For our family vacation this year we loaded up our minivan with lots of children and lots of stuff and hit the road for 9 days.
We first spent a couple of days in Las Vegas where stayed at the Excalibur hotel. The kids thought it was so cool that we were sleeping in a castle! We played carnival games to win stuffed animals, swam in the pool and went down the water slide, walked through the M&M's store, ate at the Rainforest Cafe, saw the Bellagio water show, went inside the Luxor pyramid, and we finished our stay with a Vegas buffet breakfast.
After playing in Vegas we headed toward Utah! Everything was going smoothly on our drive and we were so close to our destination of Spanish Fork, Utah when one of our tires blew. It was scary but we were able to pull over safely and Matt, my hero changed the tire and put on our spare in about 15 minutes. All was well again as we headed closer to our destination until the spare tire blew. Luckily we were able to safely pull to the side of the freeway again but now we had no spare tire and the sun was going down. Long story short, we ended up on the side of the freeway for about 3 hours until a tow truck came to our rescue with a new tire. The kids were such troopers and stayed relatively happy while we waited. So, about 4 hours and $300 later we were on the road again. We arrived in Spanish Fork, exhausted around midnight. It just adds to the adventure and memories of a family road trip!
We spent a few days in Utah Valley visiting family and friends. We had a great time swimming in a fun community pool with water slides, playing with cousins, and visiting Temple Square in Salt Lake City.
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| Thank you Julie & Alan for taking such good care of us...so fun! | |
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| Time with Great Grandpa |
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| Taking a ride |
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| Drumming with Dan |
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| Helping with the harvest of the Lewis family garden |
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| Matt and Dan |
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| On the road again...with slurpees! |
We spent the remainder of our trip in St. George, Utah with Natalie, Jed, and Ella. They always take such good care of us and we always have a great time when we're together! We spent one full day at Zion National Park where we hiked, saw the Emerald Pool and the Weeping Rock, waded in the river, caught tadpoles in the stream, and saw deer, wild turkeys, and gray foxes. We arrived at the park in the late afternoon so the sun was behind the huge rocks which gave us mostly shade. And the bus system is great-buses run every 15 minutes between all the hiking trails. We ended up staying until 8:30pm because we were having such a great time. I highly recommend Zion National Park as a fun family vacation destination!
Our final day in St. George was spent playing in the water fountains near city hall and swimming in the huge community pool.
We left early in the morning for our drive home so the kids could make it to their final chess class. We drove up just in time for them to compete in the chess tournament. Then that evening we went to Grandma's house and the kids had a campout with cousins in Grandma's backyard. A fun finale to our incredibly fun vacation!
