It was such a welcome change to feel that life as we know it had returned this Powell trip!! It was the best to be on the lake waterskiing, eating delicious food, and being with family and friends! This year the Foxes (Dave and Mary) and our Fruitland Acres neighborhood friends the Mendenhalls came. What a great group of people! Lots of experiences shared and good fits of laughter.
It was a bit of an adjustment being there with Owen. We're so glad he could be there. And it was a new experience for us to not go on every ski trip and adventure. Both Mark and I are just on-the-go people. Sitting can I dare say was a bit of a challenge. But then I had a reality check to what scenery I'm sitting down to, and really, can I even complain?! Owen's face and the red rock of Powell. It doesn't get better. It'll be even more fun when Owen can play more in the water and sand.
We had a few unforgettable moments from this week. By far the memory that will go down in history….would be the Dave Fox blue dart. I never thought I'd be saying that. But he decided to share his wonderful talent (I say that with a hint of sarcasm) with not only family but friends he had just met 5 days previous. And boy was that fart flame a-flyin'!
We also had a day of healthy competition in our second annual Worth the Wake Olympics. We started with our own opening ceremony complete with the olympic anthem and families walking with their torch (aka water bottle). Mendenhalls pretty much did a clean sweep on all four events: king of the tube, balloon sling shot, biathlon, and slide diving. It was a fun day!
We did a lip-sync competition 'Jimmy Fallon' style one night, and we had our annual glow stick dance off. In the process, we made friends with the houseboat anchored across the way who said we were the 'best neighbors they'd ever had' and even spared us some of their anchovies to fish with. How neighborly!
Rebecca Fox (aka Chip) took a real liking to Owen this week. She held him and talked and played with him any opportunity she could. And Owen just ate up all the attention. Honestly, it's the happiest I've ever seen Owen. He LOVES people and loves the attention.
And speaking of Owen, he added to his year of firsts with a first swim in the lake! He wasn't too sure about it at first, but he soon started splashing around and cooing in excitement.
Deana Mendenhall and Luke invented a new sport…jet surfing! It was hilarious….in a turn of events Luke and Deana came round a corner at one point in the week riding paddle boards behind a jet ski. And the new sport was born. It became the most popular sport that week!
For me though, really I don't know if anything beats an early morning Lake Powell ski on glass water! It is just one of those moments when you are praising the heavens you are alive to experience such a glorious event! I always try to savor as much as I can of that moment, knowing it is so wonderful and so short lived.
We also did a little Lake Powell exploring in the boats, some cliff jumping, lots of diet coke drinking, and oh did I mention laughing? Mark, Dave, Mary, and Jacob also went on their daily hike as far up the red cliffs as they could get. Mark says it was safe! It was probably just a good thing I didn't ever go with. And it cracked us up…Mary did her daily weight lifting routine with rocks…yes some big ole ten pounder rocks.
It really was such a fun week! And it would not be possible without El Capitan and La Capitan, my dad and mom. Dad says its his 'working vacation'. More like 'overtime vacation'. He is busy all day every day checking the anchors, listening to weather reports, repairing the house boat, writing up detailed reports on the operations of Worth the Wake, and making sure things are running smooth. I'm always humbled how much he does for us so that we can have a good time. And Mom is his right hand man making sure the fun agenda and activities and meals keep moving. It really is a production!
It wouldn't be a Lake Powell week without a little unexpected excitement either. This week we had a mouse run into the houseboat, plus we caught a bunch in traps. And the last day presented the biggest adventure of the week. We realized the anchors were far sunk in the water from the rising lake water over the week. So our strong men went out to meet the challenge and spent almost two hours digging out the anchors from the deep water and mud. A last big heave from all the men together finally made the last and most difficult of the four anchors to come loose.
Well, until next year Powell….we love you!!!
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