our annual camping trip at The City of Rocks

We just got back from our “annual” camping trip at the City of Rocks state park. Tay and I laugh at calling it “annual” when in reality it’s only our second year there. But we love coming here to the City of Rocks.

This year came with a beefy surprise:

Honestly, are cows mean? Because this dude isn’t messin.

Our campsite this year was as remote as they come. Fields of wildflowers and cows and sage:

My happy place is this exact field:

We had a bumpy start to the trip. We arrived too late to do any exploring and did not sleep well that first night. Then my glasses broke lol.

But, you know what? It was okay. Small challenges stayed small. I napped late into the morning. The kids romped through fields and paid tribute to ant hills by dropping sticks into their domes. Taylor and I got good cuddles in:

As well as read this book on the Navajo Marines who developed and communicated in Navajo code during WW2. Honestly, these men saved the country.

Halfway through our trip, we took the kids on a drive to Mount Harrison.

This little guy was tuckered out.

What about those other kids? Well, they were barely hanging on.

The drive took about an hour and wow was the view gorgeous.

Taylor asked Arrow what she thought about being on top of such a neat moutaintop. Her response? “All I see are tall places to fall off of.” I cackled.

Fun fact about Mount Harrison: This mountaintop grows the rare Christ’s Indian Paintbrushes. In fact, these flowers are so rare that they only grow here. Their blooming season is mid July – late August, and since we were in the right place at the right time, we obviously search for them.

We found some lookalikes:

And got a little distracted with picture taking 🙂

We didn’t have any luck finding the flowers so we decided to move on. BUT WOULDN’T YOU KNOW IT we found them RIGHT there along the side of the road!

Taylor still doesn’t think these are the actual Christ’s Indian Paintbrushes. He says these ones are too tall. But I think he is wrong and I declare success.

Next we were on to Lake Cleveland for a little paddleboarding and playing in the super shallow waters.

We had so much fun at Lake Cleveland. I would love to spend more than an afternoon here. But alas our time was up. We had to rush back to the campsite to get the fire going if we wanted to eat dinner and s’mores.