Arches: Day 2

There are a lot of pictures because I couldn't choose which ones were the best.  Since this is a blog documenting our adventures, you can just scroll down through.

Day two would be filled with a lot of hiking.  We decided to hike the Delicate Arch first, 3 miles round trip.  We knew we wanted to do this one and did it early in the morning to avoid some heat.  It was still very hot, but some of the trail had a nice breeze blowing through.

 I loved the view of Kara's braids and hat.  Cute hiker!

 This is a cabin that a rancher lived in.  I can't even imagine what life would have been like then.  I think I like my life.

 Last time we came to the Arches, Janiel was about 3.  This is the tree that she made it too.  She couldn't go any farther, so she and I sat under this tree while Brent and Wes hiked the rest of the way.  You can tell that Kara's cheeks are nice and flushed.

 Janiel has grown up a lot since our last hike here.

 Dad is passing out water to the hikers.  He said he felt like a nursing mother with the hydro pack on his back. They drank quite a bit of water...it was so hot!

 Walking along the edge of a cliff to get there.  It wasn't too bad and the other hikers were all considerate.

 There it is, just around the corner!

 We asked a man to take our picture.  And that is what he did.  He made sure he got all of us in the picture.  The arch, not so much.

 Wes and the girls definitely hiked a lot more than I did.  I stayed on the straight path, while they climbed up this rock formation and that.  Look at Wes and all the extra steps he took.  Glad they are young.

 They had piles of rocks called rock cairns to help us find our way back.

 Just some more shots of the kids on our way down the mountain.

 This was the trail to the Sand Dune Arch, .3 miles.  It is just amazing what formations there are.

 This is the actual Sand Dune Arch.  The wind was blowing really hard here and you can see how the arches are formed with that pelting sand!

 We saw that Broken Arch was just down the trail a bit, so we decided to hike there. That was a mistake.  It took a long walk to get there, 1.5 miles plus some extra detour we took.

 We found cacti on the way.

 Even a heart shaped one.

 Kara sat down and said, "My toes just want to be free!"  Her poor toes have been used to sandals and flip flops for the last 3 years.  They felt quite confined in hiking shoes.  My toes felt the same way!  So we let her toes have a breather.

 We made it to this arch with a crack in the top.  But we weren't sure if it was the broken arch or not.  So we kept hiking.  That is were our mistake happened.  We hiked and hiked to nothing.  So we turned around and hiked back.  Our feet were sure tired.  But our eyes sure enjoyed the view.

 Then we headed up to a group of arches at the top of the park.  The kids still took the long way!

 This is called the Tunnel Arch.  Pretty neat!

 Kids having another drink.

 While Wes scaled the walls.

 I love this shot of the kids on the fence.

 This one is called Pine Tree Arch.

 Our aching feet!  They sure were troopers!

 

 Skyline Arch, .5 miles.  A huge chunk fell out of the middle in 1940 and doubled the size of the opening.

 They weren't too tired to hike up the sand to the top of the crack! 

 I was, so the zoomed in picture isn't too clear.

 We were exhausted but had a full and rewarding day of hiking.  We probably covered over 7 miles of hiking.  I'm so glad that we were able to take that time to enjoy the magnificent beauties found on Earth.

We were even rewarded with a rainbow at the end of the day.

 We got to enjoy a pretty sunset on our drive home.