What I Did on my Summer Vacation

The last time I posted a blog was 20170619. That’s pretty shameful for a guy who writes for the purpose of keeping stress headaches at bay. But, like you, I’ve found that summer gets in the way and before you know it, seven weeks have gone by.

So, in honor of every third, fourth, fifth, and sixth grader who has to write a “What I Did Over Summer Vacation” report, I thought I’d fill in the gaps over this past seven weeks.

(If you read this blog for the political/religious brain dumps, come back next week. I promise to load your bucket!)

At the end of June my wife and I took an early morning flight out of Cleveland to Salt Lake City. The first part of our trip was a weekend at the Snowbird Resort for the annual (and perhaps final) Nerdtacular event.

View from the Cliff Lodge

Nerdtacular is a sort of miniature Comic Con, though it seems more like a family reunion. It’s made up of podcasters, gamers, cosplayers, artists, musicians, and general craziness. We had attended it back in 2014 and planned to go every other year. With 2016 being the 10th anniversary of Nerdtacular, the folks who run it (the same podcasters, gamers, cosplayers, artists, and musicians) decided to skip a year to make it a really big event. Check out the link for pictures, a much better description, and videos of some of the events (but come back to finish reading!): http://frogpants.com/nerdtacular

(If you check out the Live FilmSack video at around the 18:45 mark, they mention someone bringing the Blu-Ray version of the movie to the event. That person was ME!)

A picture of me and Scott Johnson, the chief nerd

The event ran from Thursday (an informal meet and greet) through the end of Saturday. When we were here in 2014 we stayed for an extra week at the Snowbird Resort and did day trips from there. This time we checked out of the hotel and drove to Cedar Creek, Utah for the second leg of our vacation.

Our intention was to visit the major National Parks in Utah. So, with our stay in Cedar Creek, we made trips to Cedar Breaks National Monument, Kolob Canyons, Zion National Park, and Bryce Canyon.

Cedar Breaks National Monument

Kolob Canyons

Zion National Park

Bryce Canyon

Next we drove over to Green River, Utah, in order to visit Arches National Park, Canyonland National Park (which I kept calling “CandyLand” by mistake. Honest!), and Capitol Reef.

Arches National Park

Canyonland National Park

Capitol Reef

The photos above aren’t even a glimmer into the beauty that these parks contain. Absolutely breathtaking. You gotta add it to your “bucket list” and then go check it off!

After a bunch of days hiking around in 100+ degree temperatures (it’s okay, “It’s a dry heat”), we made our way to Sandy, Utah for the last leg of our trip.

Not only did we celebrate our eleventh wedding anniversary with a delicious dinner while there, we also spent an evening watching the Salt Lake City Bees (the Triple A minor league team for the Los Angeles Angels) play some baseball.

Me and my better half

We arrived back in Cleveland just after midnight on 20170718. The parking pass stated our car was there for 18 days and a little over 21 hours. A nice, long vacation.

The very next Sunday we got tickets to go see the Cleveland Indians play, so . . . you know . . . that was a no-brainer!

I almost forgot: I also brought home a souvenir from our trip. At first I thought my allergies were acting up, but allergy medicines didn’t relieve it. Then I thought it was turning into a cold, but cold medicines didn’t relieve it. After missing work, I went and got a Z-pack (antibiotics) which killed whatever it was I brought home. I prefer the National Park t-shirts we got instead.

Then last weekend my wife and I got to go to Toledo with some good friends to enjoy a Toledo Mudhens ballgame (Triple A minor league team for the Detroit Tigers) and a day at the Toledo Zoo.

We love our baseball!

Finally, the company I work for had its company picnic at Canal Park in Akron to watch an Akron RubberDucks ballgame (Double A minor league team for the Cleveland Indians).

And that’s about it. My summer vacation. I know, it’s only the beginning of August still, but when it comes to time off from writing, it’s over.

See you in the dugout!

©Emittravel 2017