camping in orchard blooms and rappelling big drops.

in march my dad and i took a trip down to capitol reef.
some of my best memories growing up are the road trips we took as a family. everyone else would be asleep and i'd be in the front middle seat, listening to music with my dad and talking his ear off.
this trip was no different. we talked the whole drive down about the upcoming election, current events, and anything and everything else.
our camp site was in a town called fruita, for obvious reasons; the whole place was covered with fruit trees. the trees were all in bloom and it smelled insanely strong and sweet.

the night we arrived, we just walked around and kept sniffing and sniffing.

we walked up to a lookout spot.

i did a few tree poses.

there were deer everywhere. in the orchards, by the tents, everywhere!
no, i did not hop this fence and chase all the deer.
that would be harassing the animals.

i didn't take any pictures of our camp site, but we had a great time cooking dinner, roasting mallows, and hanging out with the hults, our longtime family friends who met us down there.

after everyone else went to bed, my dad and i decided to take a walk to go check out the stars and find some constellations. every since my astronomy class my sophomore year of college, my dad likes for me to point out points of interest in the night sky.

we walked along the highway, it was silent, pitch black besides the beams of light from our super cool headlamps. somehow the conversation turned to the best way to hide a body. pretty standard for dad and me conversations.



the next morning we got up early and had a huge pancake and egg breakfast, geared and sun screened up, and headed out to hike and rappel.

we hiked cassidy's arch, which was a gorgeous, but very steep hike. even if you weren't there to rappel, the hike alone was worth it for me.

here's the arch, which we then rappelled down.

apparently i didn't take any more pictures during the rappels, probably because i was busy. there are 7 drops in this canyon, two of them being 140 feet. canyoneering is something i hope to get more into after school is over, it's so empowering to climb a mountain and then take yourself back down via rope.

the canyon took about 7 hours and we were pooped and hungry afterwards.
we went to a cool park in fruita after and made lunch, looked at the deer, and the enormous trees.

then we drove home, stopped for milkshakes halfway, talked some more.
it was an amazing trip with one of my favorite people in the world.

towards the end my dad, who is not the most affectionate person on earth, said the words, "i had a great time with you this weekend, you're a really fun person to be around."

it was the best moment ever.



and then i got to come home to this cutie pie, so win win.
:)