Death Valley

That Moment When you Realize

You Walked Through

The Valley of the Shadow of Death

Death Valley, San Diego and Arizona

March 2014

Maddie 12

Kier 10

Cora 7

I think everyone has that “the time I got sick on vacation” story. But few people have an “ I got sick on vacation” story like Cora. Cora's experience is the type that makes time stands still and every other life event is then judged as “before our trip to Death Valley” or “after our trip to Death Valley”. In fact it is disturbingly prophetic that on this occasion we had chosen Death Valley as one of our destinations.

Cora had started to show signs of being ill mere hours before our trip began. I'd picked the kids up from “Friday School” at three. I remember on the the way home I asked Cora if something had happened at school because she was uncharacteristically grumpy. She (grumpily) told me that no nothing had happened, and she was fine-- thank you very much! I left it at that, hopping that maybe she was just a bit tired after a full day of school and her normal sunny disposition would return by morning.

As is typical with out spring trips, the weather was in charge of our departure date and time. We had planned to leave on Saturday, but in order to avoid a bit of weather, we instead headed for the airport straight from the school.

Our destination (Death Valley) lay to the west, and the incoming weather, lay to the south. So our route the first night took us over the mountains in a meandering sort of way as we avoided the tallest of the peaks. We spent the night in Grand Junction and continued on the next day. By morning, the clouds were starting to push in and we again flew a circuitous route as we made our way to Las Vegas where we met up with Bret, Dawn and Lance. They had managed to pick a night when all but one room in all of Sin City was completely booked up -- hard to believe that can happen given the number of huge casinos there!

From Las Vegas, we flew caravan style to Death Valley in California. Death Valley is a bit odd for a National Park. For one thing it is very remote. While most National Park are far from metropolitan areas, Death Valley takes it to such an extreme that it is almost a ghost town! Actually there are a number of ghost towns right in the park. In fact we rented Jeeps and visiting them was a primary form of entertainment during the few days we were there. In addition to touring ghost towns, we also made the trek to see “The Racetrack” where we watched rocks stand still, but wondered about the tracks they had left in the dry cracked mud. (The mystery has since been solved. Two brothers video taped the rocks, pushed by strong wings, sliding across slippery muddy ice). And to help combat the high heat in Death Valley, we made sure to enjoy some ice cream everyday. In retrospect, ice cream was not such a good idea, but at the time it seemed like the thing to do. We even got buzzed by some really low flying fighter jets that appeared out of no where while practicing military maneuvers in the air space over the desert.

All the while Cora continued to be grumpy and tired. What's more she started drinking ridiculous amounts of water, and consequently needing to find bathrooms more and more frequently. At first we joked that Cora was taking the signs in the bathroom that warned of the importance of drinking water and the risk of dehydration too seriously, but it was becoming clear something was not right. In fact several times a night we would have to crawl out of the tent and find the campground potties-- or eventually a bush or two. The one bright side of this was that one night, as we stumbled back to the tent in the dark, our flashlight beam shown bright on an adorable desert Kangaroo Rat. He was about the size of a small guinea pig, had big bright eyes, huge hind legs and a frizzy poof at the end of his tail.

By day three I was beginning to suspect Cora might have Diabetes. I had taken an Anatomy and Physiology class at the the community college the year before and the list of symptoms played through my head (in Latin no less) like a checklist on “loop setting”: polydipsia, polyuria, diabetes insipidus, diabetes mellitus.... But what my medical terminology failed to give my was an understanding of just how much danger my little girl was in. And so while I continued to fret in the desert, far from medical help, I naively believed that we could finish our trip and take Cora to the doctor's office when we got home.

Stop two on our multi-destination trek was San Diego. We briefly parted ways with the Lowells. They headed to Catalina Island and we went straight to San Diego.

The flight into San Diego was quite an interesting contrast. In less than 45 minutes we went from a flat dry desert, below sea level elevations and a humidity of less the 25 percent, to climbing over a snow covered mountain range, and then descending through a cloud bank into the ocean side city of San Diego, where the humidity was near 100 percent.

Despite having finished his instrument flight training more than a year before this trip, it was Joel first actual instrument landing. Once we crossed over the Laguna Mountains a thick layer of clouds hid the valley making it impossible to tell if the city even existed beneath. We had anticipated the clouds and Joel had opened an instrument flight plan before we reached the mountain ridge. We continued to fly above the clouds for about another 15 minutes. When it was time to descend through the clouds both Air Traffic Control and the airplane chose to test Joel's skills. The autopilot was having some trouble maintaining a heading and then the Air traffic controller weaved Joel all around the cloudy sky as he directed him through the busy air space. But we popped out the bottom of the cloud layer right above the runway and Joel made a beautifully smooth landing.

We spent two days in San Diego. Without the dry heat of the desert to contend with, Cora perked up a little. We went to the beach, found a tide pool to explore and visited the Birch Aquarium at Scripps Institution of Oceanography. The day before we left San Diego, we met up with the Lowells at the San Diego Zoo with the single minded purpose of seeing the Pandas. We have been to the free National Zoo in Washington DC several times to see the famous (fabled?) pandas, and every time the illusive pandas have managed to avoid us!

When we met up with our friends, Bret asked us what we wanted to see first. Joel quickly announced that the Shaklee Family had just spent $250 to see Pandas, so we demanded to see Pandas! After finally having achieved our greatest life goal we also saw several other animals. Most notable were the precious and extremely lazy Koala Bears.

Looking back at the pictures it is painfully clear that Cora was indeed very sick; she was pale and skinny. But she was also drinking less water and visiting the bathroom less and I grabbed on to these as good signs.

Our next vacation stop was Yuma Arizona where Joel was going to join Bret for part of a formation flying clinic. Cora's symptoms reemerged that day and on the short 30 minute flight to Yuma Cora was both begging for water and complaining about the lack of a potty on the airplane, despite the fact that everyone had visited the restroom moments before take off.

In the morning Joel and Bret went flying while Dawn and I took the kids to the Hotel pool. We had no transportation and really there was not much else to do in Yuma Arizona. This activity led to a new stress! Someone has failed to to turn off the overnight pump on the pool cleaning system. The kids were playing a game of Marco Polo when Kier got too close to the vent and the suction was strong enough that it held Kier under water and against the wall for several seconds. At first, when the kids ran over to tell us that “the pool had sucked Kier in” we thought that they were over reacting to the light current that is always present in a public swimming pool. Then he turned around and we saw the 3 inch perfectly round deep purple bruise already forming on Kier's back. With my heart in my throat, we went to talk to management, who realized what had happened. They turned off the pump, apologized several times and comped us for the nights stay.

So, between that and the fact that I had finally had a chance to google the list of Latin words that were running an in ongoing loop in my head, was more than a little shaky when we got into the shuttle to head to the airport to meet Joel.

From Yuma, we made the short jump to Phoenix where we were staying a at my parent's vacation condo for a few days. I did wonder if we should just head home. But Phoenix was a short ½-hour trip and home was many hours away. Besides it was already late in the day.

The next day things really went downhill. Cora was once again constantly thirsty and in need of a bathroom. At lunch with some family friends, Cora vomited. We said hasty good-byes and went back to the condo where Cora took a long nap and I noticed her breathing become shallow. I once again googled “Diabetes Onset” and finally came across the article that convinced me it was time to act. This time, at the top of the search list was the personal story of a mother whose daughter ended up in Coma at type one diabetic onset. It was easy to see reflections of Cora's symptoms in this families personal account. Wordlessly, I handed the ipad to Joel. I don't think he even finished the article before he was on the phone trying to figure out where we needed to go to get help.

In the end we didn't quiet get it right. We went to the first hospital that we found and it turned out to be the hospital that specialized in adult trauma. They didn't even have a pediatric doctor on staff! This caused a little hiccup in treatment as Cora had to be transferred to the Children's Hospital. Still the staff at this hospital was wonderful. They got us back to see the Triage nurse quickly. That conversation went something like this:

Nurse:” so why did you come in tonight.”

Me: “I think my daughter has diabetes.”

Nurse: ”Has she been diagnosed with diabetes.”

Me: “No, that's why we are here.”

Nurse(already grabbing a blood sugar meter): “What are her symptoms?”

Me:” Well, she had been really thirsty” (nurse pokes Cora's finger and squeezes out a drop of blood) “and going to the bathroom a lot” (blood sugar monitor alarms) “and..” (nurse is already picking up phone and dialing) “she vomited at lunch today, and-”

Nurse(into the phone): “we have a pediatric type one diabetic onset. We need a room and IV STAT.”

And that was that. That was the moment our family “life clock” hit reset; the moment we realized we had “walked through the valley of the shadow death”.

The next three days are a blur. Cora spent three day in pediatric ICU. We learned the real information about diabetes. The stuff beyond Latin words and symptoms of onset. We learned about glucose and insulin and the risks of too much of each. We learned about counting carbs and giving shots. Joel and I took turns sleeping at the hospital and my parents flew in from Colorado to stay with the kids.

We also had to figure out how to get everyone (including the airplane) home. We decided we were not comfortable taking Cora in the Saratoga. We would be flying over some remote areas and might not have easy access to medical help. So Joel and Kier and Maddie flew out in the Saratoga and Cora and I went by commercial airline. This made for some stress of it's own. We literally ended up getting discharged from the hospital with barely enough time to go straight from the hospital to the airport. I worried about the process of making it through security with the various needles and bottles of insulin and juice boxes and glucagon pen. As it turned out this was not a problem at all. Cora still had various hospital bands and whatnot on so she was given special treatment including a personal assistant who pushed her in a wheel chair all the way to the gate.

The problem arose when we reached the gate and got ready for the lunch that Joel had carefully packed and calculated and recalculated the carbohydrate for. You see, we were discharged from the hospital with the expectation that we would attend extensive training classes the next day at our own Diabetes Center. So the hospital had just trained me for the basics. They were careful to go over the emergency procedures for what to do if her blood sugar dropped to dangerously low levels-- but the forgot to instruct me about really high levels. And when I pulled out the glucose meter for lunch it registered a really high number. When I called the hospital, they informed me that because Cora had already been discharged they could not legally give advice as to what I should do. I frantically search for the phone number for the Denver Diabetes Center. Eventually I found it, but when I called I was informed that our assigned doctor was on rounds at Children's Hospital-- he would call me back as soon as he could. All the while the departure time was ticking nearer. Fortunate for me the good doctor did indeed call me back within minutes of my leaving a message. He calmly talked me down off that wall and told me it was okay for Cora to eat, I would just need to give an extra dose of insulin to bring the blood sugar down. This sounded like a horrible idea to me-- I had visions of plummeting blood sugar, convulsions and all the other horror I had heard of, all happening in a airplane 30,000 feet in the air. But the doctor seemed sure and he was right. We gave the shot, Cora ate her lunch, and the short flight went smoothly. Once we arrived my mother in law picked Cora up at the airport. The rest of the family had a rather bumpy flight home, but made it home shortly after we did.

The next day we attended classes to learn the ins and out out diabetes care (including dealing with high blood sugar) and began learning to live our new normal.

Cora, 3 days out of the hospital and much happier

I'll be honest with you; I am not one of those people who believe “every thing happens for a reason”, but I do believe there are lessons we can take from every thing that does happen to us. And I believe that everything that happens to us changes us. And I also think that many of the experiences we have had in the airplane—everything from engine trouble to delayed departures and unplanned destinations-- are what give us the fortitude to deal with the greatest emergencies in life.

The Moment When You Tell the Emergency Room Doctor “Wait, there's More”

East Coast Trip

Maddie

Kier

Cora

Laura 15

While our trip to the Emergency room in Phoenix was certainly the most dramatic, it wasn't our only vacation that was interrupted by a visit to the emergency room.

Our trip to the East Coast started out benignly enough. We even brought our 15 year old niece, Laura, with us for this adventure. The impetus for the trip was to celebrate Joel's half sister Kelly's birthday. The family was meeting in Fredricksburg Virginia for a weekend of birthday festivities.

The trip to Virginia was without a hitch. We picked Laura up in Greeley, made a quick stop in Pioneer Village in Nebraska, then we head to Illinois for the night. Everyone dipped their toes in the Mississippi River and admired the River Paddle-boat. The next day we finished the trip to Virginia. We ended up flying high which meant a steep and bumpy decent, which subsequently meant some upset tummies. But over all, it was an uneventful trip considering the distance we covered in two days.

We enjoyed spending time with family, celebrating Kelly, eating yummy food and taking in the rich Civil War history of Fredricksburg.

We even managed to meet my brother, Brandon, in Washington DC for a day of Capital City Culture. We made our requisite trip to the National Zoo where we, as usual, failed to see the Pandas. Unfortunately, the weekend we were there happened to be the peak of Cherry Blossom season. While this meant that Washington DC was at the height of its beauty, it also meant that there were people everywhere! In fact I think this is the trip that Joel declared in no uncertain terms that he would never walk the National Mall again.

From Washington DC, we headed to Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia. We love living history museums. In fact one year the kids and I volunteered at our local prairie living history museum. We spent several days that summer wearing way too many layers of clothes. The girls and I sweated in the kitchen helping cook stew and cookies in the gigantic cast iron wood burning stove, while Kier in turn sweated as the blacksmith's apprentice, pumping the big bellows to keep the fire hot enough to bend metal. ---And we loved every minute of it. All of which is to say, that Williamsburg, the undisputed queen of living history museums, was our kind of place!

It seems to me that there was a swimming pool in the hotel we stayed at that night, and I believe that was most likely the source of the crud that afflicted Maddie the next day.

Whatever the cause, the next day Maddie woke up with her eyes glued shut with eye discharge. Ugg! We used a clean wet washcloth to wipe it away (my apologies to the housecleaning staff), and continued on our way down to the pan handle of Florida.

Maddie's eye continued to weep green gunk throughout the day. It was the worst eye infection I have ever seen! At one point Maddie wiped the discharge from her eye and then turned to her cousin Laura to ask if she got it all. Laura's face contorted in a look of horror.

We were staying with Joel's Aunt and Uncle in Florida, and they had arrived at the little municipal airport in time to watch us land. They even videoed the landing (and the go around)which was fun because they also caught the commentary which proved that the go around looked as exciting as it felt. The trees along the sides of the runway causes the winds to tumble right as we were about 20 feet above the runway. Joel quickly pushed the throttle forward and we did a quick “go- around”. Then we had a few seconds conference as to what to do next. In addition to the paved runway, the airport had a grass runway that was in a more favorable orientation to the winds. The problem was, the club has a “get permission before landing on a grass runway” policy. In the end we decided the club would prefer a grass landing to a folded up airplane.

The second attempt-- this time onto the grass runway-- was smooth and pillow soft. In fact it was so pillow soft that Joel was afraid we might get stuck in the spongy Florida grass!

By this time, Maddie not only had a goopy eye infection, but she was also reporting an ear ache as well. We asked Joel's family about near-by emergency rooms. They didn't recommend the nearest hospital but it was quiet a bit closer then the next nearest one. We figured it was pretty clear what the problem was, surely any old doctor could diagnose a little conjunctivitis. Turns out, this was a bad call!

For one thing, it took forever! At one point I went to ask the front desk when we could expect to be seen and was told it could be awhile because the emergency room doctor was across the street at a different medical center. Ummm, what? The emergency room didn't have a doctor in the building???

Once we did finally see the doctor, he stood in the doorway, about 15 feet away from Maddie, and from there diagnosed her with an eye infection. And then he started to walk away! Wait! I called out, I think you should check her ears too (and maybe her throat, and heart and lungs like a normal doctor-- but I decided not to push it). In the doctor's defense, I will admit that you could have been in the next town and still seen that Maddie had an eye infection!

In the end she was given a prescription for antibiotics to treat an eye infection and an ear infection. The good news was that once she started on the antibiotic she cleared up quickly and was ready to hit the beach the next day. The next day we made the mistake of applying spray sunscreen on the windy beach and it all blew away leaving everyone (and Maddie in particular) with horrible sunburns, but at least that didn't require an emergency room visit. And we learn that emergency room recommendation are best taken to heart!

Cora's family is unusual

My Family is Unusual

by Cora Shaklee

Has your family ever been in an unsafe situation? Here are three different times that my family

has gotten into strange and unsafe situation. I think my family is unusual because we get into

weird situations.

One time, we landed in the airplane on a very grassy strip of runway. There were big cracks in

the runway where the grass was growing through. This make the landing kind of bumpy. Every

one got out of the airplane even the dogs. After the dogs (Piper and Zeke ) had water we

packed them back into the airplane, and we set out to find some lunch. While walking in the

direction of town, we came across a fence. Not knowing what was on the other side, we went

over the fence. When we got a little farther, we saw a bull laying down. He was starring at us.

As fast as we could, but WITHOUT running, we started down toward the street. We made sure

to stay in the trees in case the bull started coming after us! We made it safely to the fence. On

the other side was the street. We walked the rest of the way into town by the side of the road

and went to a little cafe for lunch. When we came back, we saw the bull standing up, so walked

the long way around, avoiding the bull's pen! We let the dogs out to run around one more time

and then we left in the airplane. Dad had to abort his take off because all the grass in the

runway made it hard to see the end. He turned around and departed going the other way

because he could see the road and know where the end of the runway was.

There was also time time, we were in a car on a hill. There was a great view from the hill. The

car started sliding down the hill, the view changed. I was in the middle, sitting in a car seat.

Maddie said, "Kier, can you see the sky? All I can see is the ground." Kier said all he could see

was the sky. We climbed out the windows on the uphill side. A tow truck had to come and

rescue our car.

Another time, mom was leaving to go do some thing. I do not remember where she was going, but that is not very important . Mom had left chicken so we could make chicken tacos. Maddie, Kier and I had put the chicken in the oven to cook. Dad was in the bathroom. A few minutes after we put the chicken in the oven, there was a FIRE IN THE OVEN. I was the one who told dad there was a fire in the in the oven. Dad came out of the bathroom and ran to the kitchen. He grabbed the frying pan and filled it with water.

He threw the water on the fire. The fire went out very fast; our chicken was burnt to a crisp. We decided to eat at Tokyo Joe's. While thinking of what to have to eat, we set out the fans. Then we went to Tokyo Joe's. At dinner we concluded that the pizza's grease from on Friday caused the fire. We went back home to a some what smoky room.

So you see that strange and unsafe things happen around my family. So many things that you

would never have thought would all be able to happen to one family. But now we have lots of

stories to tell.

Kier's family is unusual

My Family is Unusual

by Kier Shaklee

Why is my family unusual? Well most families go on about one trip a year where as my family goes on lots of trips. My dad is a privet pilot so we normally go in a small airplane.   My family is unusual because we go on trips in small airplanes, we get to see unusual things, and drive around in unusual cars.

Some airports have courtesy cars for doing things like going to get lunch.  In Texas we once had a police car, ancient and rusty,  that had back doors that couldn't be opened from the inside.   Also, the head liner disintegrated if you touched it. And then, in Wyoming we got a flat tire in the courtesy car. In the hard gravelly parking lot, dad changed the tire.  In Durango the van only had one back door, and it didn't open so we had to climb over the front seat to get in or out.  Courtesy cars are for your convenience, but they are some times not very convenient.

We get to see cool things in small towns that you don't normally see when you take a airliner. We got to see the Stratica salt mine in Hutchinson Kansas.  They were still blasting in that particular mine when we were in it.  We got to see the miracle of America museum where this guy turned his collection of stuff in to a museum. Its pretty much just a big lot with a whole bunch of cool things like amphibious tanks and other strange things. Pioneer Village was another one of those where a really rich guy bought stuff like his one room school house and his old church and had them moved to some of his property.

Dispite the problems we have I have never been on an entirely unfun. When we went to Yellowstone it rained and was cold and everyone got sick. But we also got to swim in the river with hot runoff and we got to go to the hot springs. When we went to Florida, Maddie got a realy bad ear infection in both ears and a realy bad eye infect and we all got sun burned. But we also got to go to the beach and we went to Washington DC and Williamsburg, which was fun.

Many people have said that we have had the worst vacations ever but we still have fun. What makes my family unique is that our family motto is “with time to spare go by air”.

That Moment when you ask where are we going?

Page, Arizona

Maddie 9

Kier 6

Cora 3

Sandstone Canyons in Page AZ

Often our trip destinations are not planned by us-- or at least are not the destinations we planned.

Maddie and Kier at the Grand Canyon

When we went to the Grand Canyon we were still naive enough to think you could just waltz into a national park and reasonably expect to find a place to stay. After all, we had a tent and camping gear!

The first night we drove from camp ground to camp ground and were turned away again and again. In the end we managed to snag the last cabin in the park-- a blessing from someone else's last minute cancellation. It was a “no-pets” room so we had to traumatize our 6 month old miniature poodle puppy with a night in the kennel (did you know that many of our national parks have dog kennels? Neither did we!)

The next day was a chilly, windy March day. But the view of the Grand Canyon are beautiful in any weather.

The GRAND Canyon in Spring

By mid-afternoon, we knew that the previous days “lucky lodging” opportunity was not to be repeated. There was no where to stay in the park. We tried the near by, but out of the park, hotels. They were also all full. We even asked at the frightening campground, but it also had no vacancy. The tent camp spots were concrete and practically right on the road-- maybe they were; it was hard to tell the difference!

We thought that maybe we could camp at the airport? The employees at the FBO looked rather dubious when we suggested it. They conferred among themselves and, I guess, decided that we didn't seem to suspect because they did finally give approval.

On second thought, I think they knew there was absolutely no way we could possibly set up camp. For one thing, the wind was picking up;

A big Crack in the earth AKA the Grand Canyon

for another, the hangers were packed tightly together and what space there was was covered in goat-heads and cactus. The sun would be setting soon; it was crunch time-- a decision had to be made.

Joel said if we left right away we could make it as far as Page, Arizona. We packed the plane, left the rental car's keys at the FBO and took off into a strong headwind.

Flying in a small aircraft over the Grand Canyon is a unique feeling. The earth seems to fall away as you fly over the cliff. Actually the airport at Page, Arizona is even more impressive at this effect. The airport at Page literally lies at the top of a cliff over looking the Lake Powell Reservoir, and upon take off it really does feel like someone pulled the rug out from under you. Landing at the Page Airport feels a bit like you might hit the side of a cliff!

Landing in Page AZ

Lake Powell

 

Once we arrived at Page we decided it was well worth spending a couple of days. After all, we wouldn't be staying in the Grand Canyon, like we had planned. We camped for two nights at the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. Apparently 'National Recreation Areas' do not share the National Park's “no-spur-of-the-moment visits” quality. 

We spent a day playing at the beach around Lake Powell. We admired the house boats and tried to take a tour of the dam. Unfortunately due to the high winds we could not actually go out on the dam that day. We did however, manage an areal tour of the area after the pilots who fly for the tour company gave us some hints on the best spots to visit. The Glen Canyon, which now makes up the walls of the Lake Powell reservoir, is absolutely stunning. The shear cliffs are composed of smooth, striated layers of red and pale yellow sandstone.

 

Antelope Canyon

"A rugged, safe and comfortable 4 Wheel trip"

On our second day we visited the near by Antelope Canyon which boasts this same beautiful geology. The Canyon is located on Navajo Tribal land. The only access to the canyon is on a guide led tour

offered by the Navajo Tribe. Here is part of the description from the website: “ The tour involves us transporting you to the Upper Antelope Canyon in our 4-wheel drive tour vehicle that is both rugged, safe and yet comfortable.” I think this can be translated into something like: Transportation to the Canyon involves cramming as many people as possible into the back of a standard pickup truck and racing across the desert at 40 miles per hour. No seatbelts or other safety equipment will be provided, so just hold on to your little ones and enjoy the ride!

Kier, Maddie and Cora in Antelope Canyon

The website also refers to the “haunting beauty” and “awe-inspiring stone formations”. No translation is required for those statements. Nothing could be more accurate. Antelope Canyon is other-worldly in it's beauty!  While in Antelope

By the third day we were ready to move on to our next destination, Mesa Verde. That plan was not to be. It appeared that while we were unable to STAY in The Grand Canyon, we were equally unable to LEAVE The Glen Canyon. In the end, this vacation stop, which we never planned to make, ended up lasting for five nights!

But on day three we were unaware that we still had 3 more nights here in Page Arizona, so we packed up our camping gear and returned our rental car. And then we waited for the weather to give us the go ahead. We spent much of day three in the FBO. We flipped through the brochures, played on the luggage scales, turned concrete barriers into balance beams, played fetch with the dog at the near by empty lot and generally made ourselves at home (if perhaps unwelcome guests who wouldn't leave...)

Eternally optimistic, but also tired of sleeping on the ground, we chose to forego the rental car and instead use the funds for a night in a hotel. I believe we hitched a ride with someone from the FBO (at the airport). It was close enough that in the morning we could walk back to the airport.

Hanging out at the airport-- our natural environment.

Camped out under a wing

Unfortunately, the weather was still not favorable the next morning. We did at one point think things had improved enough for us to leave. Once we got into the air, Joel called Air Traffic Control to open his flight plan. The ATC controller started on a whole litany of weather problems. After the first report of Thunderstorms along the way (which involved some mountain flying) Joel had already begun to turn the plane and head back to the airport. But the air traffic controller continued with his long list-- icing  en-route, snowstorms, turbulence... Clearly it was not a good day to be headed into Colorado.

At the end of the day, we dragged our luggage back to the previous night's hotel and were told that there was no vacancy for the night. The only other option was on the other side of town. Page Arizona is a small town and, at least at the time we were there, had no taxi service. So we had to drag our luggage, our puppy, and our three small children across town. It was probably only 2 miles but it seemed infinite!

One of the things we did to pass the time during our extended stay in Page was go see a movie in the cute little 1940s era, small town theater. I don't remember what movie we found to watch that afternoon, but I do remember having the most bizarre conversation with the theater manager.

We were traveling with our 10 pound miniature poodle puppy and since we had checked out of the hotel room in the morning, we had no where to leave the puppy for a few hours. But she's only 10 pounds and she fits nicely in a backpack (made for dogs). A quiet black puppy in a mesh black bag rarely solicits attention beyond the occasional smile when a particularly observant passer-by realizes that the shiny black eyes belong to a living puppy.

Invisibility bag

About half way through the movie I decided I needed to visit the “Lady's”. This presented a bit of a problem. I could choose to leave the puppy in the bag with the family-- but she is very much my dog and there was a high likelihood that this choice would result in some whining. My other choice was to take her with me. Turns out maybe I should have risked the potential whine and left her with Joel...

Anyway, upon exiting the restroom, I was ominously called in to the manager's office where the young, 20s something theater manager informed me that “backpacks are not allowed at the theater” and I would need to leave mine with her until I was prepared to leave. I have no idea what illicit things this young women thought a mom of three young kids might be carrying in her backpack (and what mom of three young kids doesn't carry a huge bag filled with kid gear...) but clearly “puppy” was not on the list!

I, however, knew full well that the bag contained a puppy and that leaving the bag would not go well! So, I suggested that she might want to take a look in the bag BEFORE deciding she wanted to keep it in her office. This idea rather shocked the girl, whose forehead creased and eyes, in turn grew large and then suspiciously narrowed before stammering out that, yes, maybe she should know what was in the bag. When I unzipped the bag a little black ball of curly fluff with a bright pink tongue happily wiggled out.

“Oh!” the girl gasped, her eyes now wide, “I don't think we allow dogs!”

I couldn't help but smile. “Well, no I didn't think you do. That's why I hid her in a bag,” I said as I directing the puppy back into the backpack.

There was now a good thirty seconds of silence where the girl and I sat looking at one another over the big desk.

Finally, I ventured to ask if my puppy and I could go back and finish watching the movie with my kids. Uncertainly, she agreed, but told me that I was not welcome in the theater in the future.

“Got it,” I agreed.

"Little House" set in Tucson AZ

So the next day, when it rained ALL DAY, going to the theater was not an option. Instead we spent a day watching a marathon of old “Little House on the Prairie” episodes. Earlier in the trip, while in Tucson, we visited the studio where many of the episodes had been filmed, so we made the best of the day while we tried to identify the various props and scenes.

Our plan that week had been to spend two or three day exploring the Grand Canyon and two or three days playing in the Cliff Dwelling of Mesa Verde. Reality provide one whirlwind night in the Grand Canyon, no time for Mesa Verde and five nights in Page Arizona. Plus a chance to learn flexibility as we discarded the plan and instead embraced reality!

Monument Valley

Maddie Air-plane Schooling

Piper

NOT AGAIN!

Montana

September 2013

Maddie 13

Kier 10

Cora 7

I think some vacations are fated to fall into ruin. And if ever there was a trip where the “vacation fates” cackled and menacingly rubbed their hands together as they planned, it was our vacation to Glacier National Park in Montana.

It was intended to be an anniversary trip for Joel and I and for our friends Bret and Dawn Lowell. We had celebrated our 16^th anniversary in August and they were celebrating their 20^st anniversary that month. But, seven Year old Cora had been diagnosed with type one diabetes a mere 5 months prior to this trip, and so this added a certain degree of complication.

The plan was to leave our three kids with my parents. We spent several months beforehand preparing them for this weekend. They had learned to calculate carbs; give meal time insulin with the insulin pen; give long lasting insulin with the syringe; they had learned emergency procedures for dangerously low and dangerously high blood sugars. We had gone over the daily routine (including middle of the night blood sugar checks). I think I had even made detailed spread sheets for everything from signs of low blood sugars to the average carbohydrate content of just about everything under the sun. I'm not saying that no one felt nervous about the weekend, but they were certainly as prepared as they possibly could be.

And then, two days before the weekend, my dad got sick; head cold, nasty cough, fever-- the works. Okay, we thought, we could still do this. We had another grandma waiting in the wings. Grandma Janie had also learned the ropes. She agreed, she would be happy to take the kids for the weekend. Slightly frazzled by the hiccup, we none the less had a workable plan. Then, one day before our scheduled departure, Grandma Janie can down with the same nasty virus!

It would be a squeeze, and it certainly wasn't the trip we were planning, but maybe we could turn the couples trip into a family trip. We called the Lowells and they were amiable a family trip. We had a two bedroom vacation house near Glacier National Park in Montana. The kids would be sleeping on the floor in their parents rooms – so much for a romantic anniversary get-away.

“Alright” we thought, “we got that glitch out of the way”--

“Not so fast!” the vacation fates cackled. And then the weather reports came in. The weather over the northwestern Wyoming looked “iffy”.

It was at this point that I asked, “At what point do we call it, and say this vacation isn't meant to be?”

Joel's response was, “not yet. We still have options. We can go to the south of the Tetons. This can still work.”

By morning the weather over Colorado was somewhat “iffy” as well. Low cloud had settled over the Front Range. I'm not exactly sure how low they were but I do know it seemed like as soon as the wheels were up, all we could see was white. This was Joel's first take on into instrument conditions and he told me later that if he had realized exactly how poor the visibility was, we wouldn't have taken off.

The clouds were low, but they also were not very thick, so within 20 minutes we had popped out the other side and were skimming along the tops. The Rocky Mountains poked up though the low clouds in an ethereal “Middle Earth” sort of way. We had a strong head wind that day and both Joel and I noticed an occasional surging as the airplane moved through the sky. We figured it must be gusty as well.

Around noon, we landed in Big Piney Wyoming. This was our designated rendezvous point with the Lowells. It was also our lunch spot. We pulled out the lunch bag and headed into the FBO. After bringing in our lunch and Cora's insulin bag, I realized that we had left the waters in the plane. I ran back out to get them, and my three kids followed-- somehow locking the door to the FBO in the process! This was a problem because, not only was our lunch in there, but so was the entire bag of insulin and all the diabetes emergency supplies. Fortunately we had not yet given Cora any lunch insulin yet, so she was not a “blood- sugar time bomb” at that moment. Still, I think I may have said some not very nice things to my children at that moment about not leaving belonging unattended and how did they lock the door anyway!

There was a phone number on the door, and while my phone was locked inside, Joel's was not, so we used it to call the number. Within five minutes someone had showed up to unlock the door. Few, one crisis was averted!

After Lunch and meeting up with the Lowels, we headed, caravan style, to the west of the mountains and then north toward Montana.

Cora asked that I ride in the back. This was our first big flight since her diagnoses of Diabetes and it turns out that the feeling of a low blood sugar was masked by the vibrating of the airplane. As a result she had been feeling funny all morning. We no longer had the Cherokee (you can read that story in the YUMA chapter). We were now flying a Piper Saratoga. The Saratoga has club seating, which meant I was riding backwards. Usually these seats are reserved for the dogs and for Kier, who isn't bothered by airsickness. I don't get airsick, but still am not a big fan of the sensation of flying backwards.

There I was, in the backseat, facing the wrong way, when I felt the plane slow down, when I heard the engine noise quiet, when I felt my stomach in my throat. I remembered exactly what that all meant. I craned my neck around in time to see Joel flick the key back to center. He turned and looked back. I don't think he even said anything to me. He didn't have to, we both knew. Magnito trouble. Again. Same problem, different plane.

The Lowels in their Moony were just ahead of us, so Joel radioed them to let them know what was going on. Then he radioed the nearest airport, Idaho Falls, to tell them we would be coming. The Lowels followed us in. Unlike our experience in the Cherokee, where we were almost still right over the airport, on this trip, we had a tense 30 minute flight to the airport.

Once we arrived, the boys went off to see the aviation mechanics. Dawn and the kids and I waited....and waited... The kids played hide and seek in the massive FBO building, wallowed on the floor in the pilot lounge, and were generally too loud and antsy after the long, stressful flight. We waited some more. Cell phone coverage was spotty and the guys were unreachable. It occurred to Dawn and I that we should start thinking about things like dinner, a car, maybe a place to stay. It turned out this was a near impossible task!

It seemed there was some sort of parents night at a near by university in Idaho and all the hotels and rental cars were booked up for the next 100 miles! Surely that is hyperbole, right. No cars or hotels for a 100 miles? Because of a collage parent's night? That's what I thought. But we called hotel after hotel, car rental after car rental-- nothing, for 100 miles. I even asked if we could spend the night at the FBO,and the heartless women said, “no”. I was beginning to envision our little family huddled up on the concrete beside a hanger, fighting over the 2 emergency sleeping bags in the plane.

Not only was this the wrong weekend to need a rental car, or a hotel room, it was also a bad week to need an airplane mechanic. Turns out that most of the mechanics were busy deer hunting that week, leaving only the youngest apprentice (who wasn't approved to do anything it seemed). After considerable begging, pleading and insisting that he knew what the problem was, Joel convinced the man to look into the magnito-- in the morning.

It was getting dark and the Lowels had to fly over mountains in order to arrive at our destination in Montana. They clearly felt bad leaving us to our unknown fate. But, what could be done. We were less likely to find lodging for two families then for one. As they were leaving, Bret commented that he had had luck once or twice renting a car from a dealership. This sparked an idea from the FBO lady (who turned out not to be so heartless after all). She knew the son of the owner of the two big car dealerships in town-- and he was a student pilot!

She gave him a call and, still in his date night duds, he picked us up from the airport, drove us to the dealership, handed us the keys to a car and told us we could “google some rates and that WE could tell HIM how much we would pay for the rental when we got back into town on Monday”. I'm not even sure we signed anything or gave him a driver's license before we drove off.

The drive from Idaho Falls to Glacier National Park is over 400 miles, and we did indeed go over 100 miles before we found a hotel for the night. It seemed like even more because, for a significant amount of it, we got stuck behind the most unbelievably huge and slow piece of equipment. We never did figure out what it was, but we can tell you it moved at about 5-10 miles per hour and took up both lanes of the two lane state highway!

In the meantime, the Lowels were having airplane troubles of there own. Their flight had gone fine but upon landing they had a spectacularly flat tire. They spent a significant amount of time dealing with their flat tire.

All in all, I think the break down of our “anniversary trip” went something like this: 10% flying; 25% dealing with logistical problems; 30% driving; 35% enjoying beautiful crystal clear rivers and lakes, fabulous scenery, and good company; and 0% romance.