Kazakhstanding Tall: October 2017

Sunday, October 1, 2017

Trip to Utah - Part 1

We had a fun summer but then life happened - a very busy life - and we got out of the habit writing about our experiences. We’ll try to catch up quickly.

After we got back from our trip to Eastern Europe we had about 10 days to catch up on things at home and then we took a 3-week trip to Utah to visit our family there. This was probably the first time when we had so many adventures getting there. Chicago experienced a huge rain storm right before we got there and was so backed up that they canceled most of the flights out including the flight to Salt Lake City that we were supposed to take. They rerouted us trough San Francisco but the flight wasn’t until the next morning, so we had to spend the night in Chicago. When we got to San Francisco, the jet-way wouldn’t connect to our plane for a long time so we missed out flight to Salt Lake City. United didn’t have any flights out for the same day which all six of us could be on, so they bought us tickets on Delta. Finally 30 hours later than expected we made it to Utah!

Gingerbread cookie gift from Lufthansa, which was celebrating 25 years of service to Astana.

Waiting for our flight to Frankfurt in Astana's new airport terminal

Chicago - waiting for our flight after spending the night in a hotel after our flight was cancelled the day before.

We had a lot of fun with our family and friends there. This time around we decided not to take any additional trips anywhere else but just stay in Utah. I think by July we were already tired of all of the traveling we’d done so far and just wanted to stay in one place for a change.

I think the first outing we did was to the convention center in Sandy to see the floats that were going to be participating in the 24^th of July Parade in Salt Lake City. There were so many fun floats but most of us voted for one particular one that ended up winning the first place!

Looking at floats with Oma.

The varieties of floats were very interesting.

This was the winning float. It had a working flour mill and sawmill on it.

One of the most fun things we did while in Utah was getting together with our long-time friends Nicole and Steve and their family that we haven’t seen in 5 years. We lived in Iowa City together and became fast friends! Our kids went to the same school, even the same class. Then life took them to Texas and us to Las Vegas first and then to Kazakhstan. This was the first time when at least for one day we ended up at the same place at the same time! We decided to get together at one of the parks up the Provo Canyon, and it was like those five years never happened! We love you, guys!

Kids doing kid stuff together.

Having fun hiking on the trail together....it's a very developed trail.

The adults being grown up.

Great picture of the crew together.

The kids sat at their own table when we went to eat.

Nicole and me - five years and we haven't missed a beat.

The same day we met with Steve and Nicole, we went to the Spanish Fork Rodeo and we brought Oma and Burl, Shellee, and Brennen with us. We went to this rodeo 2 years ago and really enjoyed it, and this time around was no different.

Waiting for the action to begin.

Bronco busting!

Barrel racing was awesome.

Bull riding never disappoints. The bulls were very aggressive.

The next few days was the Willardson Family Reunion most of which we spent at various places in Ephraim. Cousins had fun swimming at the Palisade Park, and fishing at the Community Canyon Reservoir as well as well as playing games at the hotel, eating at the Fat Jack's Pizza (now Roy's Pizza) and the next day having a lunch and a talent show at Ben’s house in Springville.