one final hurrah

We've been looking forward to spending Labor Day weekend at Lake Powell for weeks and weeks. The most fabulous lake did not disappoint. The water was about 80 degrees and perfect for swimming all day. Here is a view of our tiny campsite in Slickrock Canyon with the main channel in the background. This picture was taken from atop a crazy difficult climb up a sandy, prickery hill.

One of the most amazing things to witness in the desert is a thunderstorm/rainstorm. One night- there was a crazy thunderstorm with tons of thunder and lightening at dusk and on into the night, followed by quite a bit of rain. Luckily, we were pretty cozy all sleeping in the boat and Steve O and I just got our toes a bit wet, the kids stayed dry in the cuddy cabin. The next day- another storm rolled in, it rained hard and then the moment we had all been waiting for... this waterfall started pouring off the cliff next to our camp. The cliff was so high (hundreds of feet- my best guess) that when the water finally made it to the rocks below it was just a misty spray.

This little chump (the squirrel, not my son) had been trying to break into our food all weekend. He chewed the plastic tubs until his little squirrel mouth bled (gross). Finally, he caught a break and sniffed out some goldfish crackers left in the pocket of this chair. He'd either been around people a lot on this particular beach where we were camping and been somewhat tamed throughout the summer or he really loved goldfish crackers and didn't care if he was being petted at the same time. When I got my turn, I could have picked him up- but I figured that might be pushing my luck.


On our last trip in June, we camped in a canyon with amazing acoustics and listened with delight when our neighbors played guitar and ukulele. This time, my eldest remembered her violin and we were treated to the concert of a lifetime, complete with written program, intermission, and assigned seats thanks to her little sister/manager. It was a wonderful and proud moment for the parents.

We experienced some boat problems with our '77 Sea Ray- like we couldn't get it started and were "stranded" the whole weekend until our camping neighbor, a diesel mechanic, came over and helped fix it. When they finally got it running, (without neutral or reverse) we counted ourselves extremely lucky that we didn't have to call a very expensive mechanic or beg someone for a tow back to the marina. We quickly packed it up and hightailed back to Bullfrog Marina with our fingers crossed. Needless to say, we didn't get to explore the lake like we usually do. But, we were glad to have the kayaks and Pack Cats (pontoon boats) for little trips around Slickrock Canyon where we camped.