John and Kylee: Camping at Panguitch Lake with the Guinns

Sunday, August 6, 2017

Camping at Panguitch Lake with the Guinns

In June we went camping with some longtime friends. They live in Lehi, and we live in Phoenix, so we thought we would meet in the middle and camp at Snow Canyon in St. George. So we made a reservation a couple months in advance. Now when we made these plans we didn't consider that while St. George is cooler than Phoenix, if it is going to be 120 in Phoenix, St George would be too warm to camp. The highs were forecasted to be over 100 which isn't really reasonable if you don't have ac.

So, John and I were all in favor of either cancelling or renting a last-minute vacation home. Julie was the go-getter that found another reasonable location/weather campsite. We were actually a little concerned that it would be too cool at Panguitch Lake. They reserved a group site, and we met them there. It was a beautiful forested campsite with a view of the lake. My only complaint was that there was a pretty decent hike to the bathroom. But there was no bugs, and we loved having all the space of the group site. It was great! I do have to mention that camping is the only time when we realize we are outgrowing our little corolla. It is next to impossible to fit all of the camping gear. Stuffed little car+8 hr road trip= we were pretty happy to get out at the end.

On our full day there, we visited Cedar Breaks National Monument that was only a 15 min drive away. Benjamin and Matt didn't come with us because Benji had taken a sad tumble that morning and was pretty scratched up.

The big girls did the Junior Ranger program in about 10 minutes and proudly took their oaths and received their badges. Then we decided to do a small hike and visit the overlooks.

Fortunately, Holland tolerates the carrier regularly as long as we keep walking. She hates it if we stop.

Julie wasn't so lucky with Suzette who insisted on walking the whole hike. Suzette is 2.5 years old, and she walked the entire mile to the viewpoint and the entire mile back. Julie told us to go on ahead, and they just went at their own pace. So, it was just our little family and Madeleine. It was a gorgeous little hike with perfect weather. We loved the views.

Here is the view at the end.

It was funny to see how much taller Madeleine is than Eliza. They are only two weeks apart, and we were friends and close neighbors with Matt and Julie when these girls were born. How time flies!

Now we each have three kids!

Something crazy that happened while we were there was that a forest fire started across the valley from us on Brian Head. If you look in these pictures you can barely see any smoke. But as we play around and take more pictures, the smoke level changes.

Barely any smoke from Brian Head at this point.

Just in a matter of a few minutes the smoke has increased a lot.

We started back on the trail and loved these bristle cone pine trees.

More smoke as we hike back.

There is Julie and Suzette on the trail behind.

Pretty fun lookouts.

Sweet baby fell asleep on the walk back.

We had a picnic lunch and played some more by the visitor center. We visited more viewpoints and sometimes the wind was quite strong. I am sure that didn't help the forest fire.

This is one of those "do what I say, not what I do."

We went back to the camp and then down to the lake. I got pretty cranky at the lake because the kids got filthy and wet (just keeping it real over here). :)

The smoke from the forest fire just increased as the day progressed. We found out later that it was started by someone burning weeds. The whole area was eventually evacuated (including where we were staying, but after we had left the next day). I know there were at least a dozen homes burned and it was more than a month before it was considered under control. It was the largest wildfire in the nation for a while. It is crazy to me that we saw it start. So sad.