Bear Lake Day 2

We woke up bright and early on Day 2 and Tiffany and Jonny made breakfast. There were pancakes with chocolate chips and bacon. There was also a mouse in the trap, which we didn't eat, but which freaked out some of the more squeamish vacationers among us.

It's funny; we went to Bear Lake to play in the water, but we didn't actually spend a lot of time doing it. In fact, the second day we loaded up and headed for Minnetonka Cave before we even got anywhere near the water. On the way across the north end of the lake, which happens to be the south end of the Bear Lake Wildlife Refuge we saw a few bald eagles nesting in the branches of a telephone pole. Mark thought this was pretty awesome and regaled us with information about bald eagles and their nesting habits for the rest of the day.

One of the bald eagles we saw...and we saw them every day we were there!

We did make it to the cave, though. We had to wait outside before going in, and the boys had a lot of fun spotting fossils in the rock wall surrounding the parking lot. It has been Dad's dream for quite awhile to go into Minnetonka Cave, so he was super excited. Many campers were less excited when we saw a rat run out of the cave entrance as we approached. We weren't, though. We like wildlife--even the kind that tends to wipe out millions of people by spreading disease. In fact, we spent much of our time in the cave looking for bats, which we never spotted.

The boys have been pretty excited about caves lately, and we've done a lot of caving over the last year, but Minnetonka was a bit different. First, it is guided. Second, it has about 1,000 steps (actually it was around 890 or something). We didn't mind the steps, and the caverns inside were really cool. The last thing that is unique is that the cave dead ends. We've never done a guided cave where you have to turn around and go back out because there is only one opening. Unfortunately, Seth had to go to the bathroom, so when we finished the tour, he and Dad had to run out back along the path before there was an accident. This is the same thing that happened in Timpanogos Cave, so we've decide that caves make Seth need to pee for some reason.

Grandpa with all the grandkids who went in the cave (minus Hattie)!

We love caving!

Mark was so excited that we found all these fossils in the rocks.

Here's the crew who went in the cave. It was fun to go with everyone!

We are fans of bacon, even cave bacon 

We were glad we could take so many family pictures, even when Jonny photo bombs!

We all liked this train rock. 

This is the end of the cave. Now we have to turn around and climb 899 stairs. AAHH!

We are not joking about the stairs!

After the cave we spent a little time in Paris, Idaho. There is a beautiful tabernacle there that we enjoyed, a tiny museum that we tried, and one restaurant. We shared a table with the Poole's and let Tiffany order a raspberry chicken pizza to share, which tasted exactly like that face your making.

Hattie loved playing peek-a-boo with Dax.

Dax chowed down this whole plate of spaghetti.

The Paris Tabernacle

Here we are inside the tabernacle. I think Randy is telling Daniel something very fascinating.

The Poole's were the only good sports to make the trek out to the Paris Ice Cave with us, though, which was a highlight of the trip. It is very small, but I think we actually liked it better than Minnetonka Cave. We had to travel out a dirt road quite a ways, but the cave has two sections, one for everybody, and one for the adventurous sort. First, we went into the opening and across a wide boardwalk over the water. The cave opened up into a small cavern with no ceiling, and a few steep, nasty paths you could attempt to climb up and out. There was also a dark, foreboding crack in the back of the cave. Of course, we had to crawl through and see the ice. It was really dark back there, but there were towers of ice standing throughout the cave, and the floor was covered with a thin sheet of ice and frigid water. Tiffany even managed to get Hattie back there, which was pretty amazing. So we decided to forgive her for the pizza.

Here we are outside the Paris Ice Cave. 

Tiff was a real trooper hauling Hattie around everywhere.

This ice reached top to bottom.

It was cold in the cave, but it was so fun.

Blurry pic, but Randy lit the huge ice piece up with a lantern.

It was time to head back to the house, so we drove back and Dad pumped up the new boat. The boys loved the boat, and the beach, even though Dad let Seth's flip-flops wash away with the waves. One amazing thing about Bear Lake is the shallowness of the shoreline. You can walk out 100 yards at the water won't get much past your bellybutton. We wondered how far an adult could walk out before it went neck deep, but it was too far to leave the kids to find out. We had all the kids in the water, and the littlest ones like Charlie and Seth wanted to ride in the boat. The bigger boys just wanted to try and paddle. We discovered that paddling isn't nearly as easy it seems, and only Dad could actually make the boat move in the direction he wanted. Mom and Jonny went in hopeless little circles and felt pretty proud of that, though.

We had so much fun at Bear Lake!

Seth loved the boat. He was not good with the oars!

Mark and Daniel love spending time together.

Dax loves the water.

We ended up spending most of the evening at the lake and when we got back to the house Grandpa had barbequed hamburgers and hotdogs. Then we did stories again. This time it was the Poole's turn. Mom was smart enough to record all these stories for the ages on her phone.

After the kids fell asleep, we went outside to look at the stars. The sky was astounding on the dark side of the lake, and you could easily pick out any constellation. Dad set up the star-binoculars and found several cool things to gaze at in Sagittarius, and most people came out for a look at the constellations and the Milky Way. It was another magical day.

Bear Lake Day 1

Grandpa Daniels rented out a house at Bear Lake this year and invited everyone to come stay for 3 nights. This sounded like just the right adventure for us, and it turned out to be perfect.

Our first stop on the way to Bear Lake was the American West Heritage Center in Cache Valley. We had heard about this pioneer site, but we'd never made it to the property. It was really fun! We got to milk a cow, gather chicken eggs, ride the train, and pan for gold. We even threw axes at a target, which we were really bad at. The boys enjoyed it, though. They also rode horses, watched the blacksmith, and played with pioneer toys all before lunch.

Our boys loved seeing the farm animals.

Panning for gold was lots of fun!

Riding the train!

Randy is really good at selfies now.

I loved that they made them wear helmets. 

Randy was the only one with any force in his throw.

Seth was surprisingly good at this game.

Dax really liked this pioneer game.

We stopped at our favorite restaurant in Logan for lunch, which is called Angie's and then picked up the paddleboards that we got free for helping someone with our blog. Sadly, we never actually got the paddleboards in the water. The boys also wanted to stop and take pictures at the temple in Logan before we headed up the canyon to Bear Lake.

The Logan Temple had beautiful flowers!

We actually stopped at two temples. Brigham City was also needed in Seth's temple book.

Mmmm....we love Angie's in Logan. The scone was delicious.

Mom and Dad wanted to do a hike in the canyon, and we couldn't decide between Limber Pine Trail and Tony Grove Trail. We finally chose Limber Pine because it was right on the road. The trail was really nice, and our boys are awesome hikers. They were super-excited that you could see Bear Lake from the trail, too.

These two have become such great hikers!

Dax found a fun tree seat!

The Limber Pine Trail leads to this huge tree!

I love hiking with Mark. He always has such a great attitude!

Next we went to the rental house, which was on the northeast side of the lake in Idaho. None of us had spent time on the north beach of Bear Lake, so it was a new experience. Dad had camped on the south shore, and it is a muddy mess compared to the beach in Idaho. And the house we stayed in had private beach access on the north side.

Here was our private beach. The kids just went out the back door. 

The house was called the Three Bears Cottage, and was decorated with a bear theme. It had a fully stocked kitchen, 2 bedrooms inside, one for Tiffany's family and one for Grandma and Grandpa, and a small living room. Outside there was a fully screened porch that ran around three sides of the house. We stayed on the south side, Melanie's family stayed on the northside, and Brittany stayed on a futon on the west side. It wasn't huge, but Mark and Dax had bunkbeds and we set up a cot for Seth. Mom and Dad shared a pull out futon that was really pretty comfortable. There was only a curtain for privacy, but we still felt it was the best spot in the house, because the huge window screens kept the bugs out and let the cool mountain air in. It was almost cold at night, despite it being July, which delighted Dad.

Seth wishes we could live here.

We loved all the Bear decor!

We can't wait to stay here again--that is if Grandpa lets us!

After setting up "camp" we rode back around the lake to get a shake and dinner for the boys at LaBeau's. There was a terrifying moment when an RV blew right through the stop sign in Garden City at about 40 mph just as we were turning, but thanks to Dad's top-notch driving, or maybe luck, we narrowly skittered through the intersection and avoided a collision.

It was fun to spend so much time with family over the three days in Bear Lake, and we did almost everything together but in our seperate vehicles. I'm not sure LaBeau's liked having 20 of us pull up for dinner and shakes at the same time, but we blended right in with the crowd of about 200 other people at the restaurant.

We loved this little restaurant!

After dinner we drove south around the lake so we could see the other side. There isn't much over there, just a few campgrounds and a lot of sagebrush.

Grandma had made a special request that each family take a night and tell a story that they remembered from their childhood. Our boys worked really hard over the weeks before the trip so that they could each tell a story on our night, which was the first night. It was so much fun to tell and hear the stories! Dad told a story about his birth, which he calls The Baby That Ruined Christmas. Mom told a story about a tarantula and its babies that happened when she was a little girl in California. Mark told about all the head injuries he's had and how he's been, stitched, stapled, and glued shut. Dax told a story about his first birthday when he dumped the cake on his head. And Seth told a story with Mom's help about how he hiked to the North and South Windows at Arches all by himself when he was only 1 year old. Our stories sort of set a tone that everyone would tell a story, not just the adults, and we hope this tradition continues, because it was so much fun.

Camping on the Mirror Lake Highway

We love our new tent! 

This year we bought a brand new tent as we were having trouble with a few of the poles on the old one. This tent sets up in seconds, which we really love.

So we took the new tent up on the Mirror Lake Highway and set it up at Soapstone Campground. We made a trip of it and ate at the High Mountain Cafe and visited the Fairy Forest. We even did a few hikes including one around Teapot Lake, and one to Ruth Lake. We adore the High Uintahs and the cooler temperatures you can find up there in the summer-- it was about 20 degrees cooler than in the valley.

We saw these Osprey near Jordanelle State Park.

We ate at Hi-Mountain Drug which was delicious.

We checked on our rocks in the Fairy Forest. They are doing pretty well.

Provo River Falls is always a stop when we visit the Mirror Lake Highway.

Teapot Lake is beautiful. We had fun walking around this lake.

We love hiking in the Uintahs.

Dad is becoming quite the photographer.

This finch was showing off!

Four little ants, sitting on a log...

We have the best hiking boys ever!

Natalie is thinking about a dip in the stream.

Mom just turned around and walked away when she saw this.

The water at Ruth Lake was really clear.

And we are serious about our rock throwing.

We enjoy sitting around the campfire, and the boys are all about playing baseball with sticks and pinecones rather than plastic bats and balls. As we were relaxing close to dark the camp manager came by to tell us that a black bear was spotted across the road from the campground. We thought that the boys might be a little scared, but they were super-excited to see a bear! Unfortunately we weren't that lucky.

You can play baseball no matter where you are.

We went for a short hike around the campground so we had to be prepared with head lamps and lanterns.

Mom spotted a beautiful Dark-Eyed Junco

Soapstone is right next to the Provo River.

Dax found a rock shaped like Utah. He was so proud!

Playing games by lantern light is our favorite part of camping.

This was one of our fellow campers.

We saw this beautiful deer next to the road.

The boys went right to sleep as they always do when we are camping. They missed the main part of the adventure, which was a torrential downpour on our new tent that lasted for about 2 hours. Lightning struck with blinding flashes and thunder immediately rumbled and rolled around the entire canyon. It was a thunderstorm for the ages. We just lay there and laughed and hoped the tent was as waterproof as advertised. We were a little bit surprised that it was, and only a few drops of water had to be wiped out of the inside the next morning.

It was definitely a camping trip that we will remember for a long time!

Mom and Dad had a lot of fun watching the full moon rise over the mountains.