To dread or not to dread, that is the question...

Just coming out of my first full week in the woods and my hair was what some say is beautiful and some say a matted mess.  After a lovely shower I had quite a difficult time getting the brush to get through the tangles and I thought, hey... just wash it and leave it alone, it will dread, but then I thought about what I would look like if my head were shaved and I thought again and managed to get the brush through the mess.  We'll see what happens next time I go into the woods.

Cumberland was great.  

Mark, Zooey and our rider picked me up from work Friday afternoon and we set off on our adventure.  We had planned on stopping for the night in Marietta but changed our minds and drove straight through.  The site we were headed to was between Morehead and West Liberty, Kentucky.  I realized that I haven't really spent any time in Kentucky other than driving through.  It was actually really pretty.  We arrived on site and it was blazing hot.  In retrospect, I  now know that I need to seriously hydrate before heading into a gathering.  The hike in with the gear in the sun, after being in the car so long gave me a massive headache. Duh... should have remembered this from Ocala.  

Mark found a sweet spot to set up the house for the week, and I started to get to know the goings on of the kitchen.  It seemed to be a pretty independent kitchen and people could just come in and cook something.  There were three other small kitchens out there that I saw anyway.  Pretty much as soon as we got there, we were in the kitchen.  I made some crazy awesome food though.  And this is where I will leave you until the next time I have a free minute.  Off to find dinner for tonight. 

The day of days...

Saturday morning we strangely woke up early. We had no more than 4 hours of sleep the last few nights, but we were ready to go. I don't know what happened, but I was sick. I got glutened somewhere, but I just don't know where. After I got it together, we went to Cuyahoga Falls Metroparks to see the Brandywine Falls. This just happens to be the site where my friend works. It was beautiful. My fear of heights was however, getting the best of me.

We also stopped at the ski lift, because how funny is it to see a ski lift in the middle of summer? Yes, this is us pretending to ski. I know, I know... dorks.

After the Parks we went to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Downtown Cleveland.

The traveling exhibit was Women Who Rock. We also got to go into Johnny Cash's tour bus. That was pretty cool. They also had Lady Gaga's Raw Meat Dress. That was actually pretty gross. It looked like bloody human flesh. Apparently, it had been taken, immediately after she wore it, to a taxidermist. it was dipped in some chemicals to preserve it.

After the Rock Hall we went to the Cleveland Indians game at Progressive Field. I was excited to see what the gluten free offerings would be. I was able to eat dinner, which was good since we were starving. Here is what I found...

Party time, excellent!!!

This was party night. Stacey and Sean invited a bunch of friends and family over for a mid-summer night's party. This is always a good time including a lot of laughs. We ordered pizza from Tommy's pizza and chicken. This is, by far, my favorite of the gluten free pizza. If you ever make it to Strongsville, Ohio, you don't want to miss this.

Lunch

We arrived in Strongsville about 10am. Of course I laid on the horn as we pulled into the driveway. Sean came out and Stacey said we were rock stars for getting there so quickly. We had pretty good motivation. We hung out for awhile, and took showers and went to lunch. We went to this place called Treehuggers Cafe. They said nearly everything on the menu could be made gluten free and they even make gluten free bread in house. I ordered this crazy grilled cheese thing. It had onions, avocado, buffalo mozzarella and a few other veggies.

I really wanted these Sweet Potato fries, but they are fried in the same oil as something else, so instead I treated myself to a gluten free cranberry, chocolate chip cookie. :)

Gluten Free at Progressive Field!

WooHoo! It totally exists!!! I can't wait for Saturday! I have never been able to have anything but peanuts at baseball games. I know, I am such a dork, but this is a whole new world for me. I found this on nowheatnoworries.com. Yay!

Bryce Canyon

Bryce Canyon was absolutely amazing. I've never seen anything like it. I have always wanted to go there, well at least since the days of NCCC anyway. This was probably the most unique, natural wonder on Earth.
We bid goodbye to the Best Western Zion this morning, and saw some Big Horn Sheep and Buffalo on our way to Bryce. After the buffalo sighting, we stopped at The Buffalo Grill and clearly, we ordered buffalo. C.J. had a fancy ass buffalo burger, Greg had a Philly cheese steak with buffalo and I had a salad with buffalo. I know crazy ... I ate meat, and buffalo at that; and it was good too. I've actually eaten quite a lot of meat on this trip so far. No one pass out now.
We also stopped at a rock shop and I saw some really cool glass and stones, etc. I want a geode, and well everything there. I've seen some beautiful citrine, fluorite, azurite, and tiger-eye just to name a few. What sucks now is that I am super broke, tapped out the cc today and down to about $300 cash to last the rest of the trip, which is about 7 more days. Sorry guys- no more souvenirs for you.
Anyway, we headed to Bryce and drove through Dixie National Forest and Red Cliffs, I believe they were called. It was really pretty. Like I said earlier, Bryce was outstanding - I loved it. I did some hiking and lots of picture taking. I haven't had cell service for a few days, so if anyone has left any messages or sent any texts, I haven't received them.
Anyway ... Bryce = spectacular - I can't wait to upload the pictures for everyone to see.
We stopped at a weird grocery/camp store/gift shop and got supplies for the night. We are camping at the Bryce Valley KOA. It's fairly nice here. I had a weird dinner of bacon, pepperoni, and cream cheese on brioche that I got from the sensitive baker in Culver City. I did also have some Frito's and I made a smoke with the most delicious chocolate I have ever had. Greg bought some earlier in the day somewhere we stopped and it was amazing, so when we saw it at the store, I picked up a bar. It's huckleberry chocolate. OMG it's so fantastic, I've never had anything like it.
Now we're sitting around the campsite, listening to music, watching the fire, drinking, etc. The boys are playing football and are looking silly being their uber competitive selves. Every park we've been in, they've had rock throwing contests. I have pictures of this, but of course they have pictures of me with my ass up in the air hunting for cool rocks in the dirt, but it's all in good fun.

Fire is good btw! This is fun. Also, WTF? Michael Jackson died today. That was crazy. I got a text about it and we turned Sirius to an entertainment news channel. Anyway, getting dark now, can't see and quite drunk, I will write the rest later.

(Morning)
OK so... rain last night. Cold this morning. I feel like crap, but that may have to do with eating bacon from a skewer right before sleeping on the ground and the amount of rum I drank. Boys are sleeping, I'm in the car because my shoulder is killing me and I thought I would sleep better in here. Stupidly I thought I would take advantage of the free wifi at the koa and then get some sleep. I wrote this entry the first time on paper because I didn't realize there was wifi here and I figured I would type it somewhere else.

On to Arches today. I have been there, but it's been a long time. Hopefully I get some more sleep and I start feeling better. I definitely feel my age today, maybe older, lol.

still on the road ...

Yesterday we were in Vegas. I was exhausted because we drove all night. I got maybe 2 hours of sleep. We started the morning at slots of fun! lol, then we headed to the cracked egg for breakfast. mmmm skillet. After that we drove out to Red Rock Canyon. It was beautiful; hot, but beautiful. I am of course, collecting rocks from everywhere. I know, I'm a dork. After this, we had a fun trip to wal-mart and then finally to the hotel; Circus Circus. When we got there and finally got checked in (took forever), I crashed. I got maybe another two hours and then we headed out to cause trouble. I was still tired, so I actually didn't do much. The boys had all you can eat prime rib and then we went to gamble. I won 37$ which bought my dinner at P.F. Changs. I think that it made me sick, because I was sick as a dog all day today. It really sucked. This morning we left for Zion National Park. The thermometer was up to 105 as we drove through the desert. Zion was hot, but super amazing. I can't wait to see all of the pictures. Zion was cool because they had this shuttle-bus thing that drove us all around the scenic route of the park. We stopped and hiked a little and went to see some hanging gardens and water, etc. I left the boys to hike a long trail, so I could go pass out in the car. I really felt awful. We finally left the park around 9:00 and headed to the hotel. This is the coolest Best Western I have ever seen, by far. We went to dinner at the Spotted Dog Cafe and we're totally surprised when we got inside. It was fantastic. I spoke to the check and she knew right away what Celiac and Gluten-Free were and suggested a few things. I had Talapia with mashed pots and veg, and creme brule for dessert. Wow, it was so good. The sauce was amazing. The boys had buffalo and elk meatloaf wrapped in bacon. I think if it we're gluten free I would have tried it. We found the coolest shop after dinner and I got some bumbleberry jam amongst a few other things. I had some bumbleberries on the creme brule and they were outstanding. Anyway, that's about all for now. headed to Bryce Canyon tomorrow... we are camping. I'm excited.