Zion

Zion National Park was amazing. Probably the best park that we've been to on this trip - Matt and I hiked up the Narrows. Which is basically an unmarked hiking trail, up a river, and between these crazy sheer rock canyon walls. They warn you that there are flash floods there all the time. But we took the chance anyways. Hiking up it was a pain - literally, hidden rocks were trying to sprain our ankles at every turn. But we floated all the way back down the river by holding our breath.

Did you know that Mormons cannot drink coffee? or tea? or beer? They made Matt carry their beer, because they didn't want to be seen by any members of their church.

Don't know what to tell you about Vegas - it's all plaster and Styrofoam. It's all razzle dazzle, casino bullshit - everywhere you look it's - an Adult Mag store, a liquor store, a tittie bar, a big flashing casino, some fast food, and a smoke shop. It's hot. I'm not sure if their water is drinkable.

Salt Lake...

Yesterday I got to shoot in an Aspen National Park-thingy with all these tall, boney white trees and soft little ferns..... It was totally mind-shockingly-beautiful. Matthew and I agree, sometimes we just can't help but feel like we're part of the Truman show.... the backdrops look cheap and painted. The people are all so out of place. We have a lot of inside jokes about how our show hires half-assed extras because we are so poor. 

While driving through Salt Lake, we noticed the street was full of hundreds of people camping in the road? Matt and I were intrigued! We asked a bunch of people sitting on sleeping bags "what's going on?" "What!? Pioneer Days Parade!? Don't you know!! One of the top ten parades in the nation!!!! You have to camp out to get a good spot." Hmmm.... everyone looked like they were having such fun! Grilling outdoors! Campfires on the sidewalk (don't ask how that was legal, who knows)! We drove to WalMart and bought some $4 pillows and $8 sleeping bags - parked the mustang - And slept in the park with hundreds of people.

Ha, now as for the parade... it was a MORMON parade! Celebrating the 1847 pioneers that traveled to Utah for the freedom of religion! The parade mostly consisted of floats with mermaids and cops on scooters. Also, clowns. Wayyyy too many clowns. 

Half dead from lack of sleep -
and half delirious from watching policemen on scooters
Matt and I packed up and left early.....

Utah is Burning....

Drove through FishLake Park with the top down in a complete torrential rainstorm. Somewhere between here and there - we stopped in Arches National Park..... hours later, we arrived in Utah to see the sky a-blaze (which made for a mind blowing sunset) and ash just drifting down from the heavens...... "Black snow in the desert" We're staying at a Mom and Pop motel.... our room has real hangers and there is even a fridge (oh, the life of luxury, eh?.... we get so excited for the small things). Tomorrow is Salt Lake and Mormons.

Ojo Caliente'....

What's good about Santa Fe? I have no idea. Matt and I didn't spend any time there..... we left Benny's, headed North towards the mountains (8,000 feet about sea level)!!! 

 We stayed with a Kayaking-courchsurfer and barely saw him all weekend. Matt and I didn't spend too much time in Santa Fe. We headed to Bandalier National Park - to climb amongst the swiss cheese rocks - without any water - half delirious - on a 100 degree day. We are definitely the tourists that people have to rescue. We were so thirsty, we almost knocked down a little eight year old girl skipping around, "I love water, I love water, water water." pouring her bottled water all over the desert. Next stop was Ojo Caliente - a spa in the desert. All these hot springs in the desert.... full of healing minerals from underground volcanic flows. Matt and I spend the whole night, hopping from spring to spring. When they closed at 10pm, we found a lone fire lit on the grounds - and sat down to dry off. A bunch of interesting travelers joined us. Sisters reuniting on a cross country trip, professors taking time off from work, a woman from NYC who tastes wine for a living..... we talked until Midnight.... Next morning The Rio Grande area was really quaint but during a construction route, someone kicked up some rocks at the mustang and the windshield cracked. It's about growing by the day - about 15 inches now, Matt wears his glasses all the time, he is sure the windshield going to implode on him. We're going to see if we can get it fixed tomorrow. We ate tacos in the mountians..... now we're in Denver. Hanging out with the photographer who shot me in the pine forest in Abq. He's out here on for work and offered us a hotel room. This is the nicest hotel that we have ever stayed in. It is call the "W" - There is a hot tub on the roof, overlooking the city.

Socorro to Abq.....

Couchsurfing.... Before I left on this trip, a friend told me about a site called 'couch surfing.com' - I thought it was pretty shady at first, sleeping at stranger's couches. Haha... but then I realized, that I do that all the time with photographers..... So this site, couchsurfing, is basically, dedicated to very interesting people who love to travel... When traveling, they stay on couches all over the world (US, Kenya, Brazil, Spain, ect) When they are not traveling, they open their homes to other travelers. Matt and I decided to give it a try...Save some money, meet some people. Abq stayed with a guy named Benny. We took a chance on him, he took a chance with us (Matt and I have no couchsurfing references). What a great first experience.... Benny is a cross country biker, saving the world by peeing in his compost.. First night we got in, he took us to a ska show... It was great, Matt started dancing like a spastic thing. Benny was letting Matt tango with him. Benny even gave his bedroom to us and HE slept on the couch. We attended a couchsurfing get-together in Abq.... Benny, his girlfriend, Matthew and I all attended. We met characters from all over the state and the surfers staying with them.... It was quite the night, indeed. "Remember, Couchsurfing is a community" There is a lot of talk about Burning Man. I am curious and I am thinking about detouring. I want to go reaaaallllly bad. While in ABQ a photographer named Kenneth took us in his little four-man plane across NM - He let me fly his plane for awhile. Kenneth was a good guide, both on the ground and in the air - we learned a lot about the area. Who knew that NM had the most lava flows in the US a few hundred years ago? And who knew that the Spanish chopped off the Pueblo Indian's ankles because they revolted? After flying, Kenneth and I went out shooting in this GIANT pine woods-place. Matt was supposed to be helping with the shoot but he just could not sit in one place. He kept going off on adventures in the forest a disappearing for hours at a time.

Blinded By the Light.... Socorro

Wanted to go check out the Harry Potter movie today... Mostly because.... Socorro, the city that Matt and I are staying in, doesn't have much to look at. We googled the local movie theater here in town - it's a single screen movie theater with only two showings a day. Haha... how cute is that? I guess it's Transformers for the next month or so - so we're are out of luck. Perhaps we'll find some free time in the next week to visit Hogwarts.

Woke up at 5am this morning to drive out to White Sands National Park (about 2 hours North of El Paso).... we got there as the park opened, to be told that the Military was practicing missle launching .... "The park will re-open at 10am." Ugh. So I bought a bunch of cheap postcards and I wrote everyone, telling them about how White Sand National Park is used for military training. Matt and I sat through a 20 minute tutorial, explaining that, "Sand Dunes are made out of sand. You can find Sand at most beaches and in most Sand Dunes." Hehe, people thought we were crazy. Matt and I were laughing so hard.... half of it was the fact that they mentioned that sand could be found on beaches, I think the other half was just lack of sleep. Sand in White Sands is actually gypsum. When the park did open, we took some photos and had a little picnic. Matthew ran wild across the sands, "This is heaven!!! Heaven!!!" Eventually, he ran so far... and it was SO bright out.... he couldn't figure out where I had parked my car. He had to have been gone for over two hours. I am happy to say, that he did remember to retrace his steps so eventually he made it back without a search party. We're staying at an Econo Lodge tonight!! It was a whopping $40 for the night. It comes with access to a wooden sauna, a hot tub, a work out center, and a full out- waffle breakfast..... now that is a set up.

"Dallas/Ft Worth"

The last night in Dallas, Matt and I hit up a rodeo in Ft Worth. They called all the kids under 7 into the ring and lets them chase a duo of sheep around in circles. Now I am not sure if you've ever seen little kids playing soccer? Yes no? Where they all want to kick the ball, so they just surround it, a big group of them...? Yeaaaa..... it was just like that, but there wasn't a soccer ball...it was a sheep. A bunch of kids kicking a sheep... it was horrifying. I couldn't watch another minute of it. Matthew and I got up and left.

What else has been going on? Ummm.....drove to Carlsbad Caverns and watched Matt freak out over rock formations... "Ohhh, that's awesome! Look at that rock! Rock rock!" But seriously, Carlsbad is a magical place... if you take the natural entrance, you get to wind down into a cave of bats and beautiful cave walls... They let you explore 3 miles out of 100 miles of the cave. I am happy that place exists. We're now in El Paso - staying with a friend from our Highschool Art class. Her name is Lesley.... she is in the military. She is a Mom. I'm not used to staying with people that I know... Not sure if there are more or less expectations. All I know, is that Matt is happier here than any other place we've been.... .... so I guess that's a good thing.

Dallas/Ft Worth

The ride from Austin to Dallas was a good one - longgggg but good. I spent the earlier part of the morning shooting. Managed to shoot my first "cast fetish" shoot.... where the photographer actually used real medical supplies and put both of my legs into knee high casts. We did some content for his site, where I sat around in bed unwrapping bandages and he took photos. Guess some guys get turned on by things like that. Full of stories, he was telling me about how one of his members actually attacked a checkout woman behind the grocery counter.... because she was wearing a cast - he wanted to touch it. He got tossed in jail, got out, and attacked a woman in a parking lot, covering her in cast material...... The world can be quite strange, huh? Just go with it.... it's all cool. : ) The second shoot was a guy who was torn between launching his new dark chocolate mushroom vitamin drink in stores or starting up a glamour-website...... we got a few samples of each, shot for awhile, and were on our way..... The ride from Austin to Dallas was beautiful. I remember the first time I came to TX - which was just over a year ago (one of the photos I took) - and all the photos in my camera were photos of the sky - seriously, you have not seen a sunset until you've sat down and watched a TX sunset.....sunsets look even better if the top is down on the convertible. : ) So we did that, and eventually it started raining, we broke out some hoodies and kept driving in the rain.... it was lovely..... I think we were about 20 minutes from downtown Dallas, when traffic just stopped. I mean, stopped. People were walking around their cars, swearing, sulking with their cell phones pressed to their ears....... completely stuck on an interstate, parked on an overpass bridge, unable to turn around - 300 or so cars. Matt and I cranked some Gwen Stafani and used all our happy dark chocolate mushroom vitamin happiness to enjoy the night....... eventually some police officers started to evacuate the bridge, backwards... as the intersate was closed, we were evacuated without an idea of where to go. My sense of direction though - is like a compass... I am like a machiene. Ha, or not. All depends on who you ask - Matt will tell you that I got lost and wasted about 3 hours yesterday As if he has somewhere to go... : )

Smelly hotel... smelly smelly

Life moves so much faster with Matthew around. He always wants to see everything and do everything..... Downtime is a big-time for me..... I am used to being alone..... I need downtime to stay sane. Right now we are in a coffee shop in Austin TX with couches.... if this can last for another two hours without any interruption, I should be able to book enough work for the next week... We have left Tim's place, which is kind of sad... because it's a really nice hole-in-the-wall home. I haven't felt that 'at home' in quite some time. Tim talks to his cats and he likes having people around the house to keep him company all day. Tim let me use all his equiptment the other day to photograph a new-and-upcoming model... Now we're in Austin, staying at this incredibly smelly Motel 6. Matthew has never stayed in a junkie Motel before.... so as soon as we walked in, he was flipping out. "We're going to get shot in this part of town!!! The hotel is growing mold, there's no soap, the bed is gross.... " It was SO funny.... he made me drive aimlessly around Austin, wasting time and gas, so we wouldn't have to be at our hotel.... we ended up coming back to the hotel, to swim in their pool, during a rain storm.... I love swimming in the rain. Today was more rain, like a downpour kind of rain - Matt still wants to see the city... I've been to Austin 3 times this year. I just want to get some work done.... tomorrow is the 4th, we're watching fireworks on the lake.