Getting Back in (Blog) Shape

Romance and leaves flurry at our stay in Zion National Park.

(This blog by Austin)

Well, we have officially been blog slackers.  Normally, I would playfully blame Kindra, but really it's her fault.  No, just kidding, if anything is to blame, it has been our blistering pace of road tripping through the Midwest.  Our last post covered Texas, a gunslinging roadshow in itself, and since then we have spent an average of two nights per state cruising up to Minnesota and windily back to good ol' California.  Right now Kindra is making paper poinsettias for Xmas across the table in our current residence (my dad's in Pasadena), and I am taking advantage of some time without a food coma to catch you up on our last two weeks.  Ready?  Here we go.

Fayetteville, Kansas

Right before leaving for Canada, I discovered that my good friend Cagdas from Turkey was staying with his wife Gulden in Fayetteville, which is a stone's throw offcourse our original route of Texas to Minnesota.  Cagdas is a splendid fellow; besides being Turkish (which is automatic +10 point for me), he is friendly, comedic and doesn't mind my sloppy Turkish.  At one point we were roommates in Turkey, and we would have meaningful conversations while eating karisik sandwiches at 2 AM (don't even ask, they are so gross yet tasty).  Kindra and I toured briskly cold main street Fayetteville with them, and best of all, Gulden cooked us authentic Turkish grub, which is hard to pull off well in America.  We lamented about the missing fresh produce in the States that Turkey has in spades, and had a very pleasant stay before hitting the road once again.  I should also add I got pulled over for speeding in Oklahoma (83 in a 70), but got away with a warning.  You Midwest cops are so nice!

Lenexa, Kansas (basically Kansas City)

Kansas almost feels like Arkansas with nice parks.  Here we rendezvoused with good friends Nile and Caitlin from college who recently relocated to Kansas for school and work (wow, lots of friends leaving Cali for the Midwest!).  Caitlin is an excellent health cook, and I felt right at home with organic eggs and vegetarian chili.  When they went to work, we took their Golden Retriever Parker for a seven mile walk and almost got lost in a huge public park.  The second evening, we met up over "world renowned" Kansas BBQ with one of my old friends from New Jersey.  Super fun, and off to see more friends up north!

Caitlin, Nile, Kindra and I in Kansas City

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Minnesota, the land of nice people, supermalls, and snowstorms.  Actually, our weather was 95% spent wonderfully warm, it didn't snow until our departing morning.  We crashed with our close friend 'Jep' and his wife Laura for a few nights, and during one day also enjoyed exploring the city with Kindra's former Turkey teammate, Jessica.  Jep and Laura were fantastically fun to be our around, and we played strategic games, giggled at silly youtube videos (see Gangum Style), walked the massssive Mall of America, and mostly just watched their cow spotted bunny Twitch hop through cardboard boxes.  After hugs a plenty, we spent a Sunday with my old rommmate from college Keith and his wife Lauren.  Being of our same blood in the hiking, adventure, and pursuit of knowing people deeply, we had a blast with them.  Hikes around woody lakes (Minnesota has 10,000; need a fact check there, right?) were brisk and well needed for our car cramped legs, delicious food and great genuine conversation fed the soul.  Add some spontaneous sock floor sliding competitions at their spacious new home, and it made for a refreshing and too short of a time.  :)

Jessica, Kindra and I near the Mississippi River.

Polar bear!!  At the free Minneapolis zoo.

Good times with Jep and Laura.

Having a blast with Keith and Lauren.

Mt Rushmore, South Dakota

One snowstorm and ten bleak driving hours later, we pulled into our dark campsite at Badlands National Park.  Badlands was actually pretty cool, and receives a definite "most underrated" national park on our rankings.  Mt Rushmore was predictable, but still worth a stop, despite having to dish out $11 with our National Parks Pass not working at this location.

Future five face of the monument?  Doubtful, but worth a try.

Colorado Springs, Colorado

Being my birthplace, it was important to make a stop here.  We also had incentive that Kindra's awesome friend from high school Khristin and her equally great husband Dominique lived in the Springs.  We made our adobe on their floor for a few nights, and amidst meaningful conversations about emotional connection with our spouses and discussions of building sustainable homes called Earthships we got to explore the city as well.  Garden of the Gods, a rock climbing refuge, fulfilled my appetite for danger and challenge.  The Olympic Training Center, where Olympic hopefuls come to train at high altitude, made for a fun tour.  On our way out, we visited the house my parents built in the Springs, where I spent my first two years growing up. It was a very surreal experience.

Come join me in the Olympics!

Bouldering.

Being silly with Khristin and Dominique.

Arches National Park

Arches was awesome!!  Located in central east Utah, it was on our list of stops but not expected to be as epic as we thought.  Tons of sandstone rocks, positionally perfectly by heaven as if to say "come, climb me if you dare!"  And climb we did.  Small scrambles, high overlooks, you name it.  Kindra is the better technical climber, while I am more comfortable with heights.  We spurred each other on to push our comfort zones.  We reached Double Arch, where two arches stacked on the other.  I led Kindra up to walk near the towering top arch, while she encouraged me in scrambling up a crack and through a small boulder's hole to reach the bottom arch.  We felt like kids on a playground.

Arches in action.

My ankles started hurting a lot at Arches for no apparent reason, and every stretch I tried didn't seem to work.  It was super frustrating, and I found it revealing a lot of my issues of being super grumpy and not joyful when things don't go my way.  Basically, most of my life I have needed things to go my way to feel happy, which leaves little room for flexibility, or perhaps rather even more so a serenity when things go wrong.  This began a journey of learning to unlearn this silly pattern of my heart.  I'll probably blog more on this later, so let's get back to the adventure!

 Bryce Canyon and Zion National Park 

Bryce was overrated.  Don't get me wrong, it was scenic and had a cool trail or two.  But when Kindra and I pulled into this park mid afternoon after Arches, to found a few big beautiful canyons and cold temperatures, we did a short hike, caught a sunset, and hit the road for Zion.  Now Zion, that is a national park to behold!  We came in at night, so when we awoke to our surprisingly overcrowded campground that morning, we discovered a gorgeous, picturesque canyon walling us in on all sides.  We day hiked the canyon, gaped at deer and turkeys by the bucket load, and savored the last moments of a wonderful half country tour.  Yeah, we got pretty sentimental about it all.  Our final trip hike was Angels Landing, a monster of a trek 1500 vertical feet up a viewpoint of the whole canyon.  Along the way up we desperately clung to chains in place to keep our young, vagabond selves from tumbling a thousand feet down on either side.  The journey was adventurous, the view on top was divine.  It bonded us and prepared us for our return to civilization.

Bryce Canyon

Kindra taking on Angel's Landing.

Nearing the summit of Angel's Landing.

Back to SoCal

So here we are, back in Pasadena, had a great Thanksgiving with family and friends, and ready for some down time before continuing on to our next adventure.  And that begins January 15th, when we fly to Dublin!  Until then, more updates and reflections will be coming up here.  Happy Thanksgiving to you, may your weekend be blessed!


Photos links:

https://picasaweb.google.com/117860913937238604610/UtahNationalParks
https://picasaweb.google.com/117860913937238604610/ArksanasToColorado