Farther south.

There's a first time for everything... and this weekend it was St. George. I mean, I'm pretty sure I've been there before, but all I remember is thinking it was way cool that High School Musical 2 was filmed at the golf course where my dad was having his business meeting. So I don't think that counts.

Saturday afternoon we packed up our things and headed south to find lodgings at Melissa's grandparent's house. Our evening was spent eating the tops off of Iceberg shakes (eating any more than that would have kept us sick in bed the rest of the weekend. Those things are huge.), donating money to a girl's kidney transplant by means of going to a dance party, and watching Insidious, which sadly does not live up to its pretense of being "the scariest movie ever".

We woke up Sunday afternoon (who knows what happened to the morning) and went to Del Taco for breakfast/lunch. Can I just say, in case you didn't know, that I absolutely love Del? There is no better fast food restaurant. I don't even care what you have to say. If you have not had the funnel cake fries from there, you haven't lived.

Anyway, then we went to Snow Canyon and climbed in the lava caves. I'm so sore, but it was so worth getting a rock dropped on my foot and almost getting stuck down there because I am too short and too dumb to wear real shoes. Toms do not help you climb slippery rocks, just fyi. We found glow sticks and splattered the juice on the rocks in the pitch blackness of the caves. It was so cool.

After leaving Snow Canyon, we showered, went to Subway, and spent an hour looking for the game Curses in Walmart to no avail. So we bought the Game of Things instead and spent the next two hours playing it, and then spent the next four hours after that watching season one of Lost before finally hitting the hay.

Monday, we rose bright and early, hit up McDonald's for breakfast, and got on our way to Zion's National Park. We spent half the day driving up a winding road and through a bunch of tunnels for nothing, since everyone neglected to tell me we were going the wrong way... But we did finally find where we were supposed to be going and hiked up to the Emerald Pools. It was sprinkling and the air smelled like rain mixed with trees and sand and it was amazing.

The only thing that overshadowed this weekend was the - you guessed it - French homework that I have spent the last three hours on. But I am willing to overlook that and appreciate the fact that I got to spend the weekend with good friends, enjoying our Mother Earth. It was a good one.

"Forget not that the Earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair."

                        Khalil Gibran