Grand Canyon and Zion Nat Park

Part 3!!!!!

Grand Canyon was a really cool camp ground. We set the tents up in a little circle and had a private long-drop! Lucky us eh? This was our last night in our tent (Billy)… except we ended up sleeping out under the stars cause they were just so twinkly and beautiful. But I’m getting a little ahead of myself. First off, on the way we made up some paper-bag masks so that we would be blindfolded from the view up until the last minute. Adam saw this as another opportunity to wear his creepy tranny mask whose eyes and mouth he covered with the electrical tape. Don’t worry, I’ve thrown it out now. As we piled out of the van the walk to the edge was really an exercise in trust as Monica led us in single-file past the confused public to a view point. It was really worth it though. I’ve never seen anything so incredibly vast. It was breath-taking. Well I thought so… then Adam exclaimed “well its not what I imagined”. He still to this day believes that tv ruined this moment for him. That sunset we watched over the Canyon before heading back to make dinner. Where team B (that’s us plus Rohan and Mark) kicked culinary butt with our shepherds pie, cauliflower cheese, green-beans, sweetcorn and peas. The fire that night was HUGE and toasty and we settled down to sleep under the stars to the sound of near-by Coyotes. We were up at the crack of dawn to see sunrise (much the same as sunset but in reverse) and do a hike down the canyon…then back up again. Check out the pics.

Zion

Our last night out camping, our last national park and our last hike was today at Zion. I’d never thought about seeing Zion so I didn’t know what to expect. Although the name should have given it away I think that everyone was completely unprepared for how incredible this place was. It was named by the Mormons who tried to settle there because of its intense natural beauty but they had to move out because of problems with river flooding. Anyhoo, it was made into a national park and I vote it up there next to Yellowstone… or pretty damn close. It has the deep red rock of “The Great Staircase” but has all this lush green vegetation aswell. Check out the photos, I just can’t do it justice. That night we didn’t bother with the tents and pretty much the whole group slept out under the stars. It was the best nights sleep I’d had, really warm in my sleeping bag but with a cool breeze on my face. It was the perfect way to end the last 4 or 5 weeks of camping. The hike that we did here was called Angels Landing. It was my favourite one of the whole trip because it was pretty short with amazing views at the top and a good bit of steep incline rock scrambling for excitement/adrenaline or whatever. This bit was sooo much fun, it was really narrow and some bright spark had to put the cables… when there was any… on the inside rather that the outside. This meant that at times we were scrambling along a 12” ledge with a drop half way down the mountain. Anyhoo, it only took about 4 hrs so we were done before the hottest part of the day and still pretty full of energy for the night in Vegas...

next installment coming soon!

Monument Valley and an early halloween

Heres part 2 of our catch up posts...:

Ok, so for all those who have seen Forrest Gump you may recollect the point where he decides to stop running and go home. On route to Monument valley we passed that very spot and played chicken with the passing traffic as we tried to get some pics of us in action. No casualties and some good group shots later we headed on to our first real cultural experience of the trek. We were really excited, cause we are sad like that… and we were gonna get to meet some Navajo Indians and stay the night in one the their traditional Hogons (mud homes that look a bit like an igloo, but orange and with a complex wooden structure thing inside). This was also the first time we were gonna get to stay in the heart of one of these incredible landscapes away from other campers and hikers.

The reserve was AMAZING, the whole world as far as you could see was deep reds and oranges… exaggerated by the fact that we arrived pretty much at sunset. We were picked up by Marvin… possibly the funniest guy we met on the whole trip… in his make-shift tour jeep on which we feared for our lives at every turn. I think that his true calling was to be a stunt driver cause that is the only reason I can imagine why he would hit the accelerator at every sharp corner or vertical drop. He took us around the valley, pointed out the shapes in the towering rocks and told us any myths or stories about them. As the sun went down he took us to some rock carvings that he had to illuminate with a torch. That only made it more atmospheric. Last thing before heading to the hogons, he took us to a cave with the shape of an eagle on the ceiling where we lay back whilst he sang us some native songs.

At the camp we were served a delicious meal and danced and sang around the fire before heading off to our sleeping bags in the hogon. Just before we turned into bed we did some star gazing and I saw the brightest shooting star EVER. Perfect. In the morning we were up before the sunrise and headed out to get some pics as the sun crept over the horizon. Despite the fact the Elmer (our Navajo informer) made no sense at all and managed to avoid answering any question with a structured sentence, I would recommend this trip to everyone! For those wondering where monument valley is… for oldies John Wayne films were set here… for middle-agers Back to the Future 3 (bit at the start with the Indians and cavalry) was here and if both of the above are before your time Will Smiths Wild Wild West film, Mission Impossible 2 (the bit at the start where he is rock climbing) and one of Metallica’s rock videos were all here as well.


Easterns Halloween,
Ok, so somewhere along the trip we had decided to have an early Halloween party, carve pumpkins, dress up and dance the night away. Don’t know how that happened… but as I’ve always wanted to celebrate a proper American Halloween I was pretty chuffed with the whole idea! After an on-route dip in the controversial Lake Powell, we made our way to a super Wal-Mart to put together some creepy consumes. Now Adam really took the word CREEPY and ran with it. In fact he ran with it sooo far that barely anyone would dare say a word to him later that night. Everyone else had dressed up as zombies, vampires, clowns, witches … the usual. Adam however being the creative little being that he is donned a skin-suit and a tranny mask. Then he covered himself in fake blood and carried a butchers knife around with him. I’ll say no more. We made some delicious punch and had an awesome night.

Seattle to Utah

Hey all, So while we were on trek america we wrote some blogs that never made it to the net... here is the first. Sorry for the lack of photos, the internet here is on Fiji time. Just keep checkin flickr, we'll put some more on when we get to New Zealand in 3 days!

p.s what did you all do on Monday the 6th? For us the day disappeared totally as we crossed the international date line... weird or what! We want to live our lost monday through you guys!

Over the last week we've gone from having freezing cold weather to really hot down here in the desert. We've also been some amazing places and done some wicked things!

So lets start from the top! Seattle was kinda fun, Adam REALLY liked it, it had a really creative atmosphere and the Pike Place market was wicked! It probably helped that some of his fav photographers are based there too. We got to see the original starbucks and got a well needed thermos which was to become our best buddy over the next few days as the weather got colder and colder.

The next day we were off to Montana to stay on a cowboy ranch and do some horse riding. It was a great place, check out the pics! we lodged in cowboy lean-tos made of canvas... complete with some muddy bear prints leaning up on the window. We rode in the evening as the sun was setting on a small loop around the ranch. got a bit of a trot in but nothing too dramatic. Adam looked a little ridiculous on his 3 yr old ... having said that he didn't want a pansy ass horse... he got the smallest of the bunch! tehe. In the evening the ranch over did a cook out of spare ribs and we played pool and checkers in the barn with the new members of the group.

Then it was off to yellowstone, possibly one of the most beautiful places i have ever seen. We spent 2 days hiking around, seeing amazing waterfalls, golden plains, bison, elk deer and the hot springs. On the evening of the first day we went up to boiling river (sounds cool or what!), where a river and a hot-spring meet, creating a hot section of the river, we spent an hour swimming around in the hot water, carefully avoiding all the cold currents!. Next day we were off to see 'ol faithfull', who as promised went up in all his glory. Whilst hiking around this area we were chatting on the trail when about 10foot away a large rock stood up..... well a dirty great bison got up (at this point the warning signs stating to stay at least 50ft away from bison as they would 'gore you' came to mind as we backed away slowly!) he gave us one quick snort then walked off down the path.

Camping in yellowstone was essentially hell. no kidding, there was a 70% threat of snow (thank god the 30% won out!) but it did get down to -5c. so everything froze, beer, pens toothpaste, deodorant, shampoo (didnt know that could happen).

From yellowstone off to jackson, a cowboy town where we went white-water rafting, which was amazing! it was just like in the movies! the best bit was when Tess got to sit at the front for one rapid and the biggest wave threw here right back into the boat (hehe). Whilst here we went to the Grand Teton nation park, and did a morning hike up around jenny lake, it was like a blue mirror reflecting the mountains and trees, again one of the most beautiful places we have vistited. Here camping was just as bad, we had to leave at 6am (up at 5) as we packed up the tents were frozen, which made it even more fun!

Now we are in Utah (a dry state!) at arches nation park. Its amazing here, again the places we go keep getting better and better. Last night we hiked up to watch the sun set over delicate arch, the sunset mixed with the reds of the sandstone was amazing, looked just like a wild west movie!

hope you like the photos!

cya all later

Speed blog

Hey, greetings from Seattle. We only have a few mins on the internet (spent most of the time puting photos up on flickr). In the last week we've been to San Fran (awesome) met an Alcatraz in-mate who signed our book and went on a sailing sunset cruise and a wine tasting!; we've been kayaking in the Redwood forest, Dune buggies in Florence, been painting in Paradise (Mt Rainier), Bathed in the Hot Springs of Olympic Nat Park and went to a rainforest (spent about 40hours in a van driving between all these places!).

Anyhoo hope you all love the photos on flickr... there'll be more on the way! oooohhhh, cause of all this camping we have had chipmonks play on the tents, raccoons try to steal our food and some dirty great bears patrolling the campsites! tehe.

No idea when we'll have access to the net again but keep checkin!

Miss you all.

Top of The Dome

Just a quick one. Here is a panorama from the top of the dome! see a bigger one on flickr... Enjoy!

trekkin' tales

hey people, 

well we are in the first few days of the trek, and so far after LA we traveled up to Santa Barbara which is just like in the O.C, then up the big Sur and route 1 to Marina before heading inland to Yosemite nation park and now we are in San fran preparing to leave for the redwood forests tomorrow phew.....

anyhoo i have loaded  a ton of photos up (so far i have taken over 600 in 4 days so think yourselves lucky that only 49 made it to flickr....)

We have lots of fun stories but the one we are proud of was at Yosemite, where we decided to go on a hike and climb up the half dome mountain..... google it.....its big!

We had the idea that we would go on the hike as far as we could then when it got too hard, we would take some photos and come back down... well after 11hours, 16 miles and a 5000ft elevation gain we reached the top...

we started off on the easy walk and reached the first waterfall, from the pictures you can see i still had my sense of humor and Tess was feeling good about the experience.

By the 2nd water fall (considered the medium hike), our spirits were failing, but the views of the mountains and the semi-cute animals kept us going (even thought this bit included a grueling climb up 600 steps well not really steps, just big stones that jutted out, ouch)

now the difference from the medium walk to the hard was noticeable, the path kinda disappeared from time to time and the incline got much greater till in the end we had to scramble up a granite surface to reach the top!..

well we thought we were at the top, as we came over the top this was the view that greeted us..

now you notice the small back dots on the left had side of that rock, yup they are crazy ass people climbing up the side of a 85 degree wall, using nothing but two guide ropes to support them. Now we arent stupid, and so we decided to be happy with the semi-top (which is just as cool) we got to after 5hrs, anyhoo, its not the winning the matters, its the taking part.

What a load of toss, what a naff blog story that we be for you guys. We saw those ropes and ( after a little hesitation) the adrenaline kicked in and up we went, a 120m climb up a granite surface with no safety rope just so we could share these photos with you guys! yes, YOU! we just cant stop giving!

on the photos the little black dots sitting on the end of the rock are us! 

all comments on how amazing we are will be appreciated.

Of course the only problem with going up is the coming down, another 4hrs down with knee destroying steps and tracks.... but hey we did get to see a bear (just before he was shot by a ranger...with a bean bag to scare him away, which was mighty cool!)

anyhoo just wanted to rave about how amazing we are!

adam x

ps tess is still tending her massive blisters ( will get photos cos they are gross)

Vermont and a run in with Gustave

Alright, I think that our regulars haven't been getting their blog fix this week, sorry! Its been a manic week... or rather a manic weekend and several days of stress recovery!

So we packed up (or rather threw all our stuff into the boot of a rented car) last Friday and headed north into rural New England. City living was fun and all but it was time to follow the trees and see some of the countryside. Basically, we had spent some time watching episodes of the Gilmore Girls and wanted to see small town living Vermont style. On the 4 hour drive up through New Hampshire: "Live Fee or Die"... yes their state slogan was such a shock that I missed the camera op, so you'll just have to believe me... we stopped off in the White Mountain National Forest for a walk, a wonder and a run in with some pretty persistent mosquitoes.




By the late evening we arrived in Cabot where we met Lydia and her Mum... the plan was to meet her in town, when we asked where in town she replied that we'd know that when we got there. Turns out town was only two shops so all was well. We had a perfect evening in Caleb and Mary's farm house where we picked and ate the best sweetcorn I have ever tasted, home-grown burgers and many local favorites like local ales, dips and of course Ben and Jerry's ice cream. Thank you for having us!

As we woke up the next morning we found out that Hurricane Gustave was heading towards New Orleans and that our flight for the following morning was canceled. With a lot of help from Lydia and Peggy (Brock's mum) we avoided too much financial pain... sort of. Honestly, both of you deserve medals thank you soooooooooooooooooooo much. So hurricane or no we had not been deterred from visiting Ben and Jerry's factory on Saturday. It was tasty and filled us with dreams of creating an empire of ice cream!




To de-stress Lyds took us to Brock's bar/restaurant called Splash, on the Lake Champlain water front of Burlington (which is also really pretty). It was really beautiful and the water didn't smell like lakes in England. It was clear, fresh and bordered by distant mountains. Vermont really was the most beautiful place we've seen in America. Anyhoo, that in mind we got drunk... and took photos... eeek.

Next day we took a dip in their private beach which was realllllly cold but definitely chilled me out. I say we of course by that I meant me and Lydia , the boys were too chicken. HA. Then we headed out to the mountains to get a good view of the landscape... truly breathtaking. You all should go see it.



In the evening we were lucky enough to get an invite to the family corn-roast... even after we has been such a pain with stress and phone calls, can you believe it! We headed out into the sticks to Lydia's grandmothers farm. This was such a cool night, we got driven on a chevy truck thing to a field where a fire was lit and a buffet of homemade grub was laid out on the back of a truck. Our gift the the group was a pack of jammy-dodgers and some hobnobs. I think they went down pretty well!



Having Brock as a chef/tour guide we got to experience over the next few days the best breakfast places in town (they were amazing, i have a new appreciation of breakfast and its many forms). Throughout the week we camped at North beach, an amazing site right next to the water with amazing views across to the mountains, and spent 2 days wondering up and around the lake and the town, eating in cafes, going to tea shops, shopping and watching Tv at Lydia's.

Now we are sitting in LA after a 7hr flight across country, tomorrow we start our 28 day Trekamerica, so for those Blog junkies out there, expect some delays!! but we cant wait, its going to be amazing!!!