Cliff Dwellers

For the last couple of years we have been building a little bit of a family tradition by doing some down South exploring on the day before Thanksgiving. This year we decided to go some place new and headed down to Capital Reef National Park. I was shocked to drive into the park and not have to pay $10 - $20 of scenery tax. It was a nice surprise. I thought all the National Parks were pay per view.

We got down there about noon and poked around the visitor's center for a while. It made me laugh to see a bunch of animations that we did for the BYU Geology department like eight years ago on the screens in the visitors center. They still looked pretty good so I guess we did OK on them.

After some lunch we picked a trail and headed out for and afternoon of exploration. We picked Cohab Canyon. It Started out with about a half mile of switch backs up about 400 feet of elevation gain. Caden started to fall behind right away so I stayed with him while everyone else waited at the top.
Here are Caden, Grant, Mason and Trent in the little pass that leads down into Cohad Canyon .

Here's one looking down into the canyon.

There were tons of fun sandstone holes, pockets, slots and little caves for climbing and exploring.


and occasionally getting stuck.

or taking a rest or posing for a family picture.

We got to the valley overlook at about 4:30 it was an amazing site looking into the gorge cut by the Fremont river but I was getting worried about getting back out before it got dark. None of us had flashlights and there would have been some dangerous spots to get through in the dark. Miki and the older boys went ahead and Caden and I took up there rear. Caden was going slow but he kept at it. By the time that we got to the switchbacks he was saying that his feet and legs were hurting and was kind of shuffling along. He kept at it and we made it to the bottom when the last bit of twilight was fading away.