easter, and the morning started out with cinnamon roll pancakes with four of the grandchildren.  The pancakes were a hit with all four picky eaters. We had some of the family over for Easter lunch. It was kind of stressful on us old folks, a lot of noise and running around. We had three of the kids, eight grandkids, and two great grandkids, and several spouses and one boyfriend here, so we had quite a house full.

We ate lunch, and then because of the difference in ages of the kids, had different Easter egg hunts. We started out with the little kids, with the eggs pretty much in plain sight. The next group was the six to eight year olds. The eggs were hidden a little better.

Getting ready for the Easter egg hunt.

He was having a good time.

Little ones getting lots of encouragement.

These kids are hurrying to see who can get the most eggs.

These were the winners.

Last there were teams of two with one of the team blindfolded, and guided by the other team member. The winners got a large chocolate candy bar. It was a lot of fun for everyone.

The proud couple.

He could hardly move the pinata.

After that, we had partly filled the Audit Piñata (see the retirement bog in St. George) with candy and hung it up so the kids could take turns trying to break it. We let the little ones swing at it about as many times as they wanted. They didn't do much damage. The little older ones went next, until one of the finally got a hole in the piñata, spilling some of the candy. One of the older ones took a swing, and finished it off, spilling candy all over. They seemed to have a lot of fun doing this.

Skyler did break a hole in it.

Again, no damage.

Home run!

Plenty for everyone.

Drawing with sidewalk caulk.

We weren't the only ones worn out!

Cindy and I were so tired out, that we had a short nap after everyone went home. Overall it was a good day. Tomorrow will not be a good day; we have to do get our taxes ready for our accountant fun fun…

Home!

Riverton, Utah High 64 Low 43

Sorry, no pictures today. We were driving home yesterday. It was quite a pleasant drive from St George, although a little longer drive than I have got use to, a little over 300 miles. The sun was shinning, and no wind. Even Utah County freeways were OK. It was good that they finally got through with all the construction.

Now we will spend the next month getting repairs done to the truck and camper for our journey to Alaska. I have one more I hadn't planned on. When Cindy closed the slides yesterday, she told me that one of the living room slides had made quite a bit of noise. It closed alright, and I didn't give it any more thought, but when we opened it up after we got home, the same slide wouldn't open all the way. On checking out the problem, I could see that part of one of the cables that open and close the slide, there are four on each slide, had pulled out of the end and the cable had become frayed. Part of the cable was wrapped around the rest of the cable, and that section would not go through the pulleys.

I called the Montana dealer, who is now part of Camping World, to see if I had any guarantee  left. Guess what, we had a year guarantee, and have owned the fifth wheel for almost two years, so no factory guarantee. The service man said this was the first time he had heard of anyone having a problem. He thought the new cable shouldn't be a problem to get.  Lucky me. Cindy says, "better now than in Alaska."

Cindy has been home for 1/2 day and is on her way out to work on the yard. Today we have to take our car in for repairs. Our daughter has been using it while we were gone, and it got a coolant leak a couple of days ago.

We have several other home projects to do, along with the other things I knew about. I can't wait for May to  get here, so we can head North.

Grafton

St George, Utah High 77 Low 50

 We went to the ghost town of Grafton. I guess we like to see ghost towns. The first stop was the old cemetery. There were a lot of readable tombstones. There was on headstone with the names of 2 brothers and the wife of one of them. They were all killed on the same day by Indians. There was a monument that said the cemetery and some of the town were restored in 2004. The cemetery was interesting.

Next we went to the town site. The first building we saw was once the school and on Sundays, the church. There was a sign in the window telling that in 1930 a movie was filmed using the building. They had also built a saloon next door for the movie. Two of the houses had been partially restored. We could go into one of them. Across the road was another log cabin. It looked like it had never been restored, but we couldn't be sure. There also was an old barn, but we couldn't get very close to it. According to the signs, the last people to live in the town left in 1945.

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The road to Grafton.

There were several wooden head boards.

One of the views going up the bad road.

Partially restored home.

School/ Church.

Old log home

This tell about the 1930 movie.

Closer view of the log home.

Another view of the restored home.

The log home in it's natural surrounding.

Old Barn

Old home, not restored.

Old shed.

A little different view of Zion's.

The road got a lot worse!

Another view of Zion's

Two more views.

Along the "road" up the mountain

We were glad to see smooth dirt road!

I had read about a scenic road that went from Rockville to Apple Valley. I decided to try it. The Road was so rough and steep, that Cindy didn't want to go on it. I didn't really have anywhere to turn around, so we kept going. After a while we could see Zion’s and we got some nice pictures. By then the road wasn't quite as bad, and I told Cindy that we hadn't had to put the truck into 4 wheel drive, so it wasn't too bad. To be honest, I was sorry we had taken the road for a ways, but we did get some nice pictures. Once we got on top the road was fairly smooth and got a lot better. I definitely would not recommend a car trying to go over it.

St George, Utah High 77 Low 48

Today we went to Zion’s National Park. When we got near the entrance gate, there were two lines waiting to go into the Park. As we got nearer we showed a ranger our Golden Age pass. He waived us into another lane that was marked Employee Lane and we went right into the park, bi-passing what was still a long line of cars. We found a parking space at the visitor center, and because we had not stopped at the entrance, I had to go to the information counter to get maps and info about the Park. We found out that there was a free shuttle service we had to use to go to the scenic drive, as private vehicles were not allowed after March 24. The shuttle was OK, and we got where we wanted to go without any problems.

Our first stop was the Zion Human History Museum. There were many displays of the different cultures that had lived in the Park. The most recent were the Mormon pioneers in the 1860’s. They are the ones who named it Zion’s.

 

We took what was a little over a mile trail to Emerald Pools. The water was running off the mountain, and felt like rain. It was a good walk/hike for us. On the way to the pools, we could hear a wild turkey calling, but were unable to see him. The day was cloudy, and some of the pictures are not as brilliant as we would have wanted, but the day was quite pleasant.

Part of the trail to Emerald Pools. Both upper pictures are of the water coming down from the upper pools.

After our walk, we went back to the truck. Cindy had prepared lunch, and after we ate, we went up the highway toward the tunnel. The ranger had already told us we couldn't go through the tunnel with our dually pickup, but there were places to turn around by the tunnel. The views from going up the hill toward the tunnel were worth it, as they gave us a different view of the mountains. 

We took quite a few pictures, and I will mostly let them speak for themselves.

Part of the Virgin River by the Zion Inn.

More of the water coming from the upper Pools.

Part of the switch backs to get to the tunnel.

This shows one of the portals in the tunnel.

Taken at the furthest turn around we could go to before going back down the canyon.