High Adventure 2016 - Blanding Utah - Day 2 - San Juan Hill

On day 2 of High Adventure we went to a museum about the LDS Pioneers that settled in the area.  We learned about the Hole-in-the-Rock Pioneers and their journey across from Cedar City area to Blanding.  They planned on it taking 6 weeks to travel the distance, and it ended up taking 6 months because of all the obstacles along the way! See my post about the actual hole in the rock where they carved a road down to the Colorado River HERE.  

After they had gone through most of the journey, they got to comb ridge, that goes for miles and is impossible to get wagons and teams over, till they got to San Juan Hill.  There they had to build a road up a hill of slickrock that the horses & oxen could haul their wagons up.  It took a few weeks, but they did it!  We drove out to the hill and hiked up it and were amazed that they were able to get the wagons up there!

Hiking up San Juan Hill

 Up at the top, the pioneers were so grateful to make it to the top that they carved into the side wall "We Thank Thee o God".  It's hard to see so we dumped a little water on it to make it show up better.  It was amazing to us that these people were on a trip that took four times what it was supposed to take, but they still were grateful to God.

"We Thank Thee O God"
Carved into the sandstone at the top of San Juan Hill

 After that we found a shady spot to have lunch.  As we finished up lunch the leaders got together and decided the scouts needed a challenge.  So we got their attention and told them "We have bad news, the Bishop is unconscious and needs to be carried back to the truck."  to which one of the youngest boys responds "can I drive his truck?"  Quick boy! :)

We determined to let the boys figure it out and tried to keep our mouths shut as they worked out how to carry Bishop back to the vehicles.  It took them about an hour to come up with a way that worked the best (which meant that Bishop could lay down and rest for an hour - which he was ok with).  The picture below is the stretcher they came up with and which ended up working to carry him the whole way.

Carrying an "unconscious" Bishop back to the trucks

We were impressed with the scouts in that they didn't argue or complain.  They took everyone's ideas and suggestions and worked together to create a working option.  I think if we were to do it again they would come up with a working option quicker and more efficiently.

Then we checked out Riverside Ruin to see some ruins that were nearby:

Riverside Ruin

After that we decided they worked hard and we all needed to cool off.  We drove to a reservoir and swam for a while.  Unfortunately someone had left the head of an elk in the bushes nearby and the rotten smell was strong!  We named the spot "Elk Head Point" but then hauled the head off into the trees to make it a more pleasurable swim.

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