Days 5 & 6: Hiking

We have been in a hole for the last two days. No internet or cell service. But it was beautiful! On Tuesday we went through Bryce National Park and yesterday we were at Zion National Park. Both of these areas involved alot of hiking. By the end of the day, Zach was dreading the thought of another *%#^$ hike.

I, on the other hand, couldn't curb my enthusiasm.

No more hikes for awhile. Tomorrow, we are jumping on some broncy mules for a ride down the Grand Canyon. I'll write more later...low battery and poor service.

Day 4: Mountain Biking & Arches Park

Life on the road has made its mark on the camper as you can see. Hopefully this is not a sign of what our house is going to look like after four days!

Today we went mountain biking. Wow! What a neat experience! We were the only ones on this tour and our guide was awesome. Zach and I both decided this is something we would like to do again. We drove out early in the morning to Klondike Bluffs which is north of Moab about 15 miles. We quickly learned the ropes of riding a "true" mountain bike and then headed uphill on an 11 mile ride. It was dirt and sand trails mixed with alot of slick rock and small boulders. Along the way we saw several petrified dinosaur tracks in the sandstone rock.

We ended up at the most beautiful cliff that overlooked najavo and sandstone bluffs. I had to yell at Zach several times for getting too close to the edge.

The downhill descent was so fun! Very fast paced with white knuckle jumps.

Shortly before this picture, the terrain was dirt with rocks over the trail. To this point I had been trucking along like an old pro. But then all of a sudden I got between a rock and a crack in the ground and then my tire fell into the crack. I was going down. And in slow motion. I had time to look back at Zach, look to the guide, and then back to Zach. I probably could have took a drink of my water. I'm sure it was pretty comical to watch. I landed on my side and elbow right in a cactus patch! I was giggling pretty hard mostly at how ridiculous it must have looked. Zach and the guide ran to where I was and tried to evaluate the situation. I had hundreds of cactus thorns in my arm and the top of my rump. Zach finally got them all picked out and we headed back down the trail. At the very end Zach about tea kettled his bike when he hit a thick patch of sand. He managed to keep it up right and out of any cacti.

PS-we saw more lizards. I think it's the Utah state animal.

Day 3: Rafting

Today was the big rafting trip down the Colorado River! We were both stoked at the idea of some class 5 rapids, maybe even something bigger. We had signed our lives away on the waiver form and had mentally prepared for the fact that we may not come out alive. But as we were standing in line to load the bus that takes us out, we saw a little family with a three kids, the youngest being maybe four. The next clue that this wasn't going to be too wild...they didn't give us helmets! Okay, no big deal. Then we realized that we were going to be packed into a raft with 8-9 others. Great...

But then, one of the guides had a very special announcement. He had three kayaks that were up for grabs. I plowed over about five people trying to get to the guide to tell him Zach and I would take one. Yahoo!! Our first kayaking experience.

So we didn't hit the class fives but we had gorgeous scenery and actually did hit a few good rapids that left me quite drenched.

We stopped half way down the river to have lunch at Cliff Ranch, which was a vineyard/events center.

We even saw some true desert wildlife. (It's a lizard in case you couldn't see it).

I do

I'm happy to say I am now Mrs. Lariann Lanka! We had a very nice ceremony at our church that we attend in Rapid City. Pastor Rebecca married us off and we had two witnesses that have been married for 43 years. Ironically their names are Larry and Linda, which are my parents names!

We had a surprise visit by the wedding crashers who threw birdseed at us, wrote on the camper windows and stuck a sign in my front yard!

The first mishap of the trip happened before we even left Rapid City. As we were driving from the church to my house, the camper got a little close to the neighbors mailbox. Okay, really close. We smoked it! I won't say who was driving but he might have been the groom! I was laughing so hard I could hardly see straight! The camper door was bent up a bit and the mailbox needed to be reattached to the post.

After quickly trying to repair the damage, we got on the road and headed to Denver. Luckily, that leg of the trip was uneventful except for an arguement about the Rocky Mountains. Saturday morning we went to see Lovely Louise. She's doing great and sends her love to Mom, Lindsey, and Larissa. The drive from Denver to Grand Junction was interesting. Imagine two country bumpkins driving through busy holiday traffic. It was stop and go on the interstate for quite aways. Zach was concerned that I was riding the breaks too much. He didn't know riding breaks until we got going down some of those mountains. Anyway, we made it to Moab, UT in good order and set up camp.

Zach was pretty concerned that he was missing the Husker game so we managed to find it online. They won! (I know you all were wondering).

Technology Problems

Good morning from Moab, UT! We are getting ready for our rafting trip down the Colorado River. We made it to our campground yesterday afternoon. We might have gotten a few snickers when we pulled in. Most of the campers are bigger than my house!

We're having problems with good internet service so I haven't been able to load any pictures. I'll try to climb the tallest cliff and load some later today. Stay tuned...

Wedding Bells

Tomorrow is the day! This is my last night as a single white female. I'll soon be Mrs. Lariann Lanka. Most brides-to-be would be running around tying the last few pew bows and crying over the melting ice sculpture. Not me. I'm trying to pack 10 days worth of clothes and food into Barbara the camper. Yes! We are taking the camper on our honeymoon. Lots of fun and excitement in the next week. Our first stop is in Denver to see Lovely Louise, the little lady I used to live with while I did an internship there. Please stay tuned for updates, tales and pictures of our whereabouts.

HAYING - It's over for now

We got the chance to cut some hay on shares this year. We were excited about the prospect of getting to cut hay close to home and hopefully make a little money at it - a good deal. As most "good deals" transpire, they are not always simple. That is what makes them fun and supposedly builds character.

At the time the deal was made, we did not own any haying equipment. While cutting a few hundred acres of thick alfalfa/grass hay with our jack-knives sounded like a good way to spend the summer and save on fuel costs, we decided it was probably not the most prudent approach to the venture.

So we set out to look for some equipment. We made a deal with another guy to bale the hay, but we still needed to find swather. We looked high and low. A friend told us of a friend whose father-in-law's neighbor might have a swather in mint condition that might be just what we were looking, i.e., dirt cheap. Rumor had it that it had been used very little, just to cut road ditches. After traveling several thours away and giving it the once over, we decided that if it made it through the season, we were in luck. The kind gentleman let us use a specially designed trailer to haul our new purchase back to Rapid.

Since it had sat idle for a few years, it might take a little work to get it on the trailer. So Matt and Joe packed up their standard mechanicing tools - a mismatched set of wrenches, a 5 lbs. sledge hammer, and a can of ether - and headed up to load the swather on the trailer to make the trek back. What ensued at this point is a loose recollection from the guys. It was one of those adventures I was glad to hear about later, and not witness in person.

Using the appropriate tools listed above and a half hour of minor tweaking, the guys were ready to start the old Heston up. When Matt gave the thumbs up, Joe turned the crank. It coughed and sputtered and screamed to life. Within seconds, Joe noticed that the controls were a little leaky, i.e. uncontrollable. The swather started veering on it's own. It managed to bump into the pickup parked close by. At the very same moment, the combination of a battery cable spark and excessive use of ether sparked a fire in the vacinity of the engine. Matt was yelling at Joe, who was too busy trying not to have a demolition derby with the parked pickup which happens to have a $1000 insurance deductible. Matt used his quick thinking and dumped a 20 ounce Mountain Dew on the infant fire. It proved to be just enough sugary goodness to put the fire out.

Soon, all was under control and they started to load the swather on the trailer. After a couple of failed attempts to load it (it has two crazy wheels in the back) they were successful. After the engine was killed, both men breathed a sigh of relief. They started driving back to Lantry. It quickly became apparent that it would be a slow trip as they could only go about 15 miles an hour. But they used the time to listen to a little 810 AM radio and talk about every saddle bronc they had ever rode (I would assume). At some point the whole contraption started to pull a little easier. As one of life's oxymorons, sometimes when things get easier, a lot of times it means, something went wrong. They looked back to see that one of the rear crazy wheels had gotten even crazier, ie, it came off and was rolling alongside the highway.

While they were reattaching the renegade wheel, a wise old rancher stopped and informed them their first of many mistakes was that they had loaded the swather on the trailer backwards. Hmm. Who knew that the thing was supposed to be loaded rear-first.

Anyway, after making it back to the homestead, they unloaded the improperly-loaded swather and began doing the major repairs to it.



Even with the help of Joe's dad, who has worked on his fair share of machinery in his day, some problems were still mysteries. The guys then delved into the manuals. Yes, you read that correctly.

Once most of the bugs were worked out, we set out to load it up again to make the trip to Rapid. This time loading it correctly as instructed. As I mentioned before, sometimes doing things the right way are actually much harder than doing things the easy way. After many failed attempts to load the swather, for the sake of this story, lets just say it dumped itself off the trailer during loading. At that point it took a large loader tractor and a couple of strong-arms to get it back on the trailer properly. I was actually videoing this whole process for the sake of this post. I had correctly assumed that something video-worthy might happen, but my cinematographic duties were interrupted when the guys yelled at me to move the pickup- short, quick, and in a hurry. So the video was basically footage of my feet running to the pickup as fast as possible and then exciting footage of the cupholder.

After the longest trip to Rapid that I have endured, I am happy to report that the old Heston did manage to cut its share of hay this year. It runs a little hot, has a bent header, plugs up constantly, and occassionaly shoots a flame out of the muffler. Our friend, Nick, noted after watching the machine in action for a couple of minutes "It looks and sounds like a giant angry mosquito." Yes, it does but it got the job done this year!