Southwest National Parks Part 1

Justin and I have grown up a lot since college

Howdy do, we are currently relaxing in a hotel room in Boise watching O Brother Where Art Thou. My college pal Justin Hand is getting married tomorrow and I am recovering from his bachelor partylast night. Most of this is going to be about some of ourhiking/National Park adventures throughout the southwest. So for the various parents and grandparents that may be reading this allow me to reassure you that no harm has come to Myk or myself and all the adventures described herein were completed safely. (Ok I did get hit in the face with a piece of wood I was hatcheting but the damage was minimal).

Or not

So far, Myk and I have been only been uploading a few pictures from our phones on the blog. We have actually been taking a disturbingly large amount of pictures using a nice camera that we have on loan from Ry-bagel (fanks). We haven’t yet begun to actually sort them properly but we had some time and got through a few (hundred) and are posting some on Picasa/Google+ for you guys to check out. We are still working out the bugs so find em if you can for now but if the link doesn't work let us know. Some of these we will probably do some minor photoshopping on at some point to fix em up proper but for now we figured we could share some of the raw photos. So anyway here goes…

Grand Canyon

Do wha?

Whoa Grand Canyon. Whoa. We did not know what we were in for. Of course we knew we couldn’t
very well skip the grand canyon especially since we would basically be driving right past it, but I think we both sort of thought of it as the ho-hum stereotypical national park that’d just be full of tourists and nothing too special. False. The Grand Canyon is spectacular and ridiculously huge. We camped near the canyon that night and spent most of the day just trying to drive around and away from it in order to move on towards Zion National Park.

            We drove up from Sedona and did some minor sightseeing, going to different points and looking at the canyon and saying, “damn” and “golly.”   We did a quick little 3 mile roundtrip hike into the canyon which was no small feat on a 103 degree day, at least the getting back up portion. To give any of you who have never been to the Grand Canyon some scope of how huge and deep it is, we walked 1.5 miles going down and we were clearly nowhere near the bottom.  We had initially felt that we should have allotted some more time for hiking in order to go deeper into the canyon, but we were quickly disavowed of that fallacy on our hike back up. By the time we got up (keep in mind it was 1.5 straight up, 103 degrees, and we had little to no cover from the sun) we were pretty wiped out and went to the nearest campsite, after buying some beer and hotdogs. The next day we spent slowly driving out of the park stopping frequently to take pictures of the Grand Canyon at increasingly mind-bogglingly beautiful vistas. Our next stop was Zion National Park in Utah (Keep reading below a few more gratuitous canyon pictures).

Zion

So a few disclaimers about our day at Zion, we didn’t take many pictures and we definitely survived. We did a hike to a site called Angel’s Landing which boasts having one of the best views and one of, if not the, most difficult day hike in the whole park. We took the trolley into the park from the visitor center and as we traveled through the valley they told us about the Mormons who found and developed the park prior to it becoming a national park. Just the trolley ride through the valley was an experience. I was consistently blown away with how amazingly beautiful Utah looks. Truly the whole Southwest is like another planet. The landscape is all shades white, gold, and brick red morphed into extremes of canyons and rock jutting skyward shaped bizarrely by the elements. Zion is an excellent example of this (though Bryce Canyon is shaped even more insanely, more on that later).

This is what happens when Justin sees a log he thinks looks like a squirrel

            Back to the hike. Angel’s Landing is a 5.2 mile round trip with the last half mile being insane. Myk has a bit of the acrophobia and was a champion beyond description. We came to “Scout Lookout” the point from which, “children and scared adults should not be allowed to proceed further.” The last .5 mile to the summit is split into two sections where the path is narrow, surrounded by steep drop-offs, and only made possible because there are chains mounted for the hiker on to which hikers can (have to) hang. The catch here was that while we were aware that the chains were hung to make the hike possible we were initially unaware of it being split. This led to us braving the first section with gusto, believing that this would be the end. We got very excited as what appeared to be the end came into view. Myk was very nervous leading up to the hike due to repeated signs warning us that we should not allow children (or scared adults) to make the attempt nor should anyone if the wind is blowing. This was compounded by a particularly terrifying stretch pictured here.

Angel's Landing up the middle.

            As we neared what we perceived to be the end of our trail I was being supportive and lauding Myk’s bravery. This was soon silenced as we finished that stretch only to have what was obviously the real final stretch come into view.

This is me offering to call it a day, that is
the rest of the crazy path up the left side.

We both sat down entirely dejected and though I offered to turn back and call it a success, Myk ultimately made the call to forge ahead. It was certainly neither physically nor cognitively easy but making it to the top was incredible. I snapped just one picture with the phone I managed to scrump up with us. As you can see this odd rock formation jutting up into the middle of the canyon provides a view down the length of the valley. Just awesome.  The trip down the chains was not easy mostly due to the fact that looking down required, well, looking down. We made it however and as a reward

Clearly this was on the way down when
Myk decided to stop hating me.

we were able to actually enjoy the remarkable view as we took the switchback path down. That night we found a nice lakeside campsite for the night and spent the night relishing our victory. With more hotdogs and beer. To Be Continued...

The view. Worth it.

Roswell, Apache, and Sedona: or Myk's Close Encounter

Departing Austin, our plan was to drive to Carlsbad Caverns and camp there for the night, but the drive through west Texas was super long and boring and southern New Mexico honestly wasn't impressing us much either, so by the time we were in the cavern's vicinity it was getting a little late and we were less in the mood for camping and more in the mood for cheeseburgers, whiskey, air conditioning, and (I'm embarrassed to admit) catching up on game of thrones episodes. Shitty motels around Carlsbad were fairly expensive so we pressed on the extra hour or two to mystical Roswell, NM. Though we really only spent a few short hours there, Roswell lived up to its reputation nicely with strange alien and UFO shops around town and plenty of weirdos wandering about. I accidentally made friends with one such man outside our motel room as we were getting back from dinner (read: getting fast food and stocking up on whiskey). He seemed like a nice enough old dude at first and I was just chatting about the weather and how strange the town was and whatnot, and then all of a sudden he was muttering about how I better not tell anyone where he was and how the world is going to shit and he knows it because of the 'kids these days' and the 'politician's lyin'.' "(mumble mumble mumble) I seen 'em. I know you know what I'm talkin' bout. (mumble mumble mumble) hell in a hand basket (mumble) always lookin' at me like that. You know?" etc. etc. You guys have all seen this homeless guy. But THIS guy was like the only other dude staying at this tiny-ass motel in creepy-ass Roswell, NM and I found myself wanting to get away from him, but definitely not wanting him to know which room I was going into so I was kind of stuck nodding in agreement that yes, definitely, we all better hide off the grid unless we want Obammy's army to put us in Guantanamo or something, when Lo! Brave Justin came wandering out of the room wondering what was taking me so long and he is so used to dealing with the crazies that he just gave a firm "Hi sir, I'll be taking my wife now. You have a good night." and then he gave the weirdo a look that said you better not mess with us or else JByrd's gonna kick your ass or perhaps report you to Obammy's army. Or maybe the look said "my wife has been making me sleep with a hatchet under my pillow this whole trip." Which is true. Is it possible that I am the crazy one?? Yes it is. And I'll tell you why. I immediately texted Esther and told her exactly where we were in case we turned up missing at the hands of crazy Pete down the hall. I should take the time to say now to all the moms and grandmas out there (and to Esther who I probably scared half to death) fear not. I had had some whiskey and Justin insists on the following: 1) that I was being paranoid due to inebriation, 2) though Pete (I have no idea what this man's name was) was decidedly weird, he was almost certainly not dangerous, and 3) we were NOT the only people at the motel. Oh and 4) if I'm going to insist on being such a ninny, I should quit talking to every stranger I meet. Plus after all, we always have the hatchet.

Aaaaanyway, all was well in Roswell and the next morning we drove to Apache National Forest and ended up camping in a super sweet (and free!) campsite near Quemado Lake in NM. Nothing too special happened there but it's worth mentioning because it was so beautiful and starting to get mountainy with tall evergreens, and it was nice to get out of the crazy flat boring kind of desert. (sorry desert lovers. I'm more of a woodsy kinda girl.) A ranger told us there had been several sightings of a mountain lion recently and there are allegedly many black bears around there, but unfortuantely? luckily? we saw neither beast. 

The next morning we drove to Petrified Forest National Park. It is mostly a drive through style park but we got out and about some as well. Let me 'splain.. no there is too much, let me sum up, there were trees and after a long time they are still trees but also rocks. But seriously, they are themselves pretty beautiful and the landscape is the beginning of southwestern canyon country. It was a nice preview of some of the amazing things that we would be seeing in the coming weeks. Although only a minor warm-up for some of the rigorous hiking awaiting us.

Rock? Tree? Who can know?!

The next day - that would be Wednesday, June 5th for those who are keeping track - we drove to Sedona, AZ. Whoa. I had no idea what to expect and we actually almost skipped it because it wasn't really on the way north, but man I'm glad we didn't. Sedona is gorgeous! Tall, Arizona mountains, thick woods, snow-fed streams running everywhere, and these huge, crazy, red rock formations towering over everything casting eerie shadows at dusk and giving everything just barely this tint of a glowing ember. And then the town is adorable and tucked into the mountains and full of art and all the buildings look like rustic lodges. Justin and I are way too broke and scrumpy to live in such a cool, fancy, artsy town, but wow it was great to visit. We got dinner and beers at a local brewery (while watching the D-Backs trounce the Cardinals [go Cubs!]) and then camped up in the mountains ten miles out of town. 

Next up are our national parks adventures! We love you and miss you all and we're sorry we aren't better at keeping the blog current, but the mountain time zone barely has phone service, let alone wifi. (Also, many of these posts are written on the iPad, so please excuse spelling/grammar mistakes and strange autocorrects. We try to edit, but we're lazy.) We should have updated more in the scary Roswell hotel, which was the last time we slept inside, but I was too busy peeking out the curtains and making Justin sharpen the hatchet. More soon I promise. Love, Myk and JByrd.

 

 

Our little shutterbug

The Stars at Night are Big and Bright...

After departing New Orleans and tearing (driving exactly the speed limit at all times) through the rest of Louisiana Myk and I made it into Texas. We stopped to camp in Village Creek State Park in Lumberton, TX. Never heard of it? Well let me tell you their camping and trail-keeping is top shelf and they even somehow manage to pump town water into the park so we could fill our bottles and avoid dysentery (a common death of mine during my youthful days on the Oregon Trail). We are pretty sure that we were the only people in the park until suddenly (Cheri, you might not want to read this part!) a cockroach came literally flying into our midst out of nowhere. I know what you guys are thinking, “a cockroach? Come on J-Byrd don’t make me mock you mercilessly,” but let me tell you if I had tried to punch it in the face it would have had an easier time swallowing my fist. Luckily I managed to subdue it with a large log I was hatcheting up (it was coming right for me, you all saw it). We also had what Mychie kept calling “a little raccoon buddy” (it was a raccoon about the size of a great dane) lurking around. Despite the wildlife adventures of this particular campsite (did we tell you about worm campsite in Kentucky?) it was a lovely evening in Lumberton.

Hiya Kaya!!!

            The next morning we continued our trek across Texas arriving in beautiful Austin (before I go on I should warn all of you that after we left Austin we realized that we had taken almost no pictures whilst we were there).  We were staying with my dear friend Mike G ,whom I met in college in Springfield and has remained one of my favorite people of all time, and his wife Steph, who has easily become another of our favorite people. We got into town just as Steph was getting off work and hit the liquor store on our way back to their apartment. That was the last time any of us was to be going out for the evening, instead we sat around getting caught up on all of our lives, drinking whiskey, sharing the last of our tabbouleh, and playing with their hilarious cat Kaya. I am sure it comes as no surprise that the following morning involved yet another mega-hangover for our hero (me, Justin).

 Apologies for the Stock photo we don't
normally bring our cameras, phones,
or helicopters swimming with us.

            Mike and Steph suggested that we head out to Barton Springs for a swim in hopes of some revitalization. For those of you who may not know Austin is a peculiar little metropolis. It has the feel of a medium to large sized city but is injected with a ton of cool natural flourishes. One being the Green Belt (essentially a state park perfect for hiking and rock climbing that weaves in and around the city) and another being Barton Springs, which serves as the city’s main swimming hole. It is an actual spring to which they have added a cement border to give it a defined shape, but the bottom is like that of any other spring with reeds and other things living in it. When Myk, Mike, and Steph finally dragged me (our hero, Justin) out there and I jumped in, I discovered that despite the 90 degree heat outside the spring was still a crisp ~60 degrees. In short, HANGOVER DEFEATED!

            After our refreshing dip in the pool and a brief naptime for all involved, we headed out to Salt Lick BBQ and had unquestionably
the best BBQ I have ever had. Texas Brisket is, in fact, a force unto itself and any disparaging remarks I may have made in the past were misguided and I apologize sincerely for my ignorance.

BA-BOOM!

            While the best part of Salt Lick was obviously the food, the people running the place are no dummies. As we walked around the beautiful grounds drinking our BYOBs we stumbled upon a hammock garden. That’s right, a BBQ joint with a whole stand of trees full of hammocks. Needless to say we took full advantage of this perk.

            We ventured downtown that evening to meet up with Aidan Finnegan another great friend and spent the evening enjoying each other’s company over several rounds of Lone Star, “The National Beer of Texas.”

            We departed Austin yet again with a bittersweet farewell to people we love too much to see so sparsely. Fortunately this melancholy was quickly crushed by the monstrous monotony that is driving through west Texas. Seriously, it’s terrible. If you can avoid it, kids, do.

Mike G, keepin it real.

NAWLINS

It was with heavy hearts and aching heads that we finally left the great state of North Carolina. We were pretty sure that the bar had been set high for all upcoming states, cities, and towns in terms of the beauty of the landscape and the excellence of the people. Our first day out involved what would be one of our longer drives and most likely the most states traveled across: N.C., S.C., Georgia, and Alabama. Our next major stop was in Ocean Springs, MS/New Orleans but we decided to camp in Talladega National Forest before completing our journey. It was a lovely site and a very nice forest to drive through/walk around in. The next day we came within a couple miles of the Talladega Motor Speedway but didn’t stop for the photo-op (Sorry Pops) as we still had a pretty significant drive ahead of us. We got to Ocean Springs and went to my old college buddy Jeni’s place, and she graciously housed us for the evening and then played the role of tour guide in Ocean Springs and New Orleans.

Team KePow meets the sea

Mychie likes the beach and the beach likes Mychie

            Ocean Springs was our first view of salt-water and sandy beach on our trip and we took some time before heading to NOLA the next day to sit on the beach and get our feet a bit wet. Once we got into the city we went to the French Quarter and walked around for a few hours before snagging some excellent gumbo and heading to our hotel. That evening Jeni showed us around some more of the French Quarter and we did a bit of Bourbon Street.

            New Orleans is interesting. There isn’t another city, that I have been to, that is like it. Normally I am pretty turned off by a place that has the feel of, “we are catering to tourists now buy some crap!” While New Orleans definitely has a lot of that going on in certain parts I got the feeling that it is a very thin veneer over something truly unique. There were tons of fat tourists walking around the French Quarter buying junk but then a block away the streets are less cluttered with the pale and you can get the sense of how old New Orleans is and that the image on the postcards is just a scrubbed clean version of something real. There is a vibe to the place and music in the streets. For every skank trying to pull you into a shitty bar to drink something awful there is a bar older than America or a group of musicians actually scraping by playing on the street because this is a city where they can do it because the city needs them as much as they need it.

Bourbon St. by day

          

Bourbon St. by night

Myk and I talked about how it isn’t necessarily a place to settle down but somewhere we could live for a year or two if we had the dough and if we wanted to really let go for a while. Overall, I still feel like I have a love hate relationship with the city that leans more heavily towards love than hate. It’s like having a friend who sells used cars but at night plays in a band and on the weekend does charity work.

Anyway, we had a good ol’ time in New Orleans and Ocean Springs and our trip is great overall so far. Before we left we went to Café Du Monde and had coffee and Beignets (delicious) and then began our trek out of New Orleans and into Texas.

A proper NOLA breakfast

Lafitte's est. 1772     America est. 1776

Asheville

Leaving comfy Greensboro was tough, but it had to be done. Saturday, we headed out for Asheville. We planned to camp at a pretty cool spot we’d heard of called Curtis Creek up in the Blue Ridge mountains, but we had forgotten that it was Memorial Day weekend and when we got there, it was all full up. Instead, we happened upon a fat, toothless, shirtless, heavily-bearded hillbilly called Hoyle D. Elliott who turned out to be sweet as can be and we camped in his backyard on the side of a nice creek.

The next morning, we drove the Blue Ridge Parkway to Asheville. The Parkway was a gorgeous drive and we took a bazillion pictures of the beautiful Appalachian mountains.

Elevation 5592

Asheville immediately lived up to its reputation of a thriving hippie scene. We drove right into the downtown area and the streets were filled with people out and about on a lovely Sunday afternoon. We parked and walked around for a while marveling at the amount of tie-dye, long skirts, funky shops, and banjo-strumming buskers. We ate lunch at Chorizo where Justin got a fantastic duck and mushroom quesadilla and I enjoyed some kind of delicious pile of pork and beans and plantains. Also, their smoked tomatillo salsa was to die for and they had several samplings of refreshing margaritas. Yum. Post-lunch, we checked into our hotel, showered, came dangerously close to holing up for the whole night when we happened upon a Futurama marathon on Comedy Central, but eventually did buck up, dusted off our favorite old hippie skirts (Justin looked especially beautiful) and walked downtown to find beers. Asheville is positively bursting at the seams with breweries and cool bars. We started at Jack of the Wood – a hip, old Irish pub-style bar with tattooed hipsters, old and young, playing traditional Irish music. After that, we serendipitously ran into one of my old friends from Carbondale, Peter and he showed us around town for the rest of the night. We met up with another buddy, Liz, at a new brewery in town, of which (due to drunkenness) we cannot remember the name. Beers and beers and beers were consumed, stories were traded, laughs were had, updates of all the Kellys were given to my old Makanda cronies. And then we eventually cabbed back to the hotel. Much to Justin’s chagrin, I ended up tipping the cab driver something like two hundred percent because he was a lovely old man who grew up in southern Indiana and he was charming all the way to EconoLodge.

They say this is a vintage clothing store but the name holds a separate meaning for some.

Jamie Kelly happened upon this in Lincoln Park recently.

Greensboro

"I know! How about you guys live here now!"

Momma and Poppa at the office

Chamero kept us company while we repacked the Accordion

After Raleigh we stayed with one of our very favorite little families in Greensboro, NC. Katia, Adam, their beyond charming little boy Lio, and their lovable (if a little crazed) dog, Chamero welcomed us into their home on the outskirts of town on Wednesday night. We arrived just in time to give plenty of hugs, fill some whiskey glasses, and then watch Kate and Adam’s band practice. (Eros and the Eschaton has an album coming out in August and will be touring this fall, so look for them – they are outstanding!) Though we loved our private little show in the back bedroom of their home on Wednesday night, we got to see them play a proper one in Winston-Salem on Friday, which was fantastical. They played in a coffee shop/warehouse/club with 3 other great acts (of note a dangerously talented lady that calls herself Willower). I, of course, chatted up the locals while Katia and Justin hung out “backstage” (two couches next to the stage) and reminisced. The show itself was of course great and when we got back to Greensboro at 2am the only logical thing to do at that point was to stay up until 4am drinking wine. Our stay, bookended by Eros, was mostly spent playing with Lio. Racing trains with Lio, reading books with Lio, rocking the park and playground with Lio, filling a hole in the backyard with water from the hose (sorry bout that one, parents) and then splashing with Lio, and of course watching Kipper the Dog with Lio. We had the pleasure of meeting Lio when he was just a couple of months old and while we were absolutely smitten with him then, now, at two years old he has grown into a whole wonderful little man with a hilarious personality and facial expressions like you wouldn’t believe. He took a couple of hours to warm up to these strangers in his house, but once he did it was like we’d been there his whole life. Lio would just grab a book off the shelf and crawl up into my lap for snuggle time, or set up his train tracks and then take Justin by the hand to gently lead him over for play time. He also greets everything he sees with a chipper, “Hiya mama!” “Hiya fire truck!” “Hiya bird!” – a practice that Justin and I have adopted, “Hiya Texas!” All-in-all, our stay was quite low key but it was just what we needed and a few times since we’ve left and had hectic days of long drives and strenuous (but great!) camping, I have thought longingly of lazing around on the floor all day with Lio, the trains, and Kipper. The Hawkins family is much missed by Team KePow.

So yea, Lio likes him some Mychie

On the emotional roller-coaster that is...

...Kipper the Dog

Rally in Raleigh

Despite our best (well, maybe not quite our best) efforts, we have fallen way behind on our blogging. This morning we are in Austin, TX already, but I’m going to try to bang out posts for the past two weeks. Starting with beautiful Raleigh.

Trying to "finger tup" away the hiccups

Way back on Monday, May 20^th Justin, Ryan, Rockie, and I were making our cold and wet way down the mountains of Southwest Virginia and heading toward Raleigh, NC. For those of you who may have been concerned: Justin did manage to stay awake for the whole drive though barely, and of course I found cheeseburgers pretty much immediately. We got to Raleigh where we stayed with Rebekah’s mom, Roxanne, and her roommate, Lyn. Those two ladies were some of the most amazing hosts I have ever seen. We showed up hungry, tired, stinking, and wet. So wet. Everything we owned was wet. Rockie perhaps most of all. And they just hugged us and fed us and showed us to warm showers and to warm beds. It was outstanding. The first night, Ry, Rebok, J, and I went out to dinner with two of Rebekah’s good buddies, Nate and Jean Gray. They took us to a delicious restaurant called Beasley’s Chicken and Honey where Justin and I split a giant order of chicken and waffles with sides of smashed potatoes and creamy collard greens. Yum. Post-dinner we went to one of Rebekah’s old stomping grounds, Big Boss Brewery, which is a big ol’ warehouse with ping pong and pool tables to go along with their house-brewed beers and their own hops growing in beds out front. It was around this time that Justin's mega-hiccups first made an appearance.

Mmmmm breuben

The next day we finally got to see some sunshine and proceeded to plaster Roxanne and Lyn’s driveway with our rain soaked camping detritus in an effort to dry it out. We went to get burgers at Rebok’s favorite burger spot. Justin was introduced to a heavenly creation known as a Breuben (That is a Reuben with a Bratwurst on top on a Pretzel Bun) or as Justin affectionately refers to it, “the nail in the coffin of my vegetarianism.” Immediately following the end of the meal Justin's hiccups returned much to the amusement and annoyance of those around him. We all took a lovely stroll around a lake in one of Raleigh’s many beautiful parks before retiring to an evening of wine drinking and amiable debate.  Our departure the next morning was bittersweet as usual when there are fare thee wells involved but we are also finding that these moments are tempered with the excitement of moving on to our next locale. Before we went to Greensboro we managed to squeeze in dinner with The Wooleys (Barb, James, Amber, and Aidan). After a nice big meal of barbecue and fried chicken we began the journey to Greensboro, a journey made perilous by Justin’s full belly and the return of body shaking hiccups.

Myk looking for tiny frogs making a helluva loud song