In addition, the pater familias and the step-mater familias were able to take time from their busy retirement schedules to make the trip.
Trout had a doctor appointment the morning of April 5th, so we got a bit of a late start. I decided I wanted to take an alternate route to avoid going through the dreaded Phoenix. So we headed west on Ajo Highway in the truck. That back route from La Mansion Maybe Manana to Zion National Park took longer but it sure was more interesting than miles of traffic and intersecting freeways.
We drove through a major part of the Tohono O'odham Nation lands. If you click on the map you can see how close their lands are to us. On the map Ajo Highway is Hwy 86 which connects with Hwy 85 and goes on to Gila Bend. Hwy 286 (Sasabe Highway) is the road east of tribal lands that goes straight down to Mexico. We are east of it about 1/4th of the way south of Ajo Hwy.
We took the truck because it was the only thing we had to sleep in and we didn't want to buy a tent. We also took it because we were hauling lots of wood. The weekend before we decided we should stock up on mesquite firewood. There's a wood lot that sells it within 15 minutes of us. We bought 1/3 cord and it was pricey, but it didn't cost nearly as much as if we had purchased it at the park, or more correctly, outside the park.
We were to be there 3 nights and there were to be 5 campsites, so we also bought enough flip top boxes to provide 3 boxes of wood for each campsite. We had some left over, so we took it in carboard boxes.
We drove all the way to St. George, UT that 1st day and spent the night there. That meant that we had a very short trip on up to Zion. The kids had all converged on the Salt Lake area whether by plane or car. They also had relatively short trips that day, but they all started out in snow. Was that an omen?
We, amazingly, were the first family to arrive. Gradually the rest started to trickle in and by dark everyone was there.
Even if cold, Zion National Park is spectacular. The campground is in a narrow canyon between 2 mountain ridges. This is what we saw when we arrived.
It had snowed there the night before, but this is not snow on top of the ridge. It's just the rock.
The campground didn't get much sun during the day and the only way we could see a sunset was by seeing the sun shine on the eastern wall of the canyon.
Some trees were starting to leaf out, but most were still bare.
We were definitely not in AZ anymore.This is why we went. Everyone was there except the twins' husbands who had to work. We had someone from another campsite take these pictures and they were actually taken just before everyone left on Friday. Unfortunately, none of the shots shows everyone equally as well, but these were the best two. Yes, it was still cold.
The cast of characters roughly left to right, back row first: Jim, Brynne, Lee, Ruth, Dory, Gavin, Trout, Lo, Jason, Aidan, Ramona. Front row: Jimmy, Audrey, Katie (holding Audrey), Hilary, Kiersten, Eli, Morgan, Phaedra, Kaya. 
We did the typical camping things. I like to call this shot "2 1/2 men who stare at tents." Jim, Lee and Jimmy seem to be trying to use mind control to set up the tent. It doesn't seem to be getting the message.
Then Trout took on the Dad role and told everyone what to do. It got set up a lot faster after that.
Tents and campsites were set up the 1st evening and a little visiting was done. We were warned not to have any smellable food out of vehicles, bears, you know. We weren't warned about how cold it was going to be. I thought it was just us in the truck, but everyone was freezing that night.
The cast of characters roughly left to right, back row first: Jim, Brynne, Lee, Ruth, Dory, Gavin, Trout, Lo, Jason, Aidan, Ramona. Front row: Jimmy, Audrey, Katie (holding Audrey), Hilary, Kiersten, Eli, Morgan, Phaedra, Kaya.
We did the typical camping things. I like to call this shot "2 1/2 men who stare at tents." Jim, Lee and Jimmy seem to be trying to use mind control to set up the tent. It doesn't seem to be getting the message.
Then Trout took on the Dad role and told everyone what to do. It got set up a lot faster after that.
Tents and campsites were set up the 1st evening and a little visiting was done. We were warned not to have any smellable food out of vehicles, bears, you know. We weren't warned about how cold it was going to be. I thought it was just us in the truck, but everyone was freezing that night. Besides the things the kids had planned for the grandkids, activities included hiking and attending Ranger talks. Here the gang splits up and takes off in 2 different directions to do some of those things.
On one such excursion, several of them ended up on the side of the mountain to the east.
There was also lots of sitting around the campsite (especially ours) and chatting. Trout loved every minute of it.
As it got later on our 1st day there (April 6th), it got colder and colder. I insisted that Trout build a fire in our firepit. Og make fire.
Og made a very good fire indeed. We were able to bank the coals and we kept the fire going the entire time we were there. Most of the time we had a camp coffee pot with hot water in it sitting on the grate.
The first night the kids couldn't resist starting to roast things. Here Kaya and Jimmy were roasting Red Vines. They were quite good.
Later that night, the marshmallow roasting turned into a frenzy. We declared our campsite a marshmallow roasting free zone after that and insisted each family roast at home. Hilary is trying to control the marshmallow intake.
It was fun, though. This is Katie with her daughter, Audrey, on her lap. Brynne is on the right.
The kids did all the planning. Each campsite was responsible for its own breakfast. There were 5 total meals to be cooked (3 dinners and 2 lunches) and each campsite took on one of those for the whole group. At first we were told we weren't supposed to do anything, but Ramona shared our campsite and since they were coming from Italy, I told her I'd do the breakfasts for us. She did one of the other meals.
All the cousins had never been together at once before, so they had a great time. This is Jimmy, Brynne and Eli.
I'm not sure what Gavin was doing here, but you gotta love those eyes.
Here he and Jimmy were playing with some bug on this big rock.
Aidan plays big girl to Audrey's little girl. So far no one is crying.
Here's Aidan with her dad, Jason. He's our military man, in the Navy, and we are very proud of him and his service to our country.
Okay, this has got to be one of my favorite pictures. Ramona called me over to her tent to see this and even the flash didn't wake up Aidan. She missed the marshmallow roasting frenzy, though.
This is Morgan up a tree.
And here she is pretty in pink waiting to tell her story around the campfire.
This is her sister, Brynne. She finally got a pose that kept the flash out of her eyes.
This is one of her favorite things to do -- run.
And why is she running? It must have something to do with Eli.
Here's Eli at night. I thought wearing this headlamp was a great idea. He also made the hilarious most of it.
This is Kiersten, his big sister.
This is her with Kaya. They both turned 12 this year and I think I may call them the Dangerous Duo. They seemed to have lots of fun together, some of which got them into a little trouble with their moms.
Here's Kaya whittling on her own.
This is Phaedra, Kaya's younger sister. She did a lot of reading and crafts at the reunion.
This is Missy Fast Fingers working on a lanyard.
This is Jimmy, Katie's oldest.
I like to call this picture, "Jimmy from the Hood."
This is his little sister, Audrey at a happy marshmallow time.
And here she is as a not-so-happy camper.
Remember those hikes I talked about earlier? Hilary and I almost ran into each other coming around our truck to get pictures of this classic situation -- Trout and his youngest grandson, Gavin.
It was a great trip. The only thing that would have made it more pleasant would have been warmer weather. Even as cold as it was, the campsites were almost all sold out. Amazing.
On one such excursion, several of them ended up on the side of the mountain to the east.
There was also lots of sitting around the campsite (especially ours) and chatting. Trout loved every minute of it.
As it got later on our 1st day there (April 6th), it got colder and colder. I insisted that Trout build a fire in our firepit. Og make fire.
Og made a very good fire indeed. We were able to bank the coals and we kept the fire going the entire time we were there. Most of the time we had a camp coffee pot with hot water in it sitting on the grate.
The first night the kids couldn't resist starting to roast things. Here Kaya and Jimmy were roasting Red Vines. They were quite good.
Later that night, the marshmallow roasting turned into a frenzy. We declared our campsite a marshmallow roasting free zone after that and insisted each family roast at home. Hilary is trying to control the marshmallow intake.
It was fun, though. This is Katie with her daughter, Audrey, on her lap. Brynne is on the right.
The kids did all the planning. Each campsite was responsible for its own breakfast. There were 5 total meals to be cooked (3 dinners and 2 lunches) and each campsite took on one of those for the whole group. At first we were told we weren't supposed to do anything, but Ramona shared our campsite and since they were coming from Italy, I told her I'd do the breakfasts for us. She did one of the other meals.This is at the twins' campsite. Ruth is cooking here.
All the cousins had never been together at once before, so they had a great time. This is Jimmy, Brynne and Eli.
I'm not sure what Gavin was doing here, but you gotta love those eyes.
Here he and Jimmy were playing with some bug on this big rock.
Aidan plays big girl to Audrey's little girl. So far no one is crying.
Here's Aidan with her dad, Jason. He's our military man, in the Navy, and we are very proud of him and his service to our country.
Okay, this has got to be one of my favorite pictures. Ramona called me over to her tent to see this and even the flash didn't wake up Aidan. She missed the marshmallow roasting frenzy, though.
This is Morgan up a tree.
And here she is pretty in pink waiting to tell her story around the campfire.
This is her sister, Brynne. She finally got a pose that kept the flash out of her eyes.
This is one of her favorite things to do -- run.
And why is she running? It must have something to do with Eli.
Here's Eli at night. I thought wearing this headlamp was a great idea. He also made the hilarious most of it.
This is Kiersten, his big sister.
This is her with Kaya. They both turned 12 this year and I think I may call them the Dangerous Duo. They seemed to have lots of fun together, some of which got them into a little trouble with their moms.
Here's Kaya whittling on her own.
This is Phaedra, Kaya's younger sister. She did a lot of reading and crafts at the reunion.
This is Missy Fast Fingers working on a lanyard. 
This is Jimmy, Katie's oldest.
I like to call this picture, "Jimmy from the Hood." 
This is his little sister, Audrey at a happy marshmallow time.
And here she is as a not-so-happy camper.
Remember those hikes I talked about earlier? Hilary and I almost ran into each other coming around our truck to get pictures of this classic situation -- Trout and his youngest grandson, Gavin.
It was a great trip. The only thing that would have made it more pleasant would have been warmer weather. Even as cold as it was, the campsites were almost all sold out. Amazing. Now, I have to tell my favorite GK story of the trip. Aidan is only 3 here, but she is big for her age. She has been growing so fast that sometimes it really does makes her legs ache. She had made it a pattern to get her parents to carry her during those times. She was also asking them to carry her when she just didn't want to walk, and she's getting so big, it's not good for them to be picking her up and carrying her.
On one afternoon she kept saying she couldn't walk. Jason and Ramona just kept an eye on her, but would not go pick her up. Eventually, she "not walked" around their car and over to where the other kids were playing. She did a lot more "not walking" while playing with them. We all teased her about not walking to any of the places she went the rest of that day. These little stinkers are so clever and manipulative at such a young age. Their parents really have to stay ahead of them.
