Death in the Family

Last week Michael and I decided to take a trip to Arches National Park for our ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY. It seemed like a great place to get away from the capstone paper and enjoy the Summer. It proved to be just that . . . with a few extra surprises in store.

Arches is beautiful! We drove down Wednesday evening and woke up bright and early Thursday to fit in a whole day of hiking. We saw the beautiful arches pictured below and had a lot of fun.




The place where Wall Arch once stood




Thursday evening it rained a little, so Michael and I took cover under our tent's awesome rain fly and ate our delicious peach cobbler. Despite Michael's face he did enjoy it.


However, there was a tragedy while we were in Moab. If you know Michael you should know that the 1996 Chevy Lumina he bought after his mission was named "Grandpa". After hiking all day Thursday we decided to head back to our camp. On the drive back, Grandpa overheated. We had to pull over to let him cool down and once he did we were able to make it back to our campsite. However, just as we pulled in to the campsite, he overheated again and died. We had him towed the next morning to a local mechanic, whose number we got from the kind ladies that were camping in the site next to ours. While the mechanic took a look at Grandpa we walked the entire length of down town Moab (only 2 miles long) looking at all the cute shops. After killing time for two hours, we returned to hear the diagnosis on our beloved family member. We were very hopeful when we walked up to the shop and saw Grandpa backed out of the garage and parked outside. Michael and I both thought we would be driving home in him that night. However, the mechanic, with a grim face, (like a doctor telling someone their family member had just passed away) informed us that Grandpa's engine was completely fried! We decided that Grandpa had finally come to the end of his road, seeing as it would cost more to fix him up than Michael originally paid for him.

Having come to grips with the passing of Grandpa, the only problem that faced us now was figuring out how to get home with all our camping gear. The only rental car agency had pulled out of Moab exactly one week earlier, so that option wasn't going work. We even contemplated buying a brand new car at one of the two little dealerships there in Moab (not really though). After getting in touch with my mom she told us she could pick us up but it wouldn't be until the next morning so . . . we needed to find a place to stay for the night. There were plenty of little motels and hostels in town, but we called up our friends from the neighboring campsite Terri and Deb and they offered to let us camp with them at their site for a night! They were so generous. They came and picked us up at the auto shop, with all our gear, feed us dinner and breakfast and even shared their S'mores! Michael and I will never forget their generosity. This world is filled with some absolutely amazing people. All in all it was a memorable trip and we will not soon forget the experiences and the people we met during our adventure in Moab, Utah.

Grandpa in his final resting place: Moab, Utah.