Featured Artist: ArtWalk Exhibit

I am so grateful that I was chosen as the first featured artist in the newly revamped ArtWalk at the FRONT climbing club. Manager, Annie, has been so sweet and helpful as we installed the work. She repainted the whole space, and we really made it ours. I have six landscape pieces up for about a month and a half.

She featured my work and the new space on the climbing gym's facebook page and I hope people will take some time to check out the images. I love how they turned out, mounted on 1/4" Sintra! Wish we had more family nearby to come check it out, but we will absolutely take our families when they are here in late March. If the art space wasn't enough, Annie also let us boulder for a few hours and play a few rounds of pool. We really love the gym down there.

Climbing, and Hiking, and Biking OH MY.

Two weekends ago I got sick. Then, last weekend Brad was sick. We have been fitting in our usual activities in little spurts. Last weekend, we went climbing before Brad got too sick, which was a nice reminder of that sport we love. Climbing is harder for us to do often, because of the high price tag it comes with. We also took a short hike up City Creek when I was sick, that I conked out on pretty quickly.

After the sicknesses had left our home, we could finally get out of the house again yesterday. The weather.. was heavenly  It was 50 degrees in SALT LAKE!! It is raining again today, so we are glad we took advantage of it, but I can't believe it was SO WARM! We only wore ONE coat to leave the house and we pumped up our tires and took the bikes out!

We went on about a 6 mile ride on the Jordan River Trail. It is a nice trail because it's long and flat, spanning probably 30 miles total. It's not the most scenic ride, but we had a great time!

What a wonderful day for a bike ride!

Part of the trail goes right through a golf course. The golfers don't really like that, and the bikers we talked to don't really like the golfers. Considering the trail was there before the course was built... Some people are very bitter :)

After our lunch, I could have put money on the fact that part of the sandwich I lovingly made my husband would end up being fed to the ducks. He loves it. Always. And especially loved that this brave duck literally ate right out of his hand!

Come on SLC! Stay springtime!! No more snow please!!

Oh Yeah--

PS 

Yesterday we ran into some peacocks walking down the road. No big...

Doughnut Falls

In all our guide books, Doughnut Falls is rated one of the best short hikes. Situated in a beautiful area in Big Cottonwood Canyon, the scenery was enough to keep me photographing for hours. The smell of pine was around us, and although there was still TONS of snow, the trail seemed pretty well packed.

The gate was closed at the trailhead parking, which added an extra .8 miles each way to the hike, but it was nice and the easiest part, in fact. There were families everywhere that day sledding and we also saw several snowmobilers, snowboarders and skiiers in the back country. 

The melting snow started our hike in a GIANT puddle

An incredibly beautiful area

Let's think about this in perspective for a second please... this trail sign (in addition to the parking signs) were buried this much... when they are usually about 5 feet off the ground.. just sayin...

We attempted some geocaches... but the second we walked off the path and 6 foot tall Brad was in snow up to his upper thighs.. we knew that was out of the question. Especially because we just wore hiking pants today, not snow pants

Parts of the trail were steep downhill and were like iced over.. so we used our walking sticks as ski poles and just slid down the hills! Everyone was sliding down on their bums but we didnt have snow pants so after one try of that, being soaked through was bad news haha!

Almost at the falls!

Check out that bowl we have to hike up! So scary because it is so slick! Everyone takes forever to climb up and slides back down. From this view in the summer, you would see the falls, the water going through the hole and everything.

In the summer, Doughnut Falls is a situation where rushing water comes through a giant hole. You see the water above the hole, you see the hole, and you see it rush through. In the winter, however, you don't see anything. You get up to it, and you just see.. a cave. People take turns crawling into this tiny space, that by the way is super slippery, to see the interior of this phenomenon.. basically looks like a cave of frozen water. Still very cool, but pretty different.

Very cool! We were in a tiny little space in here and thank God we had the tripod with us because this was like a 4 second exposure. Pretty awesome :)

Brighton Resort

Brad wants to name this post "Rachel goes pro..."

We branched out of our practice snowboarding, and bought tickets for a real, live resort day!  Everyone says Brighton is a lot of fun and has a lot of runs made for beginners. We saw the map when we got there, and it was something like 25% beginner runs, 40% intermediate runs, and 35% advanced runs. Nice balance, I think.

Anyways, we bought a "learner's pass".. awesome value and lets us take two lifts which is about 6-7 runs available to us total. PLENTY for me and enough to keep Brad excited and non-bored. The snow here was... nothing I've ever felt. The moment I stood up I picked up tremendous speed and got insanely nervous. I have only snowboarded on a slow, slow hill that is wide and clear. Here, we were still on wide beginner runs, but much steeper, faster, and integrated in the trees.

I was a little shaky at the beginning, but honestly today, something CLICKED. It made since. It was snowing the whole time we were there so we were in constant beautiful, light, fluffy, soft powder snow which made it helpful in nailing my turns! On our usual practice hill, I am going so, so slow that it's hard to get up enough speed to practice the turning in S shapes down the hill. Here, however, it was crucial I used that skill.

 I got really good at it and comfortable with it. I was happy, excited and having fun, which meant Brad was over-the moon happy. He is so excited when I excel. Also, there were tiny jumps built into the sides of the runs and he could go off trail and wind through the trees, so it was awesome for both skill levels.

Check out these videos. Might not seem like a big deal to see me casually weave down the mountain... but to us, it's a huge deal that I understand how to move on the board, and I am going down the long runs without falling at all. Not once :) Just sayin...

In this first video, you see a skiier go by at first-- but look at the top of the hill. I am in a black jacket and you will see me flawlessly S curve from side to side down the hill and wave at the end like a pro :) hehe

This is a video of Brad.. he thinks it looks stupid but he's so good I wanted to show it. He goes over a little jump you will hardly notice, but seemed bigger in person haha, and then disappears into the trees! Love my hubby he's so good at this :)

The End!