Hello Elder & Family,
I wanted to get a letter out
the same time I put photos on the Blog. I have about 45 photos I’ll
attach to the Durocher Blog so it will be easier to view the pictures I took
(270 and copied to a CD.) I posted one here of all of us taking a break
near Beaver Mtn. on our way to St. Charles at Bear Lake.
Thursday the 28th was Nicholas’ 28th Happy
Birthday! Wow I have some terrific sons getting…mature… Haaa! I’d
not even go with the word OLD yet, because that would make your Mama
ANCIENT! David’s 26th will be coming up in November….whew!
As we’d planned to celebrate while we were camping, I gave the horn a
toot on FB, Text, and talked with Nick on the phone! Thursday started
very early as I had to be at work at 7am for a meeting and I’d planned to meet
up with Lindsay in Kaysville to hand off my 4wheeler. Dave was going to
take it up to the campsite so we could relay Morgan’s wheeler on Friday.
Before leaving the house that morning, Morgan and I had to get my 4wheeler
loaded and tied down so I could take it to work with me and head up to
Kaysville after our company lunch. CMA let the staff go after their
catered lunch as a management ‘Thank You’ for several deadlines that caused
late hours. Such a nice thing to do! It worked perfect for me to
get to Lindsay’s school. (I spoke and had photos about this in the last
letter.)
Friday started with a rush on Payroll and a few other tasks and I
got back home by 11am. I was delighted to see Avery home as he helped me
get Morgans wheeler on the trailer! Thanks Avery! Life saver!
Morgan arrived at 1:30pm and I had most everything loaded into the Lexus and
trailer and then it worked out that his friend Camrie and her sister Sierra
were needing a ride to North Ogden! So we adjusted things in the car and
they arrived at the house to then ride with us. It was fun to ‘talk
story’ with them and laugh all the way to their home. Camrie served her
mission in Hawaii and came home the same day. Very cool girls from a
great family as I met their mother at their 1908 vintage home.
When we arrived to Logan we picked up Lindsay and made our way to
Franklin Basin Road, just 15 miles or so from Bear Lake, Utah. We found
Nick on the dirt road leading to the campground and he directed us there.
He was looking for David who had been watching for us to arrive…a little later
than they expected…. sorry guys! The campground was
perfect for our large crowd and had good ground cover for putting down
tents. Nick had his truck and fifth wheel camper with the Rhino pulled
behind that! Morgan and Nick quickly got my tent up as David already had
his done. I got dinner started and it took a while due to the propane
tank being iffy. David was the fire master and got a blaze going and
coals ready to cook the Dutch oven dinner of Chicken and veggies. It was
dark by now, but nice to huddle around the campfire and have S’mores. The
night was pretty warm and it rained for about 15 minutes. I shared the
tent with Morgan and we were dry but I couldn’t fall asleep! I must have
sometime because I had 2 very cute grand kids at the tent door in the morning.
Saturday was Nick & Michelle’s breakfast assignment and they
did a great job with sausage and pancakes! Nick figured out what was
causing the propane to sputter with the grill so the food turned out
great. For our morning 4wheeler ride we headed up ‘Steep Mountain’ the
actual name of the trail. And it certainly was steep! It was a
great ride, but we were concerned for the bumpy trail for Lindsay and the baby
in utero, so she switched to riding with Nick in the Rhino. Those kind of
trails are exhilarating and test your skills at running the machines correctly,
but WOW, what a great view!! We had a snack at the top and enjoyed the ride
down as much as going up! Mid afternoon was a good time to take some
photos of Cambree that Michelle needed for her Preschool teacher. The
soft light of the woods was a perfect place as a backdrop. Cambree was so
willing to take her ‘Princess Pictures’ and she co-operated so well! Later
in the afternoon we took another ride 9 miles on a dirt road that cars can go
on and we sped like bandits there and back. Lindsay preferred to stay at
camp so we didn’t go too far for too long. I have to comment on what a
trooper the pregnant Lindsay has been with this new family outdoor living
adventures! She’s not accustomed to the roughing it camping and she’s
been so brave and flexible with the less than lovely outhouse, dirty life and
tent sleeping. Love her! We finished the night with a great meal by
David & Lindsay of Taco’s and the fixings with more S’mores in the
fire…built again by David & Morgan. While the fire was blazing we
placed a plastic cup of water on a board in the middle of the flames and found
the cup and the water did not catch fire. It was a great science
experiment to see the container had to equal the heat to be melted, and the
water insulated the temperature, until after about an hour it slowly melted
down. Pretty cool! The evening was very warm due to cloud cover
overhead, but that led to an all night rain storm! It blew and splattered
the two tents for hours and hours, but we both stayed dry and warm. The
sound of the pelting rain is what lead to another night of little sleep.
The morning of Sunday was clear and cold so after I made a
breakfast of sausage & egg burrito’s, we got ready to head out. Dan
arrived from Idaho with 3 more 4wheelers and later we head out for Beaver
Mountain trail and ended up going nearly 30 miles one way! We took a
break a couple times and again Lindsay did great on the flat dirt road, driving
her own wheeler. She later switched to the Rhino with Michelle and Nick
driving it. The kids did great with their huge and heavy helmets and were
all strapped in the bench seat. They occasionally went to sleep and their
heads with the helmets would bobble a bit, so once we held back Haydens head
with a bungee cord! We came to a cross road (attached here) and had a
bite to eat and then headed for Saint Charles that was another 11 miles
away. When we got there we gassed up and had dinner at a café at the back
of the gas station. The food was delicious and the shakes even better and
then we headed back to camp, 29 miles away. While heading back the Rhino
started having trouble cutting out so Nick stopped to figure things out.
Morgan said a prayer that was so wonderful and soon Nick found sediment in the
fuel filter and blew it out a couple times and we made it back to camp!
Whew! …and very grateful for the blessing of prayer. Since we’d had dinner
in town, we made the famous Scout Camp Peach Cobbler and with Morgan’s and
Nicks recommendations, we made the best Birthday Cake treat EVER! Wow it
was good! Dan and I both gave Nick some birthday cash, so it was good as
he’s been watching ads for a pair of binoculars!
The night was cool but without rain so we started taking down camp on Monday morning. Our plan was
to ride the 4wheelers on the beach at Bear Lake so after a nice breakfast by
Dave and Lindsay, we got camp loaded, cleared and headed for the summit.
Nick left his rig at the base of Franklin Basin Rd as the load is heavy and his
Rhino being temperamental. We adjust things and the kids and Michelle
rode with me and Nick with David and Morgan with Dan. After we got to the
shoreline we found it was illegal to ride wheelers on the beach!
Darn. Morgan was really looking forward to that. His machine is
really built for sand dunes and straightaways. But, we had a lot of fun
with the kids at the beach and although it wasn’t that warm (75 degrees) it was
nice to have our feet in the water. In the little settlement of Bear
Lake, they are famous for their Raspberry Shakes so we stopped at LaBaus’ and
had several different flavor shakes and shared them with all. (camping
rules remember! J) After picking up Nicks rig we headed down to Logan to
David’s house. With having both 4wheelers at Davids, Nick and Morgan
rigged up my small 4’x8’ trailer behind the Lexus to carry BOTH wheelers!
I was a bit nervous about having too much weight. David was kind enough
to install the wiring for the trailer lights with the wiring harness I got a
couple weeks earlier, and the group of fellows figured it out and got it
working. With the 2 machines my tail lights on the car were definitely
hidden from view behind me. Lindsay got the meal that Dan had brought all
cooked up…THANKS!... and we had lunch before all splitting up to our
homes. My car was quite loaded, but it handled the drive just fine.
Now Morgan and I need to spray off all the fabulous mud off the 4 wheelers
before it turns into cement! A bath was never appreciated more than that
evening! God Bless running hot water!!! With loads of laundry to do
and things to put away, it’s a great consolation to a terrific weekend with
family! I sure do love my children and the teamwork we have. We
dearly missed Michael and his family, but knew his mash up of schedule was a
lot to manage through the weekend. We’ll be gathering again soon to help
Mike move from Tooele to Logan at the end of September. Please say some prayers for Mike
& Gavin as he has a pivotal court appearance on Sept. 11th.
The moral of this story? Families are Forever! I love
outings like this with my children to share good times and lots of laughter
mixed with hard work and cooperation. These are the Best of Times and I’m
so grateful for the blessing of being together. Annie is doing well with Apollo
in Oregon and she started a job housekeeping at a local hotel. Good work
to do while they wait for the harvest season of the farm they will be working
on. They
got their truck started again so that’s great after replacing a computer chip.
Have a great week everyone! If I forgot some great details
here…let me know!
Love, Mom
