Camping part 2 ~ Grand Canyon

Upon leaving Zion, we drove a few hours to the north rim of the Grand Canyon.  I visited the south rim plenty as a child, but never the north rim.  It looks pretty much the same!

We had originally booked a single camp site because we were going to bring Bailey, but upon arrival, we and a few other families jumped onto the group site (no dogs allowed) instead (all the other families with dogs boarded them as well).  It was awesome!  We had a giant area complete with 3 fire pits, 3 picnic tables and a sewer pipe running below.  We kept feeling booms and after a few ridiculous theories on what they were, we finally asked.  The jokes about the poo running below our site never got old....are we adults or what?

Our fun campsite.  

We had 5 families and a total of 20 people.  

We were told our tent is the Duggar tent-the one with the yellow rain fly.  Its pretty big.

6 of the 8 kids. 

The other two were too small and innocent to be involved in the dinner time shenanigans.

Kylie and J.  After their first meeting and few hours together a couple of weeks back, they declared to be each others new best friend and J called Kylie his "girlfriend" to his mom.  Its super cute, but Jonathan heeded plenty of warning to J and his dad.  Here they are playing Yahtzee.

Look at these blue-eyed beauties!  

Juliet and the other little girl are 1 month apart in age (both peanuts), however big D, being only 14 mos. old most likely outweighs them and wears bigger clothes.

We usually ate meals at the same time with the other families and were never in a food shortage.  The first morning we had a fully "catered" pancake breakfast.  The instant coffee wasn't half bad either.

The next morning we took a hike along the rim to the lodge.  The girls did well considering it was about 3.5 miles round trip, and unlevel a lot of the way.

J & Kylie again on the start of our hike...at one point they were looking over the rim with their arms around each other.  No one got their cameras out quick enough.

Us at an overlook.  

Why the girls cannot look at the camera is beyond me.  Its always right in front of them!

Stopping to do a little dead tree climbing.

Of course its way more magnificent in person.

 

Enjoying the view from a bench.  Kylie is singing, maybe??

At the lodge.  A better attempt a picture.

I got very sick to my stomach when the girls got close to the edge to look over.  I guess since becoming a mom those things just bug me a lot more than when I was a kid.  And no, I didn't plan their outfits.  I packed one kid at a time (we had a 70 degree temp change so I packed a lot of clothes), and had you seen me in the morning getting the girls dressed in a mad dash to get them out of the tent to take them potty, you'd know I didn't plan it.  But it makes for cute pictures!

Just a tad windy up here at 8000 feet.

Planning something mischievous, I'm sure.

The hike back seemed much longer than the way out and the girls fell often, so here they are skipping with Jonathan singing their rendition of "A Spoonful of Sugar" and how it "Makes The Trail Go By Faster".

We hadn't done a squadron camping trip since our Wild Boar days back in Idaho and it was so much fun.  We are planning one for the spring to another nearby campground.  Our squadron here is tiny but filled with wonderful people.