Two "Up"s

It's pretty hard to get any sweeter

than the first eight minutes of Pixar's Up!

(the rest of the film is not that good)...

but "'Up' in Real-Life"  comes close!

Just in case you needed an "up" today!  :-)

Hooray for Ouray! (Part 2: Ridgway State Park)

Though we referred (and still refer) to our recent vacation destination as Ouray, we actually camped several miles north of Ouray's smaller neighbor, Ridgway, at Ridgway State Park, Site #64.  B.J. and I picked the campsite months previous, late one night, while squinting at Google Maps' satellite images of the park.  According to the campground host, whom we met when we arrived, we picked the "premier site."  It was just the right site for us - slightly set apart (good when you're camping with six kids ;-) and nearest the water.  The kids kept the foot paths down to the nearby reservoir well-trod.

First checking out the campsite:

The view of our site looking west: 

We fished some, but only caught one fish the entire time.  Oh well, it was still enjoyable!

We also saw mule deer from a distance

  
and monarchs up close, 

played on the playground,

made good use of our friends' canoe,

swam,

and caught A LOT of crawdads (there are 43 little ones in this container!).

Here's one of the big ones the kids caught:

The morning we left B.J. and I and Sean E. woke up early and slipped away for one last turn on the reservoir.

Here's a gorgeous view from the canoe: our campsite (our white van and camper are in the center with the tent a little to the left) and the sun rising on the San Juans.

Will caught our one and only fish right before we left - whew!  So we all left satisfied.  :-)

In my next post I'll take you on our first day-trip to Telluride!

Hooray for Ouray! (Part 1: The Drive)

We've had the opportunity to go on three family vacations since we moved to Colorado at the end of May 2012.  We first visited Colorado Springs (about 2 hours from Loveland), then Glenwood Springs (about 4 hours from Loveland), and finally, just this past August, the Ouray/Telluride area (about 6 hours from here).  They have all been enjoyable trips, but this last one was especially memorable.  I plan to share photos from our trip in several posts.  By the time I'm done, I think you'll know where I'd recommend you vacation if ever you ask: Ouray!  (Pronounced oo-RAY, after the Ute Indian chief of that name).

The first reason you should go is the drive.  Once you get past Denver, which is not a very pretty city, it's a lovely, lovely ride.  All the photos below I snapped out the windshield or the passenger-side window while B.J. drove.

Though the views are breath-taking, the drive is not always a relaxing one for the driver.  In order to get to the southwestern side of the state, one has to cross over the Continental Divide, which means a lot of steep grades both up and down.  If the grades themselves don't make you a bit nervous, the "runaway truck" ramps might!

If you'd like to stop on your way to or from Ouray, Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park lies right along the way.  Never head of that national park before?  Don't feel bad - until a few months ago we hadn't, either.  Black Canyon doesn't boast the beautiful, warm colors or the size of the Grand Canyon, but it's still impressive in it's own right.  Author Duane Vandenbusche wrote this about Black Canyon: "Several canyons of the American West are longer and some are deeper, but none combines the depth, sheerness, narrowness, and darkness, and dread of the Black Canyon."  We visited Black Canyon on the way home.  We didn't spend a lot of time there (Eli was sleeping - and he needed sleep!), and we found it a bit anti-climatic simply because of all the other beautiful things we'd seen that week.  But someday we might go back and do a bit more hiking in this little-known national park.  Our first glimpse of the canyon:

I "panned" to get this picture: it is three separate frams that I merged in Photoshop.  You can see the white rapids of the Gunnison River near the bottom left of the image.  I like this picture because it gives one a feel for how narrow and steep the canyon is.  Why is it called Black Canyon?  It's sheerness makes it so that part of it is shadowed almost the entire day, except when the sun is directly overhead.  Those shadows make the canyon look dark and forboding, and the drab-colored rocks look black. 

I took the two photos below while hiking the short distance from the van to the rim of the canyon.  

 

That's the end of Part 1.  Stay tune for Part 2!  (But no guarantees how soon it'll appear - blogging has had to take a backseat in my life lately!  :-)

12 + 7

B.J. and I dressed up in celebration of our 12th wedding anniversary,

and Leah snapped our picture.

A truer photo of our life now would include six rambunctious children,

but one tiny tyke made it into the photo.

Yep, you read right.

Itty-bitty Baby Seven is hiding under our hands.

LORD willing, we'll meet Little One in May 2016.

Love,

B.J. and Sarah

"O magnify the LORD with me, and let us exalt His name together."

Psalm 34:3