Colorado / Utah Trip - Day Three

The third day of our trip was Memorial Day.  We expected Arches and Canyonlands National Parks to be pretty crowded so we decided to do one of the longer hikes in Arches (and to do it early) in hopes of avoiding the major crowds.

We chose to hike the Devil's Garden trail at the very back of the park and just go as far as the boys would do without too much complaining.  There are several arches along the trail and this was one of our favorite hikes when Brian and I were in the area nine years ago.

We were on the trail just after 8 am and we could always see people, but it wasn't overwhelming at all.

Landscape arch is about 1 mile from the trailhead.  It is one of the longest stone spans in the world (over 300 feet!) and pretty impressive.

The trail was easy up to Landscape Arch but then it gets a little fun.  You have to go straight up this narrow section that drops off on one side (and makes a mommy nervous at times!).  The boys did an excellent job - they don't have much fear!

At the top, Brian took Carter and Rylan out on one of the fins to check out the view back towards where we'd come from.

I promise Gray and I were there too!

At this point we decided to take a little break in the shade and have some snacks.

Our three super hikers!

Next we took a couple of side trails to two more arches.  You can sort of Partition Arch in the center of this photo which I took from our snack spot.

We let Gray hike to Partition Arch.

Carter is our big helper with Gray!

We made it to Partition Arch (you hike behind it and then look through it back towards our snack spot).  Rylan is the kiddo under the arch in the picture!

I switched places with Rylan and took a picture of everyone under the arch.

Look who popped up in the small arch next to Partition Arch!

Cutie!!!

Next we retraced our path and took a second side trail to Navajo Arch.

Brian took my picture in the exact same spot nine years ago :)

Navajo Arch just suddenly appears!

After spending a little time at this arch as well, we decided to hike back to the trailhead.  We could have continued on to Double O Arch but that would have added another mile to our hike (we already had hiked 2 miles and had an additional 1.25 miles to get back to the trailhead).  It was getting much hotter and there is very little shade on the trail so we weren't sure the boys would have that much more in them.  Plus Carter had the stomach bug the day before - we didn't want to push him too hard.

Hiking back down the fin towards Landscape Arch ...

The hike from Landscape Arch back to the trailhead was ridiculously crowded and we were so glad we had gotten out early.  Rylan was also fading so we were glad we'd made the decision to head back.  When we got to the car, we opened up the trunk and ate lunch in the shade while Gray napped in the backpack.  Then we moved the car just down the road to the Sand Dune Arch trailhead.

There is a small arch hidden in these fins ...

We let Gray hike to this arch since it's only about 0.15 miles one way.

Sand Dune Arch ...

The arch is very appropriately named :)

After that short hike we decided the boys had one more short hike in them for the day.  We drove over to Double Arch and found a parking space (it was crowded but not quite as bad as I had anticipated for the holiday).  This hike was only 0.5 miles round trip and easy for the boys to do.

I have a picture of this arch hanging in our bonus room from our previous trip and Rylan loves to point out that he's been there now!

Brian hanging out with the big boys under the back arch ...

And, again, Gray and I were there!

After we got back to the car, we headed to the entrance of the park and went to the visitor's center.  We looked through the exhibits and grabbed Junior Ranger books for the boys to work on back at the condo.  We spent the rest of the afternoon and evening there relaxing so we'd have enough energy for the next day!  We made dinner and then went to the pool for a little bit before heading off to bed.

Edwin Warner Park

This afternoon, my mom and I took the boys to Edwin Warner Park for a couple of hours.  We've been there a few times before but never when the nature center is open.  We stopped by there first and the boys enjoyed all the animal exhibits.  They liked "trying on" all the animal bones ...

Gray went over to this little exhibit and stood just like this and waited for me to take his picture.  He's been trained well :)

Next we headed over to where the Little Harpeth River runs through the park.  The boys had fun throwing rocks in the river and just fooling around.

Carter was a natural at skipping rocks!

And Gray preferred this look (he pulled his swim diaper and shorts back down anytime we fixed it!) ...

Swim Meet #3

The boys had a swim meet at the Longview Rec Center today.  Longview has a huge team and the meet went on forever!  We didn't finish until around 2 pm (we got there around 7:30 am to get a good sport and for the boys to warm up).  We had to stay for the entire meet this time too because I was volunteering as clerk of course (the clerks make sure all the kids are lined up correctly for their heats and lanes).  My mom is visiting right now so she watched Gray and helped with Carter and Rylan while I volunteered.

Today Rylan swam the individual freestyle and backstroke events as well as the freestyle relay.  He swam the freestyle in 41.29 seconds (1.17 seconds slower than last week) and placed 9th (out of 19).  He swam backstroke in 41.11 seconds (29.3 seconds FASTER than last week) and placed 8th (out of 11).  Rylan's freestyle relay team swam the relay in 2 minutes, 56.07 seconds and finished in 3rd place.

Rylan with his friend Max who was in one of his preschool 2 year old preschool class:

Carter swam the same events as Rylan as well as the medley relay.  He finally broke 30 seconds in both of his individual events - yay!!!

Freestyle: 28.08 seconds, 11th place (out of 20) (best time by 5.67 seconds)
Backstroke: 29.79 seconds, 5th place (out of 16) (best time by 1.27 seconds)
Freestyle Relay: 1:52.55, 4th place
Medley Relay: 2:19.45, 3rd place

Carter got to swim butterfly in the medley relay.  It was his first time ever swimming butterfly and he did great!  He didn't DQ the relay and that's all the really mattered!  Here's a video of him swimming:

I'm super proud of these boys again this week.  Both were a bit disappointed they didn't get heat ribbons (Rylan was especially disappointed after the freestyle race since he got two heat ribbons last week - there were some tears) but they moved on quickly.  The boys finally got their team shirts this week - they love them!!!

Rylan's Artwork

Carter has loved art for awhile and definitely sees himself as an artist (he often says that's what he wants to be when he grows up).  However, he's not the only little artist in our family.  I asked Rylan if he'd like to draw Brian something for Father's Day and this is the awesome drawing he came up with. 

I love the different types of trees, all the unique houses, the road behind the houses with trucks, and the perspective he created with the hills in the background.  I'm so impressed!

Happy Father's Day!!!

Music City Kids Triathlon

Carter did his first triathlon of the summer this morning.  The Music City Kids Triathlon was today - it's a new triathlon run by the Aero Tri Club which is just for youth athletes.

The race was at Centennial Park by Vanderbilt University.  It was run pretty well except that everything was too spaced out and they were extremely slow with the results so we were there from 6:30 am to 11 am (and didn't even stay for the awards).

Carter did great!  For triathlons, age groups are based on how old you are on 12/31 of that year.  So Carter raced as an 8 year old.  He placed 11th out of 23 in his age group with a time of 26:14.  The 8-10 year olds had to do a 100 meter swim, 2.4 mile bike, and 0.5 mile run.  His swim time was 12th place, bike time was 20th, and run time was 4th.  We obviously need to go bike riding more often!!!  Too bad the run wasn't longer - that's definitely Carter's strongest leg!

Carter after setting up his spot in the transition area (no idea why he's sucking in his belly!) ...

The swim leg ...

Carter is about to go under the lane rope to swim back to the other end of the pool ...

Getting out of the pool ...

I caught up to Carter about to leave the transition area to start the bike leg (our neighbor Emory is right in front of him here) ...

It's hard to see much of the race since it wraps all around the park but I did get one video.  Here is Carter about to finish the bike leg ...

Carter ran super hard for the 0.5 mile run ...

Right before we left (while they were still working on the results for the senior division), they did raffle prizes.  Emory, Carter, Cade, and Avery (our neighbors) are all lined up with their "cool" sunglasses that were handed out at one of the sponsor tents.

Carter actually won a racing belt for his race number and won't have to borrow mine anymore!

We are super proud of Carter!!!

Father's Day Haircut

Carter really wanted me to cut his hair like Brian's.  So I got out the clippers this afternoon and he loves it (I definitely like it longer but it's summer and it'll grow back soon enough!).

Pool

We joined the Williamson County Rec Center again this summer for access to the pool.  So far we've been going to the Nolensville location (where Carter and Rylan do swim team).  We've stayed the last two days after practice to swim for a couple of hours.

Gray loves the water.

So do these guys ...

Gray has been loving having one entire side of the pool be zero-entry.  When the bigger boys were this age, we had to hog the tiny steps of any pool we went to.

Here is a video of Gray crawling around in the water ...

Swim Meet #2

The boys had their second swim meet of the season on Tuesday.  The meet was a home meet for us again and we had to be at the pool by 7 am for warmups (though we got there around 6:40 am to make sure we got a good place to sit in the shade of the team's pop-up tents).

Rylan did the individual freestyle and backstroke races this race.  He was in the second heat of both races which meant he was racing against the weaker half of the swimmers in those events.  Rylan did awesome!  So awesome that he won heat ribbons in both events!!!  He placed 5th overall in both events as well.  He was so proud of those heat ribbons!

Rylan swam the freestyle race in 40.12 seconds (beating his time from last week by 11.63 seconds).  He swam the backstroke race in 1 minutes, 10.41 seconds.

Carter did amazing as well but had a tougher day.  This week he swam the individual backstroke and breaststroke races and participated in the freestyle and medley relays.  Unfortunately the stroke and turn judges were a lot stricter this week and DQ'd the 7-8 year old boys in almost all breaststroke and butterfly races.  The judges tend to be less strict in the summer because not that many of the kids swim year round but these judges seemed to record all infractions.

This was Carter's first time swimming breaststroke and he DQ'd.  He swam backstroke in the medley relay but the relay team DQ'd because of their breaststroke and butterfly.  So even though Carter swam in 4 events, his times were only recorded for 2 events.  He got 3rd place in both of those events though (which is really awesome!).  If Carter hadn't DQ'd, he would have been 2nd in breaststroke.

Here is a video of Carter swimming in the individual breaststroke event ...

Carter swam the backstoke race in 31.06 seconds (which beat his time from last week by 0.17 seconds).  His freestyle relay team swam the event in 2 minutes, 23.60 seconds (which was 7.29 seconds faster than last week).