Ryan, Debi, and Toren Cragun's Blog

Even though all of her family was in town, Debi still had summer courses that were just beginning that she couldn’t afford to miss.  So she headed back to Tampa this day while the rest of us made our way to Disney’s Animal Kingdom.  We went on a few friends, saw some animals, then went on the Safari ride, which is always fun (despite the rather lame attempt to make it into a ride with a plot).  Having been on the Safari ride before I knew what was coming but was somewhat excited to see the cheetah, which we didn’t see the previous time:

cheetah on the safari ride

As I was managing Toren by myself, Steve, Debi’s brother, kindly took over photography duties and snapped the above picture (he got a bunch more of the animals that were very good as well).

We then let the kids play at length in one of the play areas that had slides and other stuff to climb on.  I think all the kids loved it and, were it not for the scorching sun, we would have stayed there even longer.  Here’s a clip of Toren running (such a cute run) in the play area:

And here’s a photo of Toren by one of the “fossils”:

Toren in the play area by one of the fossils that you can climb on

Brent, Steve, and I did sneak away to go an adult ride.  I left Toren with his Grandmary.  Apparently he cried the whole time (though, by the end of the trip he had warmed up to pretty much everyone).

We went to dinner that night at the T Rex Cafe.  As the family was visiting right around Toren’s birthday (and they gave him gifts as well), we thought we’d just tell our server every time we went out to eat that we were there celebrating Toren’s birthday.  We only managed to remember one night – at T Rex Cafe.  They brought him out a cookie and ice cream, which he didn’t really want.  Instead he wanted to hug Debi’s head as she made it back in time for dinner:

T Rex Cafe is like Rainforest Cafe in that is a themed restaurant, but it has animatronic dinosaurs.  It was fun to see, though a bit pricey for us.  That wrapped up the second day of the trip.  We were all tired from a long day at Disney.

All of Debi’s family came to Florida for a week long vacation in late May and early June.  We started the trip in Orlando and ended in St. Petersburg.  Here’s a rundown of our activities day by day.

The family was all scheduled to arrived in the evening on the 25th of May.  Debi, Toren, and I drove to the hotel in the Disney Resorts where we were staying to meet them, arriving early intentionally so Toren could spend some time in the pool, which he loves to do.  Since we only had a little while in the pool, I stayed out and took pictures while Debi and Toren swam.  Here are a couple of favorites (I posted some others on his birthday):

Most of the rest of the family arrived around 6:30 and we went to Chevy’s for dinner where Toren and Ethan got animal balloons (Andy and Maddie hadn’t arrived yet; their plane was delayed in Chicago).  There is a photo of Toren with his fish balloon in the gallery above.  It was his bedtime and he was grumpy.  Even though he liked his fish, he needed to get some sleep.

That pretty much did it for the first day.  We hit the sack after Toren did so we’d have some energy for the next day.

This was our last day in the Park.  We got up quite early, broke camp, then headed up to the trailhead of Angel’s Landing, which is one of the more famous hikes in the park.  It’s famous because it runs along a razorback for about 1/2 a mile to the top.  To help secure hikers, there are chains, like the Hidden Canyon hike, but there are a lot more of them as there are parts that are quite exposed.  It’s also a pretty long hike, 5 miles round trip with about a 1,500 foot elevation gain.

I set a good pace and got the group up to just below the razorback in about 45 minutes.  We then ran into a small problem on the razorback as one of the students, who had earlier told us she was afraid of heights, froze up on the razorback.  I eventually coaxed her back down to just below the razorbacks where she waited for the rest of us to summit.  We did about 30 minutes later, then headed back down.  Here I am brushing my teeth on the summit:

me and Kevin brushing our teeth on the summit

We made pretty good time on the way back down, stopping to pick up the one student who didn’t make it on the way.  We completed the hike in about 3 hours and 45 minutes.

From there, we headed back to the van, loaded up, and started our journey back to Vegas.  We stopped in Springdale for some souvenirs, then again in St. George to drop off the tents.  We arrived at our hotel in Vegas around 2:30, which was before the check in time, so our rooms weren’t ready.  But a short wait later, they were and we were all able to finally shower.

The students were excited for a night on the town in Vegas.  We ended up eating at the Hard Rock Cafe, then walking along “the strip” and even through some casinos.  We saw the fountain show at Bellagio and some of the students rode the roller coaster at New York New York.  By 11:00, most of the group was so tired from the hike and very long day that they were ready to fall asleep walking.  So, we headed back to our hotel, slept for about 4 and a 1/2 hours, then got up in time to catch our 7:40 flight back to Tampa.  We arrived home around 4:00 pm without incident.

It was a good trip.  Aside from the rain and cold at the beginning, the trip was a lot of fun and very gratifying.  As I said during one of the reflection exercises, as an avid hiker, I have taken advantage of many state and national parks.  Having the chance to give back to the parks, regardless of how, is a nice feeling.

I think our volunteer coordinator, Jessica, felt bad after the previous day’s project as our project this day was quite lite – cleaning up tent caterpillars from the Visitor’s Center.  Tent caterpillars (which become brown moths) are particularly pervasive in the park this year.  The also are messy.  They spread their webbing everywhere, particularly on the informational signs at the Visitor’s Center.  They also cocooned in every nook and cranny they could find.  Our goal – clean all of the webbing and cocoons out.

Here’s a shot of their tents in the trees:

the caterpillars' tents

In the close to three hours we spent on the Visitor’s Center, we must have killed thousands upon thousands of cocooned caterpillars.  The Visitor’s Center did look nicer afterward, with the webbing gone and many of the cocoons gone as well.

We wrapped up just before lunch.  This was our last day of volunteering.  Jessica, our volunteer coordinator, kindly gave us t-shirts and pins for helping out.  We then said our goodbyes and headed back to camp for lunch.

With the entire afternoon available for hiking, we opted for a more strenuous hike – Hidden Canyon – that Jessica had recommended.  We hiked it relatively quickly, then most of the group hiked up to Weeping Rock.  Here are a couple of photos of the Hidden Canyon:

the "Hidden Canyon" at the end of the hike

Like the more famous Angel’s Landing hike, there are some spots on this hike that have sheer drops.  There are chains in the cliff face for support:

if you look close you can see the chains

After Weeping Rock, we headed to the Lodge where most of us treated ourselves to an ice cream cone, a real treat after 5 days of camping.

After our ice cream, we did one more hike – the River Walk, which takes you to the mouth of the Narrows.  The Narrows hike was closed due to the height of the river, which was really high given the amount of rain the park had received (and snow that was still melting).  Here’s a shot from the River Walk:

the Virgin River

After the River Walk hike, we returned to camp and made our final dinner over the fire – hot dogs, baked potatoes, and macaroni and cheese (on the grill).  We had pudding for desert.

We chatted around the campfire, meeting some guys from England who were on vacation in the park, then had our final evening reflection in The Castle.

The project we were supposed to do on Monday that was scrubbed because of the rain was moved to Thursday.  Near the Nature Center in the park are several vegetation “islands” (surrounded by concrete curbs) that the rangers wanted to reclaim from the invasive plant species that had taken them over and replant with native species to show visitors.  The islands had become completely overgrown with invasives, including cheat grass.  Our task was to pull as much of the invasive vegetation as possible; we were hoping to then turn the remaining soil and even plant the native species, but that proved to be more than we were able to accomplish.  Here is the island before we started:

the island as we started

We pulled most of the vegetation by hand.  Here I am blazing a path down the middle of the island, pulling all the plants by hand:

me pulling weeds

We started around 9:00 am and finished around 3:30 or 4:00.  We were able to clear most of the vegetation (I don’t have an after shot; FYI, I didn’t take any of these photos, the students did), but didn’t get to turning the soil or replanting.  It was the most strenuous project we tackled. After almost 7 hours of pulling weeds, my hands were swollen and sore.  It was pretty tough work, but satisfying knowing we were helping the rangers with a project.  I think we were all a little disappointed, however, that we were not able to do more.

After we finished, we had a couple hours before dinner, so we decided to go on a short hike to see the Emerald Pools.  We hiked to the lower and upper pools (the trail to the middle one was closed).  Here’s a shot of the waterfall at the Upper Emerald Pool:

the waterfall at the Upper Emerald Pool

We then headed back to camp and made dinner – chili.  It was quite good and the group devoured it.  We spent the evening by the fire again, then had our reflection exercise and called it a night.