City Museum

Can you believe I am updating the blog and not from my phone? Here are a few City Museum pictures--only a few because my SD card needed to be reformatted and only fit a few pictures in =(









As you can see, we were sweaty as...um...ultramarathoners in Death Valley and excited as a 4-year-old on uppers. I love that place. I hate the dead baby bird I slid into at the bottom of an outdoor slide, causing feathers to get stuck to my butt and blood on the slide. I am still thinking about it, ugh. I also hate the bratty people who work at the City Museum. Get an attitude change! You are not cooler than thou!

and then there was one...

Shruti left me yesterday to return to Philly =(. THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR JOINING ME!!!!!! Tomorrow I head over to Chicago (~5 hour drive) where I will look at apartments with my future roomie Becca. YAY! And I will be staying with Henry, aka Henri. Hopefully his lack of a couch to crash on at the moment will not be too much for this 27 year old body to handle. =)

st. louis missouri!

Our trip has come to a pause in St. Louis where my younger sister lives. Shruti and I spent our first day doing free things: the new city garden outdoor sculpture garden in downtown and the awesome St. Louis zoo. Shruti then cooked Indian food for my sis and her roomie and I cooked cheesecake (sorry Hill, I can't send you any).

The next day we went to the CIty Museum. But it's not a museum at all, it is a giant indoor/outdoor playground and it was awesome! I have the bruises on my knees to prove it. They also probably prove that I am probably a little too old for the CIty Museum. All the school kids that were there were surprised that Shruti and I were actually playing instead of standing around "chaperoning." Shruti, you have any pics from this to put on the blog?

springfield missouri!!!

After a 10 hour drive from Lubbock (phew!), we made it to Springfield to visit my friend from high school, Anne. We went out to eat at Lambert's, home of the throwed roll. They literally throw rolls at you at your request. Our roll server was a 14 year old boy with a little attitude who seemed to enjoy flirting with the youngest people in the restaurant that weren't younger than him. He liked us calling him hot buns a little bit too much. Don't worry, the only purpose of our banter was to obtain more rolls! Oh yeah, we also ate chicken friend steak.

lubbock texas!!!

Ok, so the only reas

on we drove through Lubbock was to visit Tammy, a former post-doc in the Chang lab. Totally worth it!!! It was awesome to chat with Tammy, meet her puppy Peanut/Donkey, and eat some Texas meat (served on waxed paper in a crate)! AND...I finally ate at a Sonic on the way to Lubbock. They should totally expand into the Bay Area, their Limeades are sooooo delicious.

fyi shruti is totally geeking out right now

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where are we?

Our asses are so big they cover FOUR states! (yes, we went to four corners and sat right in the middle of utah, arizona, colorado and new mexico.) yo mamma got nothin on us.

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arches arches and more arches!

We did all of the major hikes in Arches minus the Firey Furnace, which requires a permit. Yay us! Here's a selection of lovely views from our hikes. This is the last Ntl Park for our trip =(. But we'll swing by Monument Valley and 4 corners on our way to Albuquerque tomorrow!

delicate arch the symbol of utah

delicate arch at sunset, with the laSal mountains in the background. lots of folks here, all jockeying for the best photo spot

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Who, or should I say Hoo, looks more like Queen Victoria?

You be the judge. We hiked the Queen's, Navajo, and Peek-a-boo loops today in Bryce before driving out to Moab (near Arches Ntl Park). The Queen's loop is named for a hoodoo that allegedly looks like Queen Victoria. Well, we thought we saw her on the trail maybe (hoodoo in center of smaller pic), but upon googling, it appears we did not see her at all (larger pic). Despite this failure, the hike was great and not as strenuous as the ranger suggested. Hiking amongst the hoodoos is definitely a little bit surreal.

Hoodoo voodoo

We got a quick taste of the Bryce hoodoos today, tomorrow we hike among them!

On the way to the narrows...

We also hiked a very different terrain yesterday-a river. We didn't have time to get to the really narrow part of the hike (which is why the long hike through the Virgin River is called the Narrows) but we got a taste for what it might be like. And neither of us fell in the water or ruined our cameras. YES!

Angel's Landing hike

Jody (my favorite guy from the woodshop =D) recommended that we do this hike. Well, I guess a lot of people did, but I'd like to think that Jody did it because he secretly wants me to be his baby mama. But anyways, the hike has some major switchbacks (Walter's Wiggles they're called) followed by some bouldering-type hiking on a narrowish ridge to the top of the daunting piece of granite. Overall, the hike was a lot of fun (makes you feel like hardcore because you're getting a little down and dirty with the rocks), and the views are amazing of course.

finally got the intarweb again!

Shruti and I have now made it to Bryce Canyon! After an awesome visit in Zion (amazing hikes-I definitely want to go back and do some more hardcore ones, and all of you should visit this park ASAP), we drove the 1.5 hours up to Bryce and were treated to the army of hoodoos that stand at attention in the Bryce Amphitheater. Tomorrow? A hike through the hoodoos! and then off to Arches =). SO MUCH FUN!!!

I'll post some picks in the next couple of posts.

from mountaintops to canyons.

this is emily wading through "the narrows," a trail that actually goes up-river into a canyon. there were parts we were up over our waist! it goes on 16 miles and can be hiked as an overnight trip. a cool way to spend a hot (98degrees) afternoon!

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angels landing zion national park

while this view may seem similar from our other canyon views, the difference this time is we climbed 1500-feet over 2.5 miles to achieve this. and i mean CLIMBED. we had to clamber over boulders on a 4-foot, steep, ridge. not for those with a fear of heights or poor grip on their shoes!

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venus and her moon hung low in the eastern sky as Emily and I raced against the rising blue light from that direction. the sun is jus now making its ascent, and each second is different from before.

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just did a quick hike into the canyon. only took us an hour to get to 1.5 miles...but that means 2 hours out. met an conductor from kansas who hikes this every year, and a man from utah who was training for a 12-hour rim-to-rim hike in a month! saaid that there are folks who do a 24-hour rim-to-rim-to-rim RUN. we think that is insane.

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Can you say gorgeous?

I can, and I probably will a thousand times more on this trip. Good job earth. Today we walked a rim trail and saw many many amazing views of the grand canyon. Oh, and last night I got what we think might be a condor (though it may just be an ordinary vulture or buzzard) in one of my sunset shots.

todays hike

Emily and I are currently on an 8-mile rim hike headed east along the south rim to the hermits rest. Currently we are walking past a portion called the abyss, where the canyon just drops straight down with a sheer granite face. eep!

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Our theme song

We have seen some pretty amazing things and we're going to see more. Last night, as we gazed over the Grand Canyon, lit in the setting sun, there was almost a hush that couldn't be pierced by the other tourists chatting around us.

Of course, we broke that hush, and quoted our trip theme song: America, F#@!* Yeah! We've been really into it. (which is another road trip theme phrase "I'm into it.")

So next time you gaze upon the beauty that America has to offer, remember this:

Devil's Golf Course, DV

I think this was the coolest thing in Death Valley-a dried up salty lake that left millions of salty rock formations behind. People have put golf tees in various places and I found a nice hole for a little golf ball. We found some nice salt crystals and yes, they tasted like good ol' NaCl.

We are the shadows in the Valley of Death

Today we drove from Beatty, NV to the south rim of the Grand Canyon via Death Valley. We left at dawn (630 am) to avoid the intense 100+ F heat in Death Valley. Thank goodness because we were getting hot by 10 am!

sunset at the grand canyon

sunset at the grand canyon

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