Home Sweet Home !??>

Can you believe we followed a MASSIVE thunder and WIND storm from Kentucky and the peak of destruction appears to have been our neighborhood, more specifically, our house!

We arrived home at 2am on June 30, after a harrowing drive weaving through downed trees and power lines -- Brandt drove through it ALL  and was a champ!  He even managed to find the ONLY gas station with power for 150 miles when we had only 11 DTE (distance to EMPTY) on our gas gauge -- we were prepared to sleep in the car…

Naturally, the house was dark.  Thirty minutes later, Frank pronounced it safe for us to enter (7 BIG trees down, but none hit the house!)

We will likely not have power for the rest of the week at least, but we don't mind another week of "camping" in our basement to stay cool.

It has been a blessed adventure!

Courtney's pick: Gateway to the… East?

Courtney's pick - Gateway Arch

 Day 22 & 23

16 hours driving (most of it in Kansas) led us to our last stop – St. Louis.  While this city is known as the Gateway to the West, commemorated by the famed Arch, it served as our Gateway to the East.  We were grateful that we had a minivan and air-conditioned RV to tour the West, and not a keelboat or covered wagon like Lewis & Clark and their followers. 

View from the top: Busch Stadium

We rode in a slightly-claustrophobic pod to the top for a great view of the city and Mississippi River.   An experience Nancy missed on her previous visit to the Arch in 1987 with college-roommate, Roslyn (who knew you could go IN it?!).

Next stop: 2629 Kimbrough Circle. J

Fly Fishing, Moose & Pie in the Eye (wow!)

Pie in the Eye for Frank!

Day 21

Frank's first catch & release
Frank and Casey went fly-fishing this morning and Frank is officially “hooked.”  After a lifetime of preferring sit-ups to fishing, he finally experienced the thrill and serenity of casting into a mountain stream, finding that perfect ripple in the water, and the catch/release of a Rocky Mountain Rainbow Trout.

Pickles hiking

In the afternoon, we all went on a hike at Grand Lake in search of the elusive bull moose.  We didn’t see one, but it was a fanstastic hike, complete with waterfall and open meadow (Frank was wishing he had his fishing gear!). 

At 6:30pm, we made our way over to Young Life’s Crooked Creek Camp where we were guests for the evening.  Wow!  It is 9 years old and absolutely gorgeous.  We had a delicious dinner (Carter & Brandt ate 9 bowls of banana pudding!) and got to participate in the “county fair” night – complete with a “pie in the eye” treatment for Frank and a water soaking for Casey compliments of our kids.

We stuck around for the “opera” evening entertainment.  Duke and Luke saved the camp from the gravel baron, J.R. “The Big Rig” Riggins. The highlight was the lip-sync number “Money, Money, Money.” Mr. Steve, the camp speaker, was Steve Chesney, who had been the speaker at Windy Gap in 1983 when Nancy was a Honda wrangler on the work crew.  Somehow, I seem to have caught up to him in age – how is that?!

We LOVE Young Life!  

Winter Park, CO or is it SUMMER Park?!

Day 20 

Finally we got to sleep in! A heaven-sent 10 hours of sleep was loosely discussed as the highlight of the trip up to this point, and after a very tasty breakfast of pancakes and bacon the Higgins and Berrys headed over to the ski village for some Rocky Mountain fun. We knew that Winter Park offered alpine sledding and mountain biking, and were therefore surprised when we saw bungee trampoline-ing, putt-putt, giant human mazes, rock climbing, and even panning for gemstones. The alpine slide was first and everyone headed up the lift except Pickles, who was the designated photographer for the afternoon. The alpine slide was out of control fun, twisting and turning at near supersonic speeds. I’m fairly sure Dad even broke the sound barrier at one point. 

Courtney on the Alpine Slide

Berrys & Higgins families

Even though we had breakfast a mere five hours ago, we all agreed it was time for lunch and stopped at the picnic tables to chow on salami and ham sandwiches. We also used the lunch break to play with the many giant games and musical instruments scattered around the Village Center.

The guys (Brandt on one wheel)

Frank

Carter & Brandt

 After lunch, we went our separate directions as the men (Me, Dad, Carter, Mr. Higgins, and Nate) geared up for downhill mountain biking while the ladies (Courtney, Mom, Katie, Mrs. Higgins, and Elizabeth) bought half-day passes to try out all Winter Park had to offer in the Village Center. Downhill mountain biking was, to use biker language, “totally rad”. Even though we all are sore in places we didn’t even know we could become sore, it was insanely awesome and one of my favorite parts of the trip. We traversed and weaved our way down the ski slopes and woods of Winter Park Resort. Astoundingly, we all caught air and only wrecked 5 times total. 

While the men were biking, Courtney and Elizabeth managed to alpine slide 5 more times, do the human maze, putt-putt, and rock climb twice. Pickles, Mrs. Higgins, and Katie hiked some of the trails around the mountain and took some stunning pictures. It was a fantastic day on the mountain and praise the Lord that no one got hurt, seriously. 

Submitted by Brandt

Adios to the RV

Day 19 Goodbye to the RV 

into the sunset

After 13 days and 2700 miles, we traded our roving RV home for a mountain chalet in Winter Park, CO.  

Good medicine at the chalet

Both were fantastic, but the relaxing time at the chalet with our good friends, the Higgins, is good medicine for the fingers.

Pickles

Our friend Casey Higgins has given Nancy a new nickname: "Pickles"Due to the green medical wrap the hospital provided for her fingers.

Pickle fingers

Route 66, 4 corners, Mesa Verde & finger update

Day 17 & 18

We enjoyed Flagstaff, AZ in spite of the circumstances – definitely a place for a return visit.  

We drove out Historic Route 66 through the desert, past Monument Valley, and made our pilgrimage to Four Corners, AZ, UT, NM, CO – the hottest and most desolate place on earth.  

In four states at the same time!

Pit stop for the night was Mesa Verde National Park with plenty of smoke from the nearby wildfire.  In the morning, we headed across the Mesa to see the 800 year old Pueblo cliff dwellings and a guided tour of Cliff Palace – pretty cool.

Cliff Palace

On our way to Denver we passed four wildfires and within 2 miles of the Mancos, CO fire.  It was stunning to see the pines and firs burn like giant torches – wow!  

See the flames, even...

Now that's a plate of FOOD!

Yelp provided a fantastic brunch at the Durango Diner – huevos rancheros and freshly shredded hash browns.  Frank was reaching for the tums about 2 hours later. 

Finger Update:  Our friend Sandy Higgins did the first bandage change before bed.  Index finger looks great and the middle finger looks “frankensteinish” with a ways to go for healing and feeling, but happy to have all five left hand digits in place.  Thanks for your prayers.

Beautiful Wolf Creek Pass, CO

Lake Powell & Helicopter Ride over Grand Canyon

Day 16

We awoke early and it was already pushing 90 degrees by 8am; it was going to be a hot day on Lake Powell, but thankfully the water was a pleasant 72 degrees.  We loaded up our boat and began to make our way “up lake” in this canyon lake brought into being by damming the Colorado River.  

It was an extremely windy day and the lake was quite rough, but after 90 minutes we made it into the “other worldly” portion of the lake surrounded by towering canyon walls.  We pulled into one of the side canyons to stop, get a drink, and jump into the water to cool off – the water was refreshing and crystal clear.  

After several of us got back into the boat, Nancy was the last one to jump in and take a dip.  Unfortunately, as she was sitting on the top of the back seat to jump in, it flipped shut smashing her fingers and locking into place with Nancy’s full weight on the hatch.  I managed to get the hatch open to find two of Nancy’s fingers badly crushed and bleeding profusely.  The next several hours were quite terrifying as we were 90 minutes from the nearest marina with no cell coverage and out of emergency radio range.  The whole family jumped in to help! Carter kept his cool, bandaged the fingers and cared for Nancy on the entire boat ride back – looks like a possible future in the medical profession.  Courtney was in charge of communications and kept redialing until we reached 911 as well as Jay Reid (our doctor friend), who confirmed we were doing the right thing by heavily icing the hand  -- thanks Jay.  Brandt masterfully navigated as I drove the boat into what was now 30 mph headwinds and white caps.  Nancy was a trooper during a very rough ride back to the marina.  We pulled into the marina where National Park Service (NPS) EMTs were waiting on the dock and within 15 minutes Nancy was loaded onto a medical helicopter to Flagstaff, AZ (~3 hour drive), which was the closest Level One Trauma Center.

The kids and I caught up to Nancy after driving the 3 hours to Flagstaff.  Miraculously, Nancy’s fingers were not broken and had no apparent tendon or ligament damage; the doctor was surprised by this, given how badly Nancy’s fingers were mangled.  I want to thank the couple that stopped to help us before we began our journey back to the marina, the NPS medical personnel, Aaron the helicopter pilot, Ed the flight nurse, Dr. Earl the attending ER physician, and the amazing ER nurse Nicki for helping my dear Nancy.  

Thanks Nicki and for pain meds!

Unfortunately, Nancy’s days as a hand model may be over.  However, Nancy did get a helicopter ride over Lake Powell and The Grand Canyon, but dozed over the Navajo Nation.  After checking out of the ER that evening, I decided to check into a Holiday Inn Express to regroup.  Thank you for God’s protection and for using this crazy experience to draw my family even closer together.

Grand Canyon to Lake Powell

Day 15

       We awoke to a relaxing morning in Zion as Mom, Dad, Courtney, and Carter sauntered over to the Springdale Coffee Shop while I dutifully finished my second Hunger Games book in two days. Finally we all convened back at the RV and were on our way to the Grand Canyon and Lake Powell. After traversing the hairy Zion Parkway with the picture of white-knuckle driving Dad at the wheel, we quickly motored on down through Southern Utah and into Arizona. We stopped for lunch at the scenic Vista Encantada overlook, and it was so scenic that Dad couldn’t even stand up and look at the same time. Lunch was tasty, and after a few pictures we rolled on to the pièce de résistance, Cape Royal. Cape Royal was nothing short of phenomenal and it even allowed us to walk right up to the edge, with fences of course. The views were as I mentioned, (insert creative adjective here), but my favorite part was seeing Dad overcome his fear of heights by walking out onto the perilous Angels Window point. We reluctantly left the Grand Canyon after only a slim glimpse of what it had to offer, but departed thirsting for the cool waters of Lake Powell.

Submitted by Brandt