South Kettle Moraine Camping

This was our BIG GROUP camping trip of the year. Tony and Susie gave us a ride up in their big red truck, and Jamie (Jason's coworker) and Joel and Cara (Kelly's sister) and Evan met us up there.

Susie and Tony had visited South Kettle Moraine before, so they knew exactly which site was the coolest one. If you want to know which number it was so you can reserve it too, too bad! We are keeping the secret. It was in a campground loop that was super quiet because campers were not allowed, and it was also a walk-in site. The con -- dragging all of our car camping equipment up a hill. The pro -- total privacy. The awesomeness of the site alone was worth the whole trip.

Hiking options were only so-so, but we did hike the Scuppernong Trail and a nice part of the Ice Age Trail. Most of the trails were for die-hard mountain bikers, and not wanting bike tire marks on our foreheads, we avoided those.

We saw some neat birds, the most vocal was definitely the Oven Bird. They were singing their little hearts out ... "Teacher Teacher Teacher Teacher!" until I wondered if my sister was going to go crazy. Jason and I hunted one down so that I could see it, since it was much easier to hear them than to find them. We also chased a really big bird through the trees in the campground. We think it may have been an eagle. But we never got to see more than it's shadow navigating the treetops as it flew out of sight.

We had a great campfire on Saturday night with the whole gang. Jason showed how manly men make fire with flint. And we ate like kings -- giant cheeseball, cheese fondue, cheese curds (do you sense a Wisconsin theme?) and brats. We had so much food that we took half of it home. Evan pulled out his pipe and looked seriously Sherlock.

Also a big hit -- the hammock. There was someone snoozing in it practically at all times.

And, Jason made a lovely funeral pyre for the goldfish bag, may it rest in peace.

Hoodoo you Love?

We are back from our Southwest adventure and we had a great time! Jason saw the Grand Canyon for the first time, and I saw it for the first time with snow ... yes ... it snowed our last night at the South Rim, and we woke up to big wet globs of snow falling off the pines onto our tent. Luckily that was the day we were leaving for sunnier territory.

But while we were at the GC, we hiked along the rim trail and saw a great sunset. Yes, the Grand Canyon is overcrowded, but if you want a little peace just walk 1/2 a mile from any major overlook and the canyon only belongs to you. We also walked down the Bright Angel trail 1 1/2 miles. This is a trail that is shared between hikers and mules, so it's a bit stinky. But the views definitely make up for it, and it's neat to hike down through several layers in geologic time (we got all the way to the RED layer. aka Navajo sandstone.) This hike should only take 2-3 hours, but it took us more like 5 because it was warbler mania. I think Jason has officially addicted me to bird watching. I only pointed out a robin once (they are actually much less common out there, believe it our not). Thanks to our handy dandy guidebook, we also got to see Sinagua pictographs on the canyon walls that we figure that the National Park Service doesn't point out to people since jerks like to add their own graffitti to those things. They blend in a bit so you have to know where to look, but when you do they pop out. On the trail, Jason got to live his childhood dream, which was to see a California Condor, North America's largest bird (9 foot wingspan, and has been extremely endagered). Actually we probably saw more around 9-10 circling, and we got to watch them come in to roost at night.

Then we went to Bryce, where neither of us have ever been before, and fell in love with the "hoodoos", the weird red pillars that fill up the canyon and for which Bryce is known. We hiked along the rim there, which was sort of a dizzying experience. You're awfully close to the cliff edge, and every time you look over to check out the spectacular view, your brain does a cartwheel from adjusting to the perspective.

We also hiked down into the canyon to the Queen's Garden. It's a short hike but steep and with some harrowing parts where there's cliffs on either side, but no problemo! Check out the people in the photo of the hoodoos from the trail to get an idea of perspective. There were crazy people climbing on some of these things for photos. Rock slides still happen in this canyon, people!

Other highlights: we saw the rings of Saturn through a telescope at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, checked out the world's best preserved meteor impact crater, and walked to the base of a giant cinder cone volcano at Sunset Crater Nat'l Monument. And we saw cliff dwellings at Walnut Canyon Nat'l Monument.

And last of all, we hit Zion and took some great hikes among the sandstone cliffs and saw tons of beautiful birds including the nectarine-colored Western Tanager and the Lazuli Bunting. I also really liked the Audubon's Yellow-rumped Warbler. Jason also has a picture of a Broad-Tailed Humingbird with a California Condor soaring behind it. It's probably hard to see either of them, but we will always remember the moment we got to see the largest bird at the same time as the smallest.

We camped in every park, only wimped out and got a hotel once (it was pretty cold in Bryce, which is at a high elevation), and had very good luck getting nice campsites.

Our favorite campsite was at Zion. First of all, it was warmest there, being at a lower elevation, so we slept a bit better. Also we were in a cottonwood grove, which the birds loved. We arrived around 11 AM and spent an our just sitting at our picnic table as new birds paraded themselves around for us. We had a little moat around us, too, which the humingbirds liked to drink from, and a yellow-bellied marmot worked on building a nest not ten feet from our tent. We even got to see a lady humingbird building a nest using cottonwood fluff! And it top it off, we were in the shadow of the red cliffs, one in particular we named the "Big Red Tooth" (I think when Jason suggested we name it he had something more romantic in mind like Love Mountain, but the name I came up with stuck a little better ;) )

We saw a lot of wildflowers. Especially at Zion. The reddish pink globe mallow, shooting stars, yellow prince's plume, white Datura, and yellow columbine, to name a few. Some cacti were blooming, too. And we saw lizards galore, mule deer, wild turkeys, elk (at Grand Canyon) and antelope (at Bryce). And scary squirrels with really big teeth that liked to attack you for peanuts. We have a video of one (below).

We flew into and out of Vegas. When we arrived we got out of there as fast as we could, but returning, we had a few hours to kill, so we walked around the strip a bit. It was quite the contrast to our peaceful nature vacation. The animated fountain in front of the Bellagio hotel was really cool, though. Some of the water must have rocketed up at least 70 feet in the air. Also we walked through the Mirage hotel, which has a Beatles theme at the moment because they are hosting a Cirque de Soleil show all with Beatles Music.

And on the way back, we missed our flight by one minute! It was a comedy of errors that included the fatal mistake of going to competely the wrong terminal at the airport.

New Bike!

Jason now has a handsome black Diamondback bike which he bought today from a nice old dude who fixes up bikes in Batavia. We pulled up into his driveway and checked out all the options lined up in front of his garage, all with their price tags swinging in the breeze. Jason tried on several to find the right frame size, drooled over the pricey mountain bikes with suspension, but then chose a good quality one with a black aluminum frame, Shimadzu brakes, and mid-duty tires. Jason haggled fiercely with the dude's wife and got $5 knocked off the price. Can't wait to put some miles on that thing together! That dude is quite the entrepreneur. While we were considering, the guy sold 2 other bikes. And it so happens that this same weekend Kelly's sister and mother also bought bikes independently. I guess spring was in the air! Kelly thinks that Jason looks more handsome and bad-boy on his bike than any man she has ever seen on a Harley.

Total Eclipse of the Heart

Jason came over to Kelly's place after work and we made some fancy steaks and watched our current addition, Six Feet Under episodes. We are plowing through season 4, but there's only one season left after this. The highlight of the evening, however, was the total lunar eclipse. It was way below freezing at night, making the sky clear as glass. Jason and Kelly popped out on the balcony, bundled up as though for an arctic adventure, at ten minutes before it was scheduled to be completely blotted out. The moon was blood red, except for a quickly disappearing fingernail sliver. Kelly took the photograph above with her Canon Powershot A75 without the aid of any telescope or special lens. And for all you photography amateurs out there, she also turned off her flash. She plans to submit this photo to National Geographic and then Jason and Kelly will retire on the royalties. The pictures below were snagged off the net by Jason. Kelly fails to see what is so great about them, because they look obviously photoshopped, and any idiot could have taken them.

RENT

Yesterday we went downtown so that Jason could see Kelly's all-time favorite musical, RENT. We rose early (for us, anyway) and took the train from Geneva to downtown Chicago. Jason lives within walking distance to the train, a great perk, especially since there is a Caribou Coffee en route. The train ride was pleasant, though it took over an hour and was packed with families with young kids (no screamers, thankfully) that were probably headed to the popular annual auto show.

When we arrived we met Denise, one of Kelly's college friends, at the train station, and we strolled over to Millenium Park to see the Museum of Modern Ice. This turned out to be a strange ice-mural about thirty feet long made up of flat chunks of brightly colored ice fused together. The overall effect was like a mosaic of melted chunks of glass, but with many interesting patterns of frost etched on each chunk. The artist's helpers were walking around spraying the ice with water, and they also carted out more chunks of ice to add to the display. Giant coils with glycol pumping through them kept the ice frozen, despite Chicago's infamous fluctuating temperatures. We also paused for a while at the ice rink and watched people with varying degrees of skill skate around and around, gasping for the people that fell in front of us and cheering on the young kids with their feet sliding in all directions.

Then we headed over to the Cadillac Palace for the show. There we met up with Susie, Tony, Traci, Lisa, and Denise's friend Terri. The show was so awesome! And luckily, Jason liked it too. The Angel character was a little strange because they used a female to play the role of the drag queen. But the cast as a whole totally rocked. Kelly did her best not to sing along as she realizes this is really annoying. But later she did serenade Jason with some lines.

After that, we went to the delicious Grand Lux Cafe on Michigan Avenue for some vittles. We got a table by the window overlooking the competing Lawry's restaurant, and racked up the biggest restaurant bill we'd ever seen between 7 of us. The food was delish. Then we raced to catch a train home -- we ended up taking a taxi to make it in time.

Also during this weekend, we watched several episodes of Six Feet Under, a show that Jason has addicted Kelly to. She can't wait to find out what really happened to Lisa, who mysteriously drowned ...

Valentine's Day ... and our Loviversary

On this night Jason arrived to take Kelly out for heart-shaped stuffed pizza at Giordano's (now an annual tradition) and presented her with a card with this beautiful poem in it that made Kelly have tears in her eyes:

What We Are

It's more than "I need you."

Merely that doesn't

send enough love to our hearts.

It's more than "I love you."

Our souls know the journey

goes far beyond words.

It's this (yet more than;

a poet can only go so far) --

We are the shining light

in the palm of God.

Kelly presented Jason with a hand-made card with a frog on it, in honor of Smacky. Later that night, they watched Six Feet Under episodes and had yummy dessert.

Incidentally, 2/15/08 is our Loviversary ... the anniversary of when we first said "I love you" to each other. We remember this because we had the decency to avoid saying it on chintzy Valentine's Day ;).

Wine and Showshoe

It was less than a year ago that Jason and I went up to Traverse City, Michigan with Susie and Tony for the Taste the Passion wine tasting event put on by the Leelanau Peninsula Vitner's Association. And here we are again ... but this time, we brought a whole crew of friends. Ten people in all, the Sands Motel was certainly happy to see us during this super slow tourist time. Christina and Rodney gave us a ride up Friday night. We arrived late to find our room keys in envelopes taped to the locked motel lobby door. This sort of thing would never be safe where we come from, but in the far North, why not?

The next morning we headed out to Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore where Jason and I collected a new stamp in our national parks passport book. Then we snowshoed the Pierce Scenic drive which they close off for the winter season for snowshoers and cross country-skiiers. We didn't make it far since we dallied in the winter wonderland to make up mini snowmen and to have fierce snowball free-for-alls. Only a few injuries were reported. The boys enjoyed striking out off the trail like polar explorers while the gals wondered if we might ever see them again.

Then we headed over to our first winery stop: Cherry Republic, where we had some delicious chicken mole tacos and cherry wine for our first wine-and-food pairing. Kelly snagged the recipe but will be unable to replicate it without a food processor. We also tasted some cherry champagne and a cherry port that tasted like cough syrup. Next door this winery/cherry emporium sold everything you can imagine with cherries in it, including cherry salsa, cherry pretzels, gummy cherries, on and on. We could have easily stuff ourselves there with sugar, but instead we headed over to nearby Boone Docks for lunch.

That afternoon we hit a few more wineries, went out for dinner with Susie's parents, then went to Susie's parents' home for some hot cocoa, cookies, and hot tubbin'. The next morning we had to forgo snowshoeing because we'd been hit by a blizzard! It was painfully cold out and the wind blasted us with icy flakes. So we opted for a leisurely breakfast that ended up with the worst luck in service ever. Kelly ordered a tea to try called "Heartwarming Cinnamon" which she detested. Jason ordered an omelette without onions that arrived choked with them. Susie had a misunderstanding about the kind of bread she wanted for her french toast. Then the bill arrived and we'd been charged for an extra omelette. We headed over to a book store in town and Jason found a book of haiku by Japanese writer Basho, whom he'd read about in a National Geographic article left in our room at the Sands which we later stole. Because of the foul weather, we spent the entire day wine tasting rather than snowshoeing although the roads between wineries were harrowing. A couple times our car coming down the hill was unable to stop, but luckily we avoided incident.

That night we had dinner at the North Peak brewery, and afterward discovered this great Irish pub downstairs where live Celtic music was playing. We stayed for a few songs, and even got to sing along.

The next morning we arose early to hit the road. On our way out of town we stopped at the Traverse Pie Company where Kelly bought Jason a piece of cherry crumble pie that she owed him from last year. Then we hit to road, stopping at the Bob Evans for lunch near St. Joseph on the way home. The roads were still nasty, full of scary potholes and unplowed sections of the highway.