Pumpkin Coffee Cake + Lake Powell Trip #3

I’m back in the groove. I just got back to Colorado from my third annual trip to Lake Powell and after letting the post vacation blues work its way out of my body, I’m back to a happy mood. It’s so hard coming back to reality, especially when you’re on a vacation that includes no cell reception. Life is more fun sometimes without knowing what the whole world is doing. Or having to see the comments left on social media by the trolls of the world. The last two trips I went on were with a group of about 20 people, this time it was just 6. We had 8 going on the trip but then one of the guys had to go on and tear his achilles tendon right before left. Thanks a lot, guy.

The first year I went to Lake Powell, I absolutely fell in LOVE. It instantly became the place I loved the most. I’m not one for sight seeing, but the beauty of the canyons there are out of control. And when you wake up in the morning, the water is so still that it looks like a mirror. It’s just awesome. But the second year I went, it rained the whole time. And it was freezing. The only sun I got was on the last day taking in our house boat. And that sun led to a lululemon wunder under burn on my shins. Not as sexy as you may think. But this year Lake Powell redeemed itself. We had 3 days of perfect sunshine but it was still cool enough night that you weren’t miserable while sleeping on the houseboat.

Let’s go over the deets of this trip. So this time around, we went North through Lake Powell since we’ve always gone South. Both directions are completely different so it was fun to see a different side of the lake. South is much more wide open so once we parked our houseboat, we were able to go right out to an open part of the lake instead of through little channels. And since there were only 6 of us on the wake board boat, we all got to wakeboard and/or surf A LOT. Here’s the thing about wakeboarding, it’s not fun unless you’re good at it and have no second thoughts about trying a trick. I am not good and I question everything at least 6 times before doing it, so I am not a good wakeboarder. So this year I decided to not even set on a wakeboard and just stick with surfing. If you’ve never surfed behind a boat before, you have to. It’s so much more fun and you can be drunk while doing it without hurting yourself. It’s magical. And in no time flat, I was learning to surf without the help of the rope. It was SO fun. Seriously so fun.

After a while of surfing and wakeboarding and getting pulled over by patrol, what else was there to do? Surf each other. Duh.

It obviously worked well.

Then, since we didn’t hurt enough from everything else, we decided to tube. Tubing is by far one of my favorite things ever. You feel like a kid again. You sometimes pee yourself because you lose all body control, you can’t stop giggling, and you fly through the water like you weigh 12 pounds. It’s invigorating. Until you fly off and your body gets whipped around like a rag doll on acid. You get my visual? Good. The boyfriend became so much like a child, at one point he was whipping his arms around like a Britney Spears backup dancer in ‘hit me baby one more time’ music video. I ended up with a fat lip. I didn’t ride with him again after that.

One of the days we decided to pack up all of our drinks and a ton of food and just cruise on the boat up the canyon and see where it took us. We got like 15 miles through and then the water was too low. Lame. Our excitement diminished quickly. So we headed the other way to explore other stuff since we were buzzed and ready to do something with our lives.

Then we found this rock. Doesn’t it look like a person? Or a god? Or a buddha? The answer is yes, yes it does Juli. We named him something but I already forgot. C something.

Can you see the tiny people up there? Crazy. We found a beer can that was crazy old. Super exciting huh? So exciting.

Something that was very different about this trip was the food. When you have 20 people eating, the food is pretty simple. Burgers, brats, hot dogs. Nothing exciting or that good. But when it’s just 6 and everyone is helping out with cooking and cleaning, the food is goooood. I didn’t get many pictures, but here are what our meals looked like:

Breakfasts:

• breakfast tacos with corn tortillas (eggs, sausage, avocado, peppers, hot sauce)
• scramble with eggs, bacon and avocado along with fruit

Lunches:

• all the guys were too drunk for lunch, so we just snacked on lunch meat

Dinners:

• on the first night we did a shrimp boil with shrimp, hot sausage, potatoes, corn and peppers
• on the second night we did fajitas with chicken and all kinds of peppers and onions
• on the third night we did rib eye steaks with asparagus
• on the fourth night we did blue cheese burgers with bacon and corn along with some corn

Every night after dinner, we had an after-dinner-drink contest. Two people would put their heads together to come up with a special drink for everyone. The first night was a drink with whiskey, sage, and muddled blackberries. The second night (ours) was a spin on a margarita, then the last night was a s’mores cocktail. Nobody won because everyone was too nice. I was the only person who voted for my own. What an only child. But look how sweet the s’mores drink was:

As for alcohol, this trip was the least I’ve ever drank on a trip. I’ve never been a huge drink, just had my drunk moments. That makes no sense, does it? In my head it does. Anywho, as I get older, I’ll have one or two drinks, but then I’m not thirsty anymore. And in my head, that’s the reason I drink anything. If I’m not thirsty, I don’t want it. The only thing I really enjoy drinking is Hendrick’s gin with some tonic and lime and champagne. The other drink that I just recently tried and wish I had more of on my trip was Bon Affair wine spritzer. Mostly because it doesn’t taste like wine. But after we were out of those two drinks, nothing ever sounded good. So I drank A LOT of water.

This was by far my healthiest trip to Powell. I think I came back thinner because I wasn’t spending my days eating in the kitchen all day long. Obviously that went away within 2 days of being back. Especially since it’s pumpkin season and that’s all I’m craving. What else should I make with pumpkin this year? I need some ideas! Especially since I only have this weekend before I leave out of town for some business! Help me out! Let’s feed the sh*t out of you!

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