(Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah)
I have to say I am so impressed with northern Arizona & southern Utah. I have never really thought of the area as a scenic location. All I have to say now is WOW! That is some gorgeous piece of land, especially in winter. I was able to go through the area graced with blue skies, sunshine, & clear, dry roads. As you travel through the area you go from one amazing canyon to a stunning rock formation and you just continue on through to more rock formations & canyons. Most have heard of the Grand Canyon & Arches national park, but these two are only a portion of the sights to behold. I went through the Grand Canyon, Zion, Bryce Canyon, Capitol Reef, Glen Canyon, Natural Bridges, & Arches National Parks. I just kept humming to myself the song America the Beautiful & being amazed at what I was seeing. Since it is winter in these parts there was snow all about. The snow gave it an added level of beauty seeing the reds and browns of the rocks mixing with the white snow.
When I finished my explorations of southern Utah I headed to Grand Junction, Colorado to visit 2 of my good friends & their 2 boys. Bekah & I were room mates before she got married when we lived in Seattle. David & I have been friends since before I can remember and of course he practically lived at our old house Bekah & I lived in Seattle. It has been too long since I have seen them. I had planned to stay for just a day as they have a two week old baby, but ended up stating 3.5 days. We spent those three days reminiscing of the good (Zion National Park, Utah) old days, talking about current events, & I spent hours playing with their boys. Bekah & I spent a day hiking. In Arches National Park. We had a great day slowly walking through the park as her oldest son climbed every rock he could. Let me tell you that is park full of rocks!
(Capitol National Park, Utah)
On Sunday David took me into his work & showed me what he did. He is a chemical engineer that works for an crude oil services company. In short David takes a team of guys put to the wells & where they pump the oil out. Once there they use a series of different tools to get data & information on the wells, oil thousands of feet below ground. I learned so much about the oil industry & how the whole extraction process & maintenance to improve the productivity of oil wells & pumps work. I found the whole thing to be incredibly interesting. Perhaps it is just my geeky engineering side coming out but what they can do to get testing equipment down to the oil & the data they can get from it is fascinating!!
