Granite Flats

I've been wanting to go camping for a LONG time now. We're talking like since I was pregnant with Noah. And granted we went in August for the Statham reunion, but we all got sick and Noah didn't sleep well and it just wasn't what I needed to get rid of this camping craving. So I told the Wardle's that they were going camping with us, assigned Craig to find us a campsite, and away we went!

We ended up going to the Granite Flats campground up American Fork Canyon. For those of you familiar with the canyon, it's up right by Tibble Fork. Fantastic little (ok, huge and sprawling) campground. Wardle's went up early on Saturday morning to get us a spot because it was a free, no reservations weekend. Us Indo people got up there around 2 because we had to drop Noah off in Orem. We decided it would be a more fun trip for everyone if he got to sleep in a house instead of a tent. After setting up camp and wasting a bit of time playing Craig's new Operation game, we went exploring down the "trails" leading away from our tents.









The trails lead down to a little ravine with 2 streams coming together in it. It was so pretty down there, the leaves had changed colors and were just starting to fall off the trees, the sound of gurgling water was all around, and it was just awesome. On our way back it was decided instead of following the trails we should make our own trail and just follow the streams back up, and then climb out of the gorge. It was actually a lot of fun. Zander was nice enough to create a log bridge for me and Steph (who were wearing flip flops) to cross the stream, and he also did some crazy Superman dive across the steep mountain face to save me cuz the tree I was holding onto decided to break. twice. Kind of a crazy adventure, but really a lot of fun.

We got back, cleaned up a bit, made dinner and dessert, talked to the neighbors, played Killer Bunnies (I won cuz I had ALL of the carrots), sat around the campfire trying to stay warm, then decided around 11:30 to head to bed. Wardle's heard an owl at some point in the night, but Zander and I didn't hear anything except the occasional clicking of Steph's propane tent heater.

In the morning we got up (Steph dragged herself out of her scalding hot tent around 10:30), played games, read books, layed around, ate breakfast, layed around some more, got packed up, and headed out. Wardle's headed further up the canyon up to Silver Lake to try and find a moose, and then came home the long way via the Alpine Loop. Us Indo's headed down to Orem, got Noah, dropped off the camping stuff, and headed home. All in all, a perfect way to end the summer.