Spring Break in the East and West

 The Easter tradition at the Virginia Fagella household is every year is different.  This year was no exception.  Since this was Anna's last spring break of high school and since she had a total of 9 days off, a bigger trip was in order.  There was a desire to go out West - a trip that was postponed during COVID.  Theresa's proposal:  a visit to southern Utah to visit 5 national parks.  There was discussion about renting a camper van for the trip (more on that in a moment).  After much debate, Joe sent Anna and Theresa on the March 31 - April 2 Western adventure and he headed to Massachusetts and Long Island to visit family.

Anna and Theresa both had a camper van on their list of things to do.  Theresa researched it and even reserved one.  That was she realized that you needed to book camping sites in the National Parks at least 6 months in advance.  Needless to say, everything was booked.  There were options for "remote" camping (basically on the Bureau of Land Management locations with no running water).  This did not seem like a good option, especially for the first time using a camper van.  In addition, private camp sites could run almost as much as rooms.  In the end, Theresa opted to forgo the camper and went with Airbnb or hotel rooms.  This proved a wise choice on several fronts, including the fact that the weather was much colder than anticipated.  Before getting into the details, here are some key highlights:

• 5 National Parks (Zion, Bryce Canyon, Capitol Reef, Arches & Canyonlands)
• The America the Beautiful National Park pass was essential (thank you Joe)
• LOTS of driving
• Podcasts are essential for road trips (Anna and Theresa are experts on Dolly Parton)
• Lots of photos
• Anna and Theresa were still talking to each other by the end of the trip
• If you have a jeep, you must go to Moab
• 
  Already plans for next trip (white water rafting, hiking the river in Zion, horseback riding, renting an electric bike, a jeep ride on trails).
• There is no need to go back to Vegas

The trip kicked off with a flight into Las Vegas (neither Anna nor Theresa have ever been there).  Let's just say that was quite an eye-opening experience upon landing at 11:45 PM.  People are essentially flying into a casino as there are slot machines and show advertisements throughout the airport.  After getting some sleep at an airport hotel, they headed over to the car rental facility (conveniently across the street) to pick up a rental car.  The facility was packed and after getting the paperwork went to the lot to find no cars available.  Staff was driving them in newly washed and then people were running to grab them.  Theresa saw a Jeep Liberty coming down the lane and immediately ran to secure it (Anna thought her mom was going to jump in front of the car to stop it but that proved unnecessary).  Theresa hopped in before the next tourist could get it (you really need a jeep for hiking trips).  Unfortunately, there were some electronic issues that left the odometer flashing, but Theresa decided she could deal with that and sort of got use to a flashing odometer for the next week.  They loaded up the bags and hit the road for Utah.

Driving out of Las Vegas was also an adventure.  Anna quickly noticed that every other billboard was for a personal injury or divorce lawyer.  Soon they were on desert roadways before hitting a beautiful stretch of canyon upon entering Arizona and Utah.  The first stop on the trip:  Wal-Mart.  That's right - no vacation is complete without stocking up on supplies for the week.  The next stop:  Zion National Park.

After following Google maps rather than the road signs, the girls ended up at the Northwest entrance to Zion rather than the main entrance.  Google clearly knew best as it was a quiet part of the park with spectacular scenery.  The ranger noted that to go in the main entrance, you needed to be in the park no later than 8:15 AM or there would be no parking.  This was important advice!  After exploring the area and taking a couple of small hikes, the girls were off to the Airbnb, which happened to be a converted barn.  There were farm animals (not in the converted barn but outside) and spectacular views of the mountains AND fresh eggs in the morning.  Tuesday morning, they were out the door by 7:30 (no easy task for a teenager on vacation) for a beautiful 20-minute drive to Zion National Park where they were immediately greeted by a long line to get in.  It seems that lots of families were spring breaking at Zion.  After another 20 minutes in line, they made it in and secured one of the last parking spots.

Due to the high number of tourists, Zion does not allow cars to drive in the park beyond the campground and lodge and instead runs a shuttle bus.  Anna and Theresa got their hiking gear and headed to the shuttle bus only to find another long line. Anna commented that it looked like the ride lines at Disney. IT was fully of families - some clearly experienced hikers and others not so much.  One of the famous hikes is up a river (literally in the river), thus several people had rented hip waders and poles along with their regular gear.  It was quite an eclectic group. Forty minutes later, we were on the shuttle bus and enjoying the spectacular scenery in the canyon of Zion.  We decided to hike the Emerald Pools, which involved hiking a trail along the canyon wall.  About twenty minutes into the hike, Theresa tripped on a rock while looking up at the scenery and took a slow-motion fall, demonstrating the need to watch where one is going and the importance of having a first aid kit in the backpack.  A few band-aids later, they were back on the trail enjoying the gorgeous scenery.  After exploring more of the park and the local town of Springdale, they headed back to the barn with a plan to do one more hike in the morning before heading up to Bryce Canyon National Park.  Wednesday was a bit of a later start, which meant there were no parking places when arriving at the park.  They opted to change plans and do the scenic drive to Bryce Canyon.  This involved a 1.5-mile tunnel built in the 1920s through a rock in Zion and more spectacular scenery on the way out of the park.  Unfortunately, all of the short trails, and look out points were full of people (there were LOTS of people) so they headed on over to the Bryce, which was 2 hours away. There was a variety of scenery along the way, including driving through a red rock canyon.

Bryce Canyon

They arrived in Bryce Canyon around noon on Wednesday to find snow on the ground and it was chilly.  There were still lots of people, albeit not as many as Zion.  For those movie fans, Bryce Canyon is where the famous last scene from Thelma and Louise took place in which they drove off a canyon cliff.  Most of the trails into the Canyon were snow covered or full of mud, so that put a damper on the hiking.  There is a scenic drive along the canyon, which is what they opted to do.  They accommodations for the night were the major hotel in town, Ruby's Best Western.  This was clearly THE place to stay for families visiting and they had the monopoly on most things.  The find of the evening was a small BBQ restaurant at the adjacent town with delicious food!  They ended up sharing the table with a couple from New York and got some tips for the rest of the road trip. One of the things Bryce Canyon is known for is stargazing.  Unfortunately, it was cloudy so no stars.  Theresa got up the next morning to see that sunrise at the canyon, another must do.  Once again, it was cloudy (things really didn't line up for Bryce).  After a hotel buffet breakfast (LOTS of families), the girls hit the road for the next park:  Capitol Reef National Park.

The drive from Bryce Canyon to Capitol Reef was one of the most spectacular and harrowing of the trip.  The landscape changed from canyons to mesas to deserts to mountains - all within a two  hour drive.  At one point, the drive went down into another canyon and a narrow road across a rock wall (Anna could look out the window and see the cliff).  The road then wound around and across a snow-covered mountain.  At last, they girls landed at Capitol Reef.  This was the least busy of the parks and ended up being one of the favorites.  The landscape is hard to describe, but it was settled by Morman homesteaders.  There was a river running through the canyon along with orchards.  The girls enjoyed lunch by the river and learned there was the original house where they park now sold fruit pies (Theresa & Anna enjoyed the peach).  Anna, who did not get much sleep at Ruby's Best Western the night before, was not particularly excited about a hike.  Theresa had already mapped out a trail near their picnic site.  Anna reluctantly agreed (more because she had concerns about her mother's gracefulness and did not want her to take a fall on a trail with no cell service).  They hiked up a cliff and found themselves on an amazing trail in a canyon.  It was incredibly quiet and felt like a walk on another planet.  After the hike, the girls took the scenic drive through the park and tried out some of the gravel roads (the jeep came in handy).  That night, they stayed at Austin's Chuckwagon Lodge, a family-owned hotel.  There was a burger food truck nearby that got rave reviews, so they opted to go there for dinner.  Theresa ordered what she thought was a pulled pork sandwich that actually turned out to be a burger with pulled pork on top of it (who would have thought of that).  After a good night sleep, it was off to Moab, Utah.

The drive to Moab was another two hours.  This time the scenery transitioned to desert.  Since it was Friday of Easter weekend and in anticipation of crowds, they opted to go to Arches National Park first.  This proved a wise move.  While the park was busy, it was only a 10-minute wait to get in.  They did a few small hikes (Theresa was on her own for one since Anna determined there was sufficient cell phone service) and headed into Moab to their tiny house Airbnb.  As the drove through town, the noticed jeeps everywhere.  Then they saw signs on hotels welcoming "jeepers."  As it turned out, it was jeep safari weekend in Moab and there were thousands of jeeps there to do the off roading trails.  Theresa was waiting for her brothers to emerge at any moments as these were their people.  The town of Moab is one of the largest in Utah and has an eclectic groups of outdoors folks and a big arts community.  After dinner at the tiny house, they enjoyed a quiet evening (except for all the jeeps driving by on the road outside) and headed out to Canyonlands National Park the next day.  On the way, they passed Arches and seen an enormous line of cars waiting to get in.  Canyonlands was also spectacular and had a much more remote feeling.  It was thankfully less crowded (everyone was at Arches) and they were able to enjoy a hike along the top of the canyon along with some smaller hikes along the way.  At this point in the trip, the spectacular scenery had become the norm.  That evening, they enjoyed a great Mexican dinner in Moab, followed by live music at a local bookshop (by some very tattooed young musicians named Hemlock) and ice cream. 

Easter Sunday it was time to gear up for the long drive back to Las Vegas but not before starting the day with mass at the local Catholic church (people showed up in their hiking clothes).  The drive back with over 6 hours through desert and mountains (including snow squalls) before arriving in Las Vegas.  The plan was to spend one day there, and sight see.  Theresa managed to find a hotel without a casino.  It is definitely a crazy place, and they were immediately struck by how expensive everything was - especially food.  After an Easter dinner of over-priced Asian noodles, they opted to go back to the hotel.  The next morning, Anna got to sleep in before they headed out late morning to explore the strip.  It was quite a site with LOTS of people (a surprising number of families).  By late afternoon, the girls were done with Vegas and ready to go home.  The best part of the day was the Mat Franco magic show, which was incredible.  The other highlight of the day was the cake boss vending machine where they secured dessert.  They headed back to the hotel and got up early for an uber ride in a Tesla to catch their flight home.  All was well until the connection in Dallas was delayed for 2 hours due to too much fuel in the plane (that's right - they had to empty 5,000 pounds of fuel from the plane).  They at last arrived home to Joe braving the crazy airport traffic to get them, and a very happy dog.

Meanwhile, Joe had a great trip to Massachusetts and Long Island and got to see all of his brothers and sisters.  He spent a few days with Loren at Lucy and Terri's place where he also got to meet their new dog, Blossom.  They visited his brother Tom in Vermont.  He and Loren then headed back to New York where they enjoyed lunch with John and Yvonne before going to Mary's for Easter.  There he got to enjoy Easter Bread, a delicious dinner at a local restaurant and Mary got to meet the Easter bunny.  He flew back to Virginia on Monday morning and sprung a very excited Benny from the dog sitter.

A big thanks to everyone who hosted us, transported us, and watched Benny!  It was a great trip for all involved and definitely a memorable Easter!

Game night at Lucy & Terri's