Snow?!?!

One of our goals in our full-time traveling is to stay warm in the winter and cool in the summer. That's why we spend our summers in the north and winters in the south. Fall and spring are easy, enjoying the nice temperatures in between. But this fall we are struggling to stay ahead of cold temperatures. We are hearing weathermen through Montana, Idaho, and now Utah exclaiming about temperatures that are 15-20 degrees cooler than usual. We have been heading straight south, with a forecast for snow just as we were leaving each campground. We thought we were safe here in central Utah, so we were certainly surprised to see snow flakes falling in our campground!

It was hard to take pictures of the falling flakes, but we could definitely see their effects. Even though there was no accumulation on the ground close to us, it was interesting to watch the mountains around us turn white. When we arrived a couple days ago, this view out our front windshield was a totally brown mountainside.

What would be a good activity for a cold, snowy afternoon? How about making home-made ice cream! Mark loves ice cream, and he was dangerously low--down to his last half gallon. In our road trip yesterday to points in the middle of nowhere, we purchased the ingredients for his third batch of ice cream in the last month. Yes, he is outside freezing ice cream in the middle of a snow storm.

Paired with warm brownies right out of the oven, home-made hot fudge, and a generous sprinkling of pecans, it was a great dessert for a snowy afternoon.

After the rain and snow cleared, (and after our decadent dessert) we needed some exercise. We were smart enough to stay on the road--for a while. Then we got the great idea to cut across the "grassy" pasture area to make a loop hike. Too bad we ran out of grass, and found ourselves in the middle of a mud pen.

With the two inches of rain and snow, the dirt was turned into something akin to construction adhesive. Mark took a picture of his shoes. Yes, all that mud is attached to his sneaker. With all that muck stuck to his shoes, he is now two inches taller than when we started this hike.

It took as long to clean our shoes as it did to go on our messy little hike. Sometimes we just have to laugh at the messes we get into.

The local news reported snowfall totals of 6-12 inches in the mountain regions of Utah. It also reported breaking records for the lowest high temperatures for this date for many towns. We guess we're just lucky to be traveling through the state during a record-breaking cold spell. Wasn't the official end of summer just a week ago? But looking on the bright side, this crazy weather gave us a giant rainbow that stretched all the way across the sky. 

All those clouds gave us another beautiful sunset. We caught the now snow-covered mountains in the east, turned to a bright pink from the setting sun.

After such a cold day (and night) we found plenty of ice on our vehicles the next morning.

We're once again on the road driving south, towards another national park. It's a two-hour drive further south, so HOPEFULLY we won't be seeing any more snow!