moab in may

i am so behind in my blogging.  

so behind, in fact, that i haven't even posted about my school's humanitarian trip to moab the second week of may.  we go somewhere at the end of every school year to offer audiology services to people in need.  last year we went to costa rica, the year before the gang went to the dominican republic.  this year we were supposed to go to mexico, but everything fell through shortly before we were supposed to go because we didn't feel like it was a safe time to be traveling across the mexican borders.  so instead we decided to help out some of our local friends in need.  we headed down to moab for a quick trip (we left monday morning and returned late tuesday night) but we sure had a good time.  

first stop- the moab charter school.  we got the entire school screened in about 2 hours and had the rest of the time to play in moab.

that night we all went to arches national park and it was a fabulous evening!  i'd never been to moab or hiked to any of the famous arches and i was seriously so amazed by all the amazing rock formations.

we all spent the evening at the watermelon house.  a fabulously ghetto house that fit us all quite comfortably.  we spent the entire evening playing card games, poker, eating junk food, and laughing.

the next day we all got to choose what activities to do- a hike to the various hot spots throughout arches and moab or a canyoneering trip.  megan and i decided to go with the boys on the canyoneering trip and it was awesome!  the day started off cold and rainy but turned out to be fabulous "canyoneering" weather.  one of the boys in my class knew about a "secret hike" that very few people are able to go on.  we spent the entire morning walking, hiking, rock climbing, and scrambling up some huge red rock boulders.  thank goodness those boys were so patient with me and megan as we tried using our short legs and weak arms to scale those large rocks and rock ledges!

we eventually made our way through a canyon to some ledges and then rappelled down. 

we continued onward and made our way to the highest point in all of arches- elephant butte.  the view was absolutely amazing (but it was sooooo windy) and i can't believe we made it to the top so quickly and with no casualties!  at the very top there is a canister holding a register of all the people who have made it to the top- we all wrote our names on it with pride!

on our way down we hit another drop that we had to rappel down.  this was a fun one especially since we had the chance to take some pictures of us hanging upside down. some of us were better at getting our legs up than others.... (mike)... haha

this trip ended up being so fun and i am so glad i was able to go.  i really like that we are all able to spend some time together at the end of a crazy year to just laugh, relax, and have a great time.  i'm going to miss my classmates that are a year ahead of me (and are currently off working at their 4th year externship sites) and was so glad i could spend some quality time with them.  we become like a family and it's always bittersweet to finish a year off and see people move on.  but... just one more year and that'll be me!