#zionsvacationapocolypse2015

 This year we decided to re-institute our Anderson family tradition of traveling to Zions over President's Day weekend and meeting up with Becca and her fam and the Broadbent family. 

Unfortunately...nothing went as planned.

We were planning on driving out after school, but that morning Lucy threw up and stayed home sick.  She slept most of the morning and we decided to go on the trip anyway. She was an angel in the car.

 We drove all afternoon and finally hit our hotel in Tecatchapi. It was the grossest hole ever. They didn't have the room we reserved, so they gave us one room with a king bed-for7 of us. There was porn under the couch bed, the deadbolt had been ripped off the wall and we later realized the door didn't lock at all. Creepy. Mom and Dad slept on this tiny couch bed-they had to spoon and couldn't move:)

 Katy slept on a rollaway bed and I slept at the foot of the bed the kids were on.  No one was comfortable. Joyce had crazy nightmares and was moaning half the night...it was memorable.

 Fortunately the next morning Lucy felt a lot better and could even eat some breakfast.

 To add some excitement to the trip (and several hours of driving!) Mom and Dad took us on small back roads and through Death Valley. We loved the ice cream break.

 I don't have pictures of that crazy night. As we drove over the Arizona border into Utah Becca called and told us that our hotel reservations in Springdale were wrong and had been made for the previous week.  She hand gone through Springdale there were no rooms to be had-let alone four rooms for our big group. The next several hours were spent frantically calling hotels. Turns out there were several huge sports tournaments in St. George-you could hardly turn around without seeing little soccer players.  We drove by a hotel off the freeway and I went in and chatted with the super nice asst. manager-she eventually managed to get us two rooms so Nieman and Becc'as family stayed in those and we were able to find a room for us across town. By the next day we were all staying in the same hotel in St. George. Not the trip we imagined! Everyone had a very good attitude about it though:)

The next day we drove to Zions to spend the day.  Dad, Katy, her friend Bentley and I all hiked Angel's landing and everyone else had fun hiking the waterfall trail and playing in front of the hotel.

 The weather was gorgeous so there were way more travelers then we've ever seen at Zions during this time of year. The Angel's landing trail was packed and walking along the chains took forever waiting in line. Dad and Danny have hiked it in the snow and ice where they never saw another soul so it was a bit of a shock to see so many people around. I hiked it in the snow, but didn't attempt to go up the chains in that weather (I have a healthy sense of caution as opposed to my crazy husband) so I had never been all the way to the top. It was beautiful:)

 (sorry Kate-just noticed your eyes are closed-my bad)

As soon as our favorite restaurant, the Pizza Noodle, was open, we were there.

 The next day Joyce woke up not feeling too good. While our whole group was hanging out in our hotel room she threw up all over me. Not a great moment. Fortunately they had a laundry at the hotel and I had lots of help. Everyone else went and picnicked at the St. George temple then played at the park while Joyce and I stayed home and watched Disney Jr/ Gilmore Girls. That evening I snuck out to see a movie with Katy-it was so nice to be out of that hotel room!

 The next morning at 4 AM we drove out. Poor Joyce felt sick most of the way but only threw up once. Holding a full vomit bowl in the car was not my favorite moment of the trip.

 

With a sick girl we were in no mood to dawdle and the trip went quickly. We were home by early afternoon and were surprised by a Valentine's display from our dad! He had missed us:)