Vacation: Day 6

As we were planning to leave Grand Canyon National Park today, Shawna and I had intentionally planned to 'play up' today and the rest of the trip so that the kids would not get discouraged.We were all very excited about getting to go to two states we have nver been to before. We started out fairly early and stopped at McDonald's in a near-by village for lunch. We got some last looks at the canyon from the car and hit the road. We traveled to California and stopped at Taco Bell in California for lunch. I commented it taste the same in California as it does in Tennessee. We then moved on to Nevada and before we knew it, we were back in Arizona. We did not even get out of the car in Nevada but we can all say we have been there. Our original plan was to stay in Flagstaff, Arizona for the night but we got there and ate dinner (at Five Guys) and decided to move a little closer to Four Corners. We had Grampy do some ground work to find a hotel near Four Corner for us and we stayed a little over an hour away from the landmark. We passed the time in the car by having a devotional, reviewing Bible facts, and writting in our journals. We had an awesome day. Here are some pcitures of the day.

Can you tell who was in charge of taking pictures?

 

 JT and I are still very proud of our accopmlishment of hiking to the river and back in one day.

 

We ran into the Roakkill Cafe on our trip. JT thought it was cool but stated the drink he ordered tasted somewhat like gravel!

This was entering into California. Again, we slowed down but did not have to stop to talk to anyone.

Taco Bell tastes the same in California as it does in Tennessee!

On into Nevada but was not in the state for long.

Kaylee wanted to take pictures of the scenery.

 

It was a good day. And we were safe.

 

-j

Vacation: Day 5

Day five was planned to be a leisure day at the canyon. It was the last day at the canyon and we planned to do some touristing and having a good time. JT and I were very sore this day. JT really wanted some alone time and wanted to stay in the room which he did most of the morning. The family went and ate breakfast and then we took JT back to the room while Shawna, Kaylee and I toured some on the bus system. We also did some souvenir shopping. We also got to take a car tour along the rim of the canyon and stoppes several times for pictures. JT found some shirts and a hat which he really liked. The kids bought a lot of things for other family members. Shawna and I went and did some laundry. I was able to remember the Laundromat from when I came back in the 1980s as it was attached to the shower house by the campground. After touring, we went to a steak house (a plan JT and I had for our celebration of hiking the canyon). After dinner, Shawna and Kaylee went back to the room while JT and went to a lookout point and took even more picture. After we were all back in the room, we had a family devotional and I went and did some more laundry so that we can head out from the canyon fairly early in the morning. It was a good, relaxing, day.

-j

Vacation: Day 4 - Details

Okay, so I posted some pictures of the trail hike JT and I took. Now, I will give you a summary of the great day we had. I woke up around 3:50 AM and took a quick shower. JT and I got dressed and Shawna took us to the trailhead. We prayed together. One blessing I have noticed is how JT is really showing spiritual maturity when he leads prayers. It was cold and we were covered in layers but we were confident it would warm up as the sun came out and the day went on. It did. We hit the trail at about 4:40 AM and hiked at a fairly slow, but steady pace. We took about an hour to get to the mile-and-a-half rest house. We stopped and got something to drink. As you can see from the previous post, we took a lot of pictures. What you saw is a very small sampling of what we actually took. We got to the three-mile rest house at about 6:40 am and the sun was up enough that we did not need our flashlights any more. JT commented several times about the rock formations. We made it to about the half-way point down at a campground area called Indian Gardens at about 7:50 AM and stayed about 20 minutes. We ate some and then hit the trail to move on to the river. At a couple of points, JT wanted to turn around but with a little encouragement, we kept going. In the end, he stated he was very glad he did not turn around at all. We arrived at the river at 9:50 AM and rested a while. We continued to take a lot of pictures and take our time as we knew we had plenty of daylight left in the day. I was glad we left so early in the morning. The move up out of the canyon was slower for sure but we were keeping a steady pace. We got back to Indian Gardens at 12:10 PM. We turned out pants into shorts (the legs zipped off to convert them to shorts). We made it to the three-mile rest house at 1:50 PM and stayed a while. We were noticeably getting more sore and tired but still moving, slower but sure. It was 3:30 PM when we made it back to the mile-and-a-half rest house and we stayed for about 30 minutes. We would walk about 100 strides and rest for a couple of minutes. Every 10 sets of 100 strides, we rested longer and slowly moved on up out of the canyon. As we moved on, JT kept trying to text Shawna letting her know we were getting close. We made it back to the trailhead at about 5:30 PM making the total hike a little less than 13 hours.

Shawna took us to the room and JT and I took showers while Shawna and Kaylee went to get something to eat. After they got back, Shawna took me to get something to eat and JT insisted on not wanting to leave the room. I transferred the pictures from the camera to the computer and iPad. We had planned on having a family devotional but apparently, I was asleep by 8:00 PM. JT has since insisted it was the best day of vacation and wanted to talk to everyone about it. He even called his Grampy from the room (we did not get very good cell service at the canyon) and told him about the day. It was a great day!

-j

Week in Pictures

JT tested this week in Tae Kwon Do this week and acheived.

The kids had their last day of class this week. Next week is finals. So, I took a pictures of them before they went to school.

-j

Vacation: Day 4



Here are some pictures (of many) of our time on the trail, beginning to end.

 

-j

 



 

Weekly Update

Things have been interesting this week, to say the least. However, interesting seems to be a good word to describe our life in the family of N. Monday and Tuesday were fairly normal with the parents going to work and the kids going to school. Mom had an out-of-town event two days this past week but was able to come home for the evenings so we really did not notice anything different. The school where Mom teaches had their last week of classes and they have final exams this week so things are starting to wind down for the school year.

Dad resigned from his job. While that may seem like a shock to some of our readers, he says he has seen this coming for a while now. He does not have anything definite worked out right yet but has a lot of leads. This summer, he will start teaching adjunct at the same school Mom works so that will help out a little bit. He also has some speaking engagements lined up over the next few months which will help. We are actively praying for God's will to be done.

Phil Robertson, from Duck Dynasty, came to speak at a fund-raising event nearby this past week. Dad and Bubba got to go as Mom had secure some free tickets. They say they had a really good time.

-j&k