Mirror Lake with the Scouts

Tyler and I took 6 of the boys up to Mirror Lake for a camp out and it was one of those "it's all fun and games until someone breaks an ankle" type of camp outs. Did I just ruin the ending? Oops. SPOILER ALERT!!!

We left K-ville and headed up into the mountains. We got hit with a bit of rain on the way up, but we found a great campsite and the rest of the day was clear skies! It was beautiful weather for a camp out. We threw up the tents and hammocks and made ourselves at home...

We spent the rest of the day exploring, cooking hamburgers, doing Merit Badges, and enjoying the great outdoors. We had a beautiful night sky that night and sat around the fire for hours talking and cooking marshmallows. It was a great night.

We woke up the next day to beautiful sunshine and started cooking breakfast. Somehow overnight the boys had gotten really dirty... It was kind of funny.

Oh, and they like to dance in the morning apparently. Haha! I love these guys...

After breakfast, we got into a hardcore game of Capture the Flag! Instead of playing in an open field or meadow, we decided we'd play in the middle of trees, hills, and rocks! Perfect! It actually turned out to be really fun. Everyone was having a great time until one of the boys was chasing Tyler and as Tyler was jumped over a log, he landed in a hole and screamed out in pain. As it turned out, he didn't break his ankle, but it was really close! He sprained it really bad. Fast forward a few days and this is how it looked:

That pretty much put an end to our fun. We decided to pack up and head to the lake. The weather turned nasty on us on the way up there and it turned out to be really cold when we got there. We climbed out, took a short look around, and decided to head down to Kamas and get some pizza! It was delicious.

The trip home was rainy, but uneventful. I'm pretty sure all the boys had a great time. I'm 100% sure we did a good job of wearing them out...

Diamond Fork Hot Springs

I've heard several times about a natural hot springs that was somewhere in Spanish Fork Canyon, but never had the opportunity to go up and check it out. Well, that opportunity finally came! I took the Scouts and theBRIGADE with me and it turned out to be pretty freaking sweet!

We left after work and school in the afternoon from the church with the Scouts and met Jeff and Paul on the way. This campout was extra cool because I had two new Scouts come with us for the first time too! The trip down took almost 2 hours with all the traffic in Suck Valley, but thankfully we made it without anyone throwing up in the truck. Miracles... Ha!

We found a really beautiful campground and a great campsite that allowed for plenty of hammocks and tents to be set up. After setting up the tents, we got a fire going and started cooking hotdogs for dinner.

After dinner, we decided that we would try to make it up to the hot springs. It was a beautiful night and perfect for a night hike! We drove down the road to the trailhead and it was pretty much packed full of vehicles. We turned on our headlamps and started up the trail...

It was quite the hike for doing it in the dark without ever being up there before. We passed a lot of hikers on their way down and they updated us on our progress. The boys were troopers and did great! After about an hour or so, we finally found, or actually SMELLED, what we were looking for! And believe me, it was 100% worth the hike!

The water was PERFECT! We couldn't have been more happy. Soon our shirts and shoes were on the ground and we were soaking in the amazing hot springs. Then we looked up to see literally BILLIONS of stars in the sky on what was a clear cloudless night. It was perfect.

After a good soak, we decided to head back down since it was getting pretty near to midnight. The hike down was much faster and we made good time getting back to the truck. We drove back to camp and everyone fell asleep pretty quick. The night was clear and cold, which made for a long night sleeping in a hammock! Overall though, everyone slept well.

We awoke to frost in the morning, so it wasn't long until we had a good fire going and started cooking pancakes and bacon for breakfast. It tasted extra good on this cold morning. We were living like kings!

After breakfast, we cleaned up camp and loaded all our gear into the truck. We decided to hike back up to the hot springs one more time before heading home. The hike was really enjoyable in the daylight and we were finally able to see everything we missed the night before! It was beautiful. Look! Jeff even found an arrowhead! (Inside joke)

We had such a great time at the hot springs that day! The waterfall was really cold, but made for a refreshing rush when you went under it. There was even a hole through it that could be accessed from the backside! It was so sick!

After we were done, we hiked back down to the truck and headed for home. Once again, this was an awesome trip and adventure! Well done, boys!

Goblin Valley

We went down south for our latest Scout adventure and got to check out Goblin Valley! What a cool/strange/unique/awesome place that is! The drive down was a long one, but the boys were well stocked with gummy products which made the trip more bearable. Of course, that also meant that they were nice and sugared up, which made them more hyper... Hmm. Thankfully, I had Tim and Tyler with me to keep some sanity and order in the truck!

We pulled into the campground just after dark and met Jeff and Maren who were already there waiting for us with a fire burning. We set up our gear and cooked dinner (hamburgers) over the fire and enjoyed some delicious dutch oven cobbler! We were living the high life for sure. As it was such a beautiful night, the boys decided to set up their hammocks and sleep in those. It got pretty windy throughout the night which really stirred up the sand and blew it around everywhere, but other than that we all slept well.

The next morning, we were able to finally see where we were camping. The view was amazing at sunrise! The campground was completely surrounded by sandstone walls and it was the coolest thing to see. It felt like we were inside a fortress! We had a great breakfast of eggs, bacon, sausage, and pancakes. (Again, living like kings!)

After we got our gear all packed up and loaded into the truck, we decided to check out The Valley of Goblins. We were able to see tons of different rock formations and structures and really enjoyed exploring the area. We even found a Geocache! Here are some photos:

After we were finished in Goblin Valley, we drove out to the visitors center to check out maps of the surrounding canyons. We had some extra time and decided to check out one of the canyons on our way home. We had a great hike, ate lunch on the trail, and found lots to see!

The trip home was pretty uneventful, except for stocking up on yet more gummy candy... Haha. We had a great trip! Nothing like a trip with the Scouts and theBRIGADE. I roll deep.