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Our first day of vacation was almost 20 days ago (holy cats!) and I've procrasinated to the point where I know I'm going to have some difficulty remembering everything that we've done... but I might as well give it a shot, right? I got out of the field a couple weeks back when someone from work comes up to me and says "Nate's taken the next shift off, do you want to take it off too?" A little taken aback by the news, I decided to join Nate on whatever crazy adventure he was planning this time, this is where we went:
First, we drove off to San Diego to meet up with a bunch of Nate's friends from High School and College. Granted, this was a planned trip, so Nate's crazy planning doesn't really shine through on this first part. San Diego was a ton of fun and meeting all of these awesome guys that still keep in touch was a blast! We were only there for one night and then headed off to Palm Desert/Indio for the remainder of the weekend. Here, we had some STELLAR food dished up by our generous hosts Greenwood and Lisa and played pool for 2 days straight.
They also managed to snag us some free tickets to a festival called Coachella where we saw a bunch of fun bands like TV on the Radio, The Chemical Brothers (though I was expecting more from them), M.I.A., The Killers (and oh man have they gone down hill, did you know they sing that terrible song that asks the world "are we human or are we dancers?"... probably the most aggravating and annoying song on the radio), DJ M (basically just an alternative radio station without commercials) and a couple more dance-y bands that I thoroughly enjoyed. Overall, a decent festival day.
The next day we went to a pretty posh hotel pool on a staggaring 108 degree day and hung around the bar which was conveniently the epicenter of the pool. After some more wouth watering dinners, we said farewell and headed over to Joshua Tree National Park. Cruising into the ranger station, they politely informed us that our yearly pass which was purchased 15 days earlier was only good till the end of the month because the crazy old lady at the BLM office didn't comprehend the concept of an expiration date and issued a pass to expire the very month that we bought it instead of a year from then.
At least we had enough time on the pass for an on-the-whim FIVE day stay at the park and what an amazing park! They have the strangest looking cacti and plants there I've ever seen. First Joshua Trees apparently aren't trees at all, but gigantic, spikey Lily plants! They also have these odd things called octopi cactus that grow almost 10 feet but they're the same, skinny width the whole way to the top and come in big bunches of 10-15 with red flowers at the very tip of each one. I think my favorite were the red koosh balls and also spidery looking ones; they looked super fuzzy from far away, but definitely not the case from close up. Aside from that, I have a gazillion photos that you can check out of the climbing and hikes that we did. I think my favorite hike was the Lost Horse Mine hike and all of the climbing was fun, so I can't decide on what to recommend there. Two of the hikes we went on (Ryan Mtn and 29 Palms) were, what I deemed, "country club" hikes... I was half expecting one of the girls in skirts or women in pant suits to come trotting down the stone steps with a martini in one hand. When it's all said and done, they were just super easy.
On our way back to Utah, we spent a night in Vegas (my first visit there) and stayed in the ritzy-est Motel 6 in the world. All I know is that it is the most bizzare city in the US. You can walk on the streets drinking alcohol, there are street peddlers pushing baseball cards with hooker's info, and every hotel has it's own casino! I was a bit wide-eyed about the whole thing, but ended up having a lot of fun and will probably end up going back at some point to finally catch the pirate performance at Treasure Island.
Finally returning to Utah, we met up with our quasi-roommate Caitlin and went on the most green and lush hike in town. After that, we were still homeless for a few nights and ended up finding FREE camping a half hour outside of Moab. Now, I'm happy to say we've taken showers and we're in our new home (check out the photos, you'll be jealous!) If you'd like to chat, our new phone number is (435) 259-3447 and our mailing address is HC 64 Box 1812, Castle Valley, UT and if you want to Google our actual house, it's 387 Castle Creek Dr.
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