The Dance Club

It isn't really a club, its just a few folks getting together to learn and dance. Surprisingly, there are quite a few folks in this valley who really like to dance. I had thought that 'real' dancing was becoming a lost art, but perhaps not.
The VanWagners moved into the valley and offered to teach dance to anyone that wanted ot learn. Just after Christmas they had eleven couples jammed in their basement for the first session and quickly decided to move to the church. Now we are meeting every Saturday at 4:00pm. We are not only learning to dance, but we are also learning a special waltz routine for the floor show at the New Harmony Sweetheart's Ball on February 13th.

Today, January 24th, besides working on the waltz routine they taught us the basic steps of the Cha Cha. They want to also teach the Rhumba, the Two-Step and the Polka before the Ball.

Valentines is kind of special to Ellie and I. We had our first date to the Cedar High Sweetheart's Ball on February 12th, 1965. We attended the same Junior High and High School but never really knew each other until we were seniors. That year we had two classes together, and by virtue of alphabetical seating we sat by each other. The Sweetheart's Ball was girl's choice, and she just couldn't resist my charm and asked me. We were married fours years and four months later.

This is a photo of one of our first dates in 1965

Another New Years Resolution- Do More Geocaching

Geocaching is an international sport-game of treasure hunting using satellite global positioning technology. It is based on the groundspeak website : http://www.geocaching.com/. People hide small treasure containers called geocaches and record the GPS coordinates, then post them on the Internet site. Other folks then try to find the hidden treasures after finding their coordinates on the Internet. Anyone can play but you need a GPS to do it. Geocaches vary in size from micro to large. The only requirement for a normal cache is that it have a log book. When someone finds it they sign the log, then also log the find on the Internet site. Micro caches can be as small as a 1" tube about 1/4 inch in diameter, or as large as an orange crate. Obviously small caches may only contain a log. Larger ones may be chock full of basically worthless items. Rule is that if you want to take a 'treasure', you must replace it with something of equal or lesser value.

I have been geocaching for almost two years now. I have hidden 29 caches and have found around 160. I enjoy doing it because it gives you a reason to get out of the house and explore. Geocaches are hidden everywhere you can imagine from city center to mountain top. Some are quite challenging, some are very easy. The listing on the Internet site gives you the coordinates, a short description of the cache, the size, the relative difficulty and a map showing the approximate location.

Part of the game is to see how many caches you can find, or if you are also hiding them, it is fun to see what clever and unusual places you can put them. It is also fun to come up with ingenious ways to disguise them and catchy names to describe them. There is also some prestige in being the first to find (FTF) any particular cache.

I went out this morning and in just a few hours found eight caches, five of which I was the FTF! Below are some photos of my adventure.

The colorful sunrise as I was heading out this morning.

The bird whirly gig was the first cache of the day. Log is in the container attached to the tail.

This is near a cache aappropriately named "Speed Bump" .

The red, heart shaped souvenir box hidden here is a cache called "Elvis Coral"

Some old sheep loading corals not too far away I never knew existed before today.

This cache is about 100 yards inside the tunnel. Flashlight required!

Another cache near by required a little scrambling up this rocky hillside.

You can view my geocaching profile by clicking on this link:

Death Of The Snow Cave

Just like Frosty the Snowman, most things made of snow have a fairly short life. The snow cave we made when the grand kids were here for Christmas is pretty much history. I am quite surprised that it lasted this long, but the cold nights have prevented things from melting too fast.

The kids really didn't get to spend very much time playing in the cave, mainly because Joel was having too much fun making it. By the time we got the living room, kitchen, master bedroom and bath finished it was getting too cold to play outside. We didn't get the heating system and furnace installed until the next day. Hopefully we will have another big snow storm that coincides with a visit from the grand kids before they are too old to enjoy it.

A New Years Resolution: Do More Trap Shooting

We had a little get together with the Sandberg family on New Years Day. Mostly we ate and visited. My brother-in-law Dorian mentioned that they were going to go shoot some clay pigeons the next day and invited me along. I know another brother-in-law, John, likes to shoot so I called and invited him. He invited his son (my nephew) Shon so we ended up with a pretty good group.

We went down to the Cedar Shooting Club range east of the airport. It was kind of cold and windy but we considered that a minor annoyance. It was way too cold to work outside, but not too cold to play. In addition to John, Shon and myself, Dorian brought his wife Joyce, their daughter Kari and her husband Dusty, their son Trevor and his wife Jill, and another son Tyler and his wife Hailey.

I spent quite a bit of time messing with my thrower but couldn't keep it from breaking the clays. It insisted on throwing them out there in pieces too small to shoot at. We ended up using hand throwers and that worked out fine. We practiced for a while, then played 'Annie Oakley'. We had enough guns for six shooters at a time. With this game the first person in the line calls for the throw and gets the first shot. If he misses, the next person in line shoots. If this person hits the bird it puts out the one that missed. If the second shooter misses the third has the chance to put the first two out, and so on. The first chance to shoot rotates through the line until there is only one shooter left and he, or she as was the case several times, is the winner.

Photos are courtesy of John Spevak

John and Shon eagerly awaiting for their chance to put me out

We played several rounds and I got put out early every time. It was a big blow to my ego to have Kari (who up until then was my favorite niece) put me out. AT first I couldn't hit a thing, but after a while I got a little better and stayed in longer and finally won a round. After everyone else left John, Shon and I continued to shoot until our arms were sore. I think I shot close to 200 rounds and I finally felt like I was doing better.

Looks like shooting more bull than clay pigeons

All in all, we had a lot of fun, and resolved that we need to do it more often.

Searching for the Elephant

A photo of Elephant Arch I stole off the Internet

Yesterday a neighbor, Richard Jensen, and I went down to Dixie to do some hiking and maybe soak up a little heat. The plan was to hike to a place in the Red Cliffs Desert Preserve called Elephant Arch. This is a rock formation that resembles an elephant's trunk, including part of the head and eyes. Everything went beautifully except we hiked in the wrong place.

Richard soaking up a little Dixie sunshine

I was going to give Richard a demonstration of how a GPS works. As it turned out I don't think he was really impressed. I used my Mapsource software to program a waypoint in the GPS for the spot I thought was Elephant Arch. It wasn't identified on the map, so I sort of overlayed a map I got off the Internet on the USGS map and came up with a spot I thought would be fairly close.

Somewhere north of Washington

We started hiking out north of the town of Washington where the locked gate to the Preserve keeps you from driving further. Every description we read on the hike said we would find a locked gate and we would have to walk about a mile and a half on a dirt road before entering the wash the trail follows. What we didn't know at the time was that there is a gate just as you leave the asphalt road in Washington, that is sometimes locked, but wasn't locked yesterday, so we drove to the next locked gate about a mile and a half up the dirt road.

The numerous red rock formations make any hike in the area worthwhile

We parked there and walked our mile and a half, give or take, passing right by the wash we were supposed to follow, and followed another for several miles into the heart of a red rock jungle. The GPS was telling us we needed to be nearly a mile further east, but true to our male instincts we ignored it, still thinking we would find the trail heading that direction. After deciding we had gone too far north we explored each side gully and finally found something that looked like what we were hunting. We did quite a bit of rock scrambling only to find it wasn't.

The formation in the center sort of looks like an elephant's trunk don't you think? Please say yes.

We needed to be home by mid-afternoon, so we finally headed back. On the way we noted "Bone Wash" just a few hundred yards from the vehicle, and upon looking at the map at the Preserve boundary discovered that was the wash we should have followed. We made it way too hard.

Vernile looking for an elephant lost somewhere in the red rocks.

If we had just sauntered up that wash and right to the arch it wouldn't have made much of a story. At least now we have an excuse to return and find the real Elephant Arch. We plan to do that soon, along with some more hikes in the area. I have identified several in Snow Canyon State Park that look quite interesting while not too challenging. Anyone want to go?