St. George Trip!!

As a combined graduation/anniversary/travelling home trip, we decided to extend the trek home to Houston. Back during Fall semester, Weston accepted an internship with Exxon Mobil for the summer. Coincidentally, Weston's coworker (Monte) at BYU studies was also offered the same internship. So we decided to caravan with their family back to Houston making some fun stops!

We extended the 24 hour drive from Provo to Houston into a 6 day drive spending extra time in St. George, Zion's National Park, and the Grand Canyon! I was worried that we would feel so sick of living out of the car and on fast food by the end of it that we wouldn't really appreciate the time in the National Parks, but it turned out to be a great side-trip! We were also so glad to have our friends Monte and Becca with us.

Drivin around St. George with Monte and Becca

Our first stop in St. George was a hike to see Rock Art. It was pretty crazy trying to decipher what the natives were trying to say. This drawing was on of my faves probably because you can almost tell what it is. But as we learned from a random guy there that seemed to be a self-proclaimed expert on the subject, the simplest of shapes can have many meanings to many different groups. 

The Rock Art in St. George

 The view was so pretty there!

We passed the Biggest Loser Retreat and wanted to take a pic with the sign.
This picture cracks me up every time.
Could you say optical illusion????

Weston looks like a GIANT and I look like some kind of elf!! 

After lunch, we stopped at this little park that Monte and Becca visit every time they come to St. George. The rock is so close together but if you are thin enough you can climb all the way through.

(For all of you who are wondering... He did not take the baby with him all the way, thank goodness! There is barely room for one person in this opening.)

I was feeling unadventurous so I did not try to squeeze through but Weston gave it a shot. He tried to go through this narrow area, but his rib cage was too wide.

We spent some time at the pool playing Liar's dice, the game from Pirates of the Caribbean. Becca and I totally rocked it and Weston and Monte got out first or second almost every time. It was fun and the perfect game to play in the pool!

Later in the day, Monte took us to this cave.

We had to climb down in this hole, head lamps and all, and keep climbing down for 15-20 minutes to a giant underground area. I was pretty nervous before going down and almost lost it when a bat flew right by my head, but we kept going.

It was actually really cool. So you climb down into the ground for 15-20 minutes until you get to this huge room underground. Apparently lots of kids climb down into the huge room and throw glow stick juice everywhere and it looks really cool. We arrived in the room a while after some kids that had just done that and it looked pretty sweet. Since you are underground, you have to bring flashlights but when you turn them off... you can't see a thing! It's so crazy cool!!! Monte and Becca brought enough head lamps for us to use and it was really, really cool.

In the giant cave room

This is us looking up from the hole on the way out of the cave.

It was a very fun day in St. George! On the way out, we stopped at the St. George Temple which as you can see is GORGEOUS! It's so white! Someone said that they have to paint it every 3 months to keep it white but I'm not sure if that is true. It was very pretty. 

In front of the very white St. George Temple

It was a super fun & short trip to St. George! We had a blast! Thanks to Monte and Becca for showing us around!