Valley of Fire State Park is very close to Las Vegas (about an hour away), so today we took advantage of some free time to go see it.
Meghan, Baby Joshua, and I went there during our vacation in 2011, but we didn't spent a lot of time there. Still, I loved it, and it was definitely something we wanted to see again on this trip. This place is pretty much unreal. From the time to approach it via the highway until you're inside the park, it's stunning. You may not realize the scale of it until you notice the tiny road with the tiny cars in the picture on the lower right.
Here you start to get an idea of the expansiveness of the park. There are quite a few places to park and then go on your own to hike and explore. Meghan had packed us picnic lunches, so we chose one with picnic tables and had a quick meal before we got started.
We has decided to hike this trail, but the description hadn't prepared us for the elevation change. Meghan wasn't so sure about our whole family going down this steep path, but I convinced her it would be fine.
Everyone did well, but for the steepest parts (the rocks were also conveniently covered in a layer of somewhat slippery sand), I helped the kids down and then parked them in a safe spot and went back up to help Meghan down. Here she is at first remaining unconvinced that this isn't a terrible idea of mine and then later feeling relieved that she avoided a skull fracture.
Along the path there were many nooks and crannies where bigger kids might climb, but our kids had to be put into in the name of getting pictures. If I were by myself, I would have climbed all over the place all day long, as there are no restrictions on climbing, surprisingly. But in this case I limited it to taking everyone up a moderate rock formation, and we celebrated with pictures at the top.
After we made it to the bottom of the trail, we circled around to take the much easier path back up to the parking lot. Hannah, being Hannah, wasn't interested in walking. We anticipated this and bought a nice backpack off Craigslist before we went, so I carried her around in it. She loved it, and it really wasn't much of a burden on me at all, as it was a quality backpack, so it didn't feel like she was weighing me down.
The sun was setting as we finished our walk, turning the rocks an even brighter orange than normal. Hannah continued to enjoy her first class accommodations through the park.
When we returned home, the kids got to enjoy some time with their grandparents.
Last time we went to Valley of Fire, we didn't stay long enough for me to realize really how awesome it is. I'm really glad we got to go again this time, as I love that place so much. I could spend days and days just climbing around and exploring if I had the time. But for now, I'm just happy to get to go whenever we're close enough to make it happen, which hopefully we'll be able to do every time we're in the area in the future.
