Tweed pyjamas and piranhas

As the weather gets better and we get better at finding fantastic camping spots, the frequency of our updates seems to be plummeting. Our sincere apologies, hopefully we'll be good from now on and updates will keep rolling in on a regular basis. I'm delighted to announce that I actually figured out Windows Movie Maker yesterday and I started the opening scene of our travel movie. At the rate at which I'm going, it's probably going to be an epic 3,5 hour movie which will hit theatres in Fall 2014.

After our last update, the Hoff took us (we really don't have a say in all this, the Hoff is a true tyrant) to Bryce Canyon National Park, which was a fairytale experience (I urge everyone to Google some pictures until we find a router that will allow us to upload some of our own. We found a free camping spot with restrooms (!) and spent 2 full days hiking. For the people unfamiliar with the North-American obsession with Stop-signs: They. Are. Everywhere. And I seriously mean Everywhere. So on our way back after our second day of hiking, I was stupid enough to ignore one, right in front of a park ranger. Apparently, park rangers are also some hybrid form of police officers, which I realized after the poor guy had been driving behind me with flashing lights for some 2 kms. After making sure we weren't drunk, stoned, or in any other way showing off our Dutch heritage, he let me off the hook with a warning.

The next day was my birthday. So we woke up to snow. Say what? Yup, there was actually snow on the 18th of May. Thankfully, it heated up fairly fast and we were able to go for a short hike (actually advertized as "The Best Short Hike In The World") before stealing Best Westerns' WiFi to Skype on my birthday. We had a "Helluvah" pizza for dinner in a restaurant with waiters (premier during this trip) and drove to Petrified Wood State Park where we spent the next day listening to Frans teaching us all sorts of interesting stuff about biology and watching some pieces of petrified wood.

After a drive through yet another snow storm we arrived in Capitol Reef National Park, where we would spend the next 5 nights. We found an absolutely gorgeous place to camp and hiked for a couple of days in what is probably the most diverse and pretty region we have visited yet. Canyons, mesas, arcs, rainbows.... it was absolutely gorgeous. After five days we had exhausted the hiking possibilities and decided to hit the road again, which brings us to our current location. We are in Moab, Utah, at a couple of kilometers from Arches National Park and Canyonlands National Park, which will consume a couple of days before we continue our way to Colorado.

That's all for now. Hopefully pictures, movies, powerpoints, stickers and promotional chap sticks will follow soon!

Mr. Thumb and the amazing Razor

 Well folks, after our Grand Canyon adventure I (Frans) shall bring some stories and myths about our 3-state-crossing journey. At first, we had to steer the Hoff towards Phoenix again. In a two day journey, including sleeping in the desert under the stars, we arrived in the suburbs on Saturday to skype and team up with Kaylee's mom and colleague who were in town for work. After a huge amount of Mexican food (which I missed because of skyping) we left Kaylee with the two ladies. Kaylee, later that day, got on her flight with some help of her mother, who works at the airline company.

We, in the meantime, drove away as quickly as possible from our city-shaped nemesis, though not after buying another load of books. We spend the night at the foot of Humprey's Peak, an old volcano near Flagstaff. Courageously we started to climb the mountain on Sunday morning but found our Waterloo in the snow which slowed us down and made the trail almost impossible to walk on. Defeated we returned to the Hoff and got on the road again toward the west where we camped at Kingsmen. Miraculously, the Walmart had a quiet parking lot and we slept liked knocked down daisies.

The next goal on Monday was to conquer Nevada with Jaspers wisdom, Sanders looks and my silly dances. First we had to face the challenge of visiting the Hoover dam at border. Before we could drive over the dam we were checked on atomics and bombs. As we proceeded and drove over the dam, Sander and me were largely disappointed by the size of the famous dam. Jasper at first didn’t notice the dam at all as he was occupied by slaughtering a mango. The second time we drove over the dam, Jasper also noticed the miracle of concrete and shared our opinion. Our opinion of the highway bridge near the dam was the opposite though.

A couple of miles up the road, we saw the skyline of Las Vegas unfold before our eyes. Miles and miles of suburbs surrounded the skyscraping casino's along the Strip. Vegas doesn't have many rainy days but we managed to get there on one of those days. After another skype session we headed for the strip, were Jasper played on his pink guitar and we shot movies and pictures of the astonishing wast of energy and scenery the casinos displayed along the Strip. We also got out of this city as fast as possible and slept at a Casino near the Nevada - Arizonian border.

The next day, the Hoff brought us through the desert (with a gray sky!) into Utah toward Zion National Park. We immediately grabbed a back country permit as we planned to hike on Wednesday and Thursday along the West rim trail. That night we had a pancake party. Together with leftover pancakes, sleeping bags and a tent we started hiking up the canyon the following day. Awed by the sandstone cliffs showing crossbedding everywhere, we climbed up the canyon and enjoyed the view. Though up at the plateau it was kinda coldish, actually too coldish for the Grand Canyon diet we brought with us. So, after an emotional discussion in which all three agreed from the start, we decided to call an end to our backpacking trip and head for the Hoff. After a 30 km hike, in which Sander injured his knee, we slept like babies. The following day, Jasper and I decided to hike up the east rim, leaving Sander behind with the Hoff due to his knee. The hike was even better than the day before which washed away the last regrets about abandoning our back-country adventure.

The next day was another skyping day, combined with a small hike in the afternoon in the Kolob Canyons, the northern part of Zion. Sander and I went up to a overlook point to read our books there while Jasper ventured on a longer hike. The evening and night was spended at a rest area where the generators of the trucks contributed to a nice allround environment.

Saturday we headed back to the Kolob Canyons to hike a 20 km roundtrip towards possibly the largest arc in the world. Why the word possibly was added in the description is unknown. The arc was indeed quite big and was located high up one of the canyon walls. A good look at it was difficult though cause the trail was in the forest at the bottom of the wall. During the way back we couldn't resist a nice clean creek and we took a nice bath (without shampoo though) in the cold and refreshing water. Today we are at Cedar City for skyping, again, and for the laundry. Next stop is Bryce Canyon National Park.

To end with a typical Dutch greeting: Ajeto Buur!!

North Side Story

This blogpost is written by Jasper and will tell of Frans’ and my adventures in the Grand Canyon. The day we left for our four-day hike we got up at 4.45 (at least, we should have; the alarm didn’t work). So, the day we left for our four-day hike we got up at 5.15 (pretty impressive without an alarm!) and ate a very cold breakfast of yogurt, cornflakes and banana since it had been freezing that night. Frans took his shot of ultra-concentrated Redbull which he needed to start him up for the day and we were off at 6.11 am! We walked for fifteen minutes to the rim of the canyon and followed the rim trail to our trailhead. Alas, we didn’t check the distance it was to the trailhead too closely and after walking for 45 minutes we were still some 5 km from the trailhead. So we took the bus which took us back to the village first before dropping us of at the trailhead. By then it was eight o’clock and we could start our descend amidst the host of people who had come up with the same idea of descending the South Kaibab trail.

When we descended some 1000 meters, we decided it was time for lunch; we checked our watch and it was only 09.31! So a grain bar would have to do. We managed to get to the Colorado river in three hours and since we thought we were almost there (by then it was only 10 km to the campground) we settled ourselves and read a book for an hour. Then we were off again into the smaller canyon which would take us to the campground. However, we hadn’t realized our poor shoulders still had to get used to carrying the weight of a tent, a sleeping bag, an air matrass, 2.5 litres of water, clothes, 40 wraps, 20 grain bars, 2 cans of pasta sauce, 2 blocks of cheese, 2 crops of lettuce, 4 sausages and two bags of peanuts so it took us another 3.5 hours to get to Cottonwood campground. There, we set up our tent, placed our food and garbage in the metal boxes which were provided and had to make sure the wildlife stayed wild and got to bed at sunset (8 p.m.) after which we slept for twelve hours straight. Except for one incident at 4.45 am when the alarm decided to work properly this time.

The next day, we had to climb 1400 meters to the North Rim which was pretty easy; we walked in the shade most of the way and we left a part of our food at the campground to which we would return the day after. When we got up the North Rim in the late afternoon, we were greeted by patches of snow and a completely deserted camping because the season starts only at May 15^th. We ate our dinner at the lookout point on the rim and watched the sunset before going to bed. Again, we slept for twelve hours and again, we woke up at 4.45 am because Frans had forgotten to turn off the alarm. Time to get back to the Colorado. The killer canyon from the first day proved even more of a challenge this time because there was scant shade to be found. At five in the afternoon we arrived at Bright Angel Campground and washed ourselves in the stream before eating our last dinner (wraps with pasta sauce again, yummy!). All was left for us to do the next day was to get up at 4.45 and climb back to the South Rim, which we managed in 5 hours; just in time to wake Sander and Kaylee with our amazing stench!

Grand Canyon I: Kaylee

I (Kaylee) have been deemed this weeks blog writer, so Ill fill you with what we've been up to since the last update. On Friday, The Welcome Wagon (aka: The Hoff) rolled into Phoenix Sky Harbour airport at about 9am. After popping about 30 balloons that decorated The Hoff for my arrival, we went to Starbucks where, while basking in the amazing warmth (well, I thought it was amazing. The Dutchies may argue otherwise), we ate breakfast/stole wifi. After Sander finally shaved off his beard, we then we hit the road. We drove for what seemed like forever (which is likely due to the fact that we had to stop every 15 minutes because Jasper has the bladder the size of a pea), and finally rolled into the luxurious campground in Grand Canyon National Park. Our first day here, Frans and Jasper headed to the Rangers station to get their back country hiking pass. Sander and I figured this would be a great time to go get groceries/gas up, so we hopped in The Hoff and hit the road. Seconds before we were about to exit the park, Sander asked “where's the park pass”. This sent us into a frenzy of searching, yielding no results. We headed back to the campsite where Jasper and Frans joined the search. The poor Hoff was violated as we strip searched him. Just as we were about to give up, Jasper figured it'd be a great idea to check the pockets of the pants he wore the day before. Guess what he found? After that adventure, the four of us hit the road one more time, and went to get groceries, where the adventure continued. We arrived at the General Store, which one would assume has more than canned goods and a few rotten vegetables for sale. After paying an arm and a leg for the little bit of decent food we could find, and a bottle of wine (which we had to prove we were old enough to purchase by showing our passports because apparently a drivers license isn't valid photo id), we set out to stock the fridge. However, a faulty grocery bag made this seemingly simple task far more complicated than necessary, for our bottle of wine smashed, starting an argument with the store employees. After a lengthy exchange of rather unpleasant words, we were finally on our way back to camp (with a free, new bottle of wine).

Over the next few days, Jasper and Frans were gone on their 4-day hike across the canyon. I can't offer much detail on this excursion, but I can wager a guess based on the state they returned in: it was super warm, and they're sick of eating wraps. During these four days, Sander and I did a nice day hike along the rim of the canyon. We also attended a lecture about how the Grand Canyon was formed, simply to avoid the cold. One would think the Grand Canyon is a warm place to vacation. Guess again. The high for the day was 8ºC and overnight, a not-so-comfortable -7ºC. We ate breakfast with an elk, and after a couple of days were finally able to enjoy the sunshine we expected.

Oh, I also forgot to mention, during the first night, aliens abducted Frans and replaced him with a goateeless lookalike. Check it out:

Strapazen

A little Dutch documentary (about wasting time in Phoenix, AZ)

Immer gerade aus

Dear all,

We're in Arizona! It's some 30 degrees centigrade 24/7, the cities are as uninspiring as I've ever seen them and the gas is about twice as cheap as it was in California.

After Sanders last update two days ago, we drove via the outskirts of LA (still some 60 kilometres away) to Joshua Tree National Park. Along the way, I (Jasper) bought a new tent, as my old 2-person tent which I had bought in Seattle proved way too noisy under windy circumstances, robbing me of three nights of sleep. Now, we have a luxurious 3-person tent with wifi, a bath tub and escalators and the three of us are now able to go on multi-day hikes!

We had found out the location of the free overflow campground of Joshua Tree Village where we could stay the night. However, the navigation system directed us to a very uneven patch of desert which happened to be the property of a beer-drinking, red-neck giant with a very frightening German Shepherd and an equally frightening wife (we've not been able to distinguish between the two). Luckily, we were allowed to spend the night 5 meters away on the other side of the road, outside of the rightful property of this charming gentleman.

The next day, we drove to Joshua Tree National Park and out of fifteen people inside the visitor centre, nine persons were Dutch! After having received warnings about dehydration and the presence of snakes and turtles (yes, turtles, I don't know why either) we set off for the desert. We walked two short, one-mile nature trails which led us to a canyon with completely weathered, yellowish granites interspersed with Joshua trees, some erratic flowers and more rocks before climbing a 400-meters high mountain called Ryan Mountain which gave us a terrific overview of the desert plain. We'd never been in a desert before and it was awesome; it's strange to realize that Indian tribes were able to live off the land where we'd be dead in two days' time.

We had dinner at Jack in the Box because we just had to know what kind of food was being served in a place called Jack in the Box. It turned out to be hamburgers and unlike the McDonalds, these were really tasty! Afterwards, we headed to the McDonalds for an icecream cone which we ate in the Hoff; we were watching two drunk tramps having a fight right outside the entrance while a third one took off with the meagre possessions of one of them.

This afternoon, we arrived in Phoenix where we'll be picking up Kaylee from the airport Friday morning. However, Phoenix is a very, very dull place without any entertainment, culture or whatever, so we'll be spending the next day talking to people at home via Skype, writing cards, shopping for groceries and shorts, repainting the Hoff, eating out of our own and each others noses, attempting to break the world record for wearing the most purple t-shirt and going for a swim in the one swimming pool which isn't open only from late May to early August. Friday, we'll head for the Grand Canyon, where we'll be staying with Kaylee for a week before taking off to Vegas. See you next time!  

Oh sweet Sun

Since Frans wrote our last update, we've been blessed with sun, sun and some more sun. This has yielded some inevitable results. Jasper is already more tanned than I will ever get. Frans seems to be incapable of getting sunburned but he's slowly becoming a pretty blondine. My skin is peeling off.

We happened to be in Yosemite NP at the beginning of National Park Week, which meant that people who normally can't be bothered to go there decided to take there dog for a walk, go biking (or whatever they call biking here) and occupy every single square metre of the park. We managed to find a pretty terrific hike though (pictures on picasa https://picasaweb.google.com/thehoffmeister42), which ended at the video in our last post. Because that was our first really sunny day, we didn't have sunscreen on us, so by the time we got back down, Frans couldn't look at me without laughing. My clowns nose was gone pretty soon, but there is still skin peeling off my arms and neck.

After Yosemite, we decided to go and see some really big trees in Sequoia NP. We found a place to spend the night really close to the park entrance (we got a discount for being Dutch, hurray) where we could hear some horny bulls calling. We never saw any bulls though, and next morning we were wondering where in the world they were when the owner of the campsite came over to chat with us about being Dutch and told us there were no bulls around. We'd been listening to bull frogs all the time.

Sequoia NP was a fairly big disappointment. There were some big trees, but they weren't nearly as impressive as the Redwoods and there was ~3.5m of snow to make sure there was no way in the world we could go hiking. So we drove on and took a shower in the river instead.

Sequoai was our last view of the high mountains for a while, and we left for Lake Isabella, an artificial lake with a free campsite, where for the first time since the Nightmare of Chillwack we camped on the same site for more than one night. Even though the mountains weren't really high anymore, we could still do some serious hiking and reached some pretty cool  vista points.

Tomorrow we'll be frying our asses of in Joshua Tree NP and then we're on our way to Phoenix and the Grand Canyon!