Family Vacation to Badger Creek

As I mentioned yesterday, my family went on a quick trip to visit Beki this weekend in eastern Idaho.  Beki is a counselor at BYU-Idaho's Outdoor Youth Adventure (OYA) camp.  As family of a counselor, we were able to visit and stay in the cabins and do all the activities for free!  It was really neat seeing what Beki is doing all summer... I can see why she loves her job!

The camp is in Tetonia, Idaho (near Driggs) and has the most beautiful views of the Teton Mountains.

So now for the picture overload of all the activities we did... my mom and my sister always had their cameras with them!  I think this just may be my longest post ever! We started out Friday night with the Giant Swing.  That was one of my favorites!  It's hard to tell from the video, but I was up so high!  We all took turns in the swing, while the others pulled the person in the swing up to the sky :-)

After a delicious breakfast Saturday morning, we headed off so Beki could show us some of their "initiatives" at OYA.  The first one involved swinging on a rope over a "ship" and landing on the platform.  You couldn't knock over the ship (which was really a stick resting on a couple of stumps) and your entire group had to stand on the platform on the other side.  We all made it! 

I know some of you reading this might wonder at my hat because you've probably never seen me with any hat (besides my cowboy hat!).  I bought this hat in Ketchum and it was my savior over the weekend.  I can't go more than a day without washing my hair :-)

Next was the trust fall.  Hailey liked this one!

And then we headed over to All Aboard... similar to the ship platform, but the platform was much smaller.  Beki tells us that they had all 22 counselors on this platform at one time.  I would have liked to see that!

I can't remember what this next one was called... but the point was to try and walk across the cables, pushing against the hands of your partner.  The wires widened as you went, so if you made it all the way, your body would be parallel with the ground.  My mom and dad didn't make it very far, but way to go mom for trying :-)

After the initiatives, we did a little rock climbing.  Great shot, I know :-)

My trusty belayers... mom, Hailey, dad, and TJ.

And for a little perspective - we were up high!

Once we got to the top of the wall, we zip lined down.  I love my dad's face in this picture... just as he is getting ready to start the zip line.

After we had all had finished our zip line, my dad and I went horseback riding while the rest of my family had lunch and took a nap.  I really enjoyed riding Excalibur (my horse), and for the first time ever I got the horse up to a run (canter).  That was so much fun!  Way more exciting than a walk or trot.

Next up was the ropes course, aka Jungle Gym.  There were definitely a couple times I relied on my "lobster claws" (carabiners), especially in the third picture down.  Those ropes seemed so far apart!

Our last activity of the day (before smores and fireworks) was the Power Pole.  You had to climb up a tall pole, and then jump off of it and try to hit the tennis ball suspended in the air.  It seems simple, but this was probably the hardest one for me to do.  Taking that last step up on top of the pole was kind of scary!

And here's my somewhat freaked out close-up.  Not sure why I was so nervous!

I've got way more pictures, but I figure 19 is enough for one post.  Nah, let's make it an even 20.  My mom might kill me for this one, but it made me laugh so hard.  This was the first night when my mom was getting out her sleeping bag.  Look at the size of that thing!  I'm seriously laughing now as I type this.  Thanks for being a good sport mom and letting me take a picture.  You know that any picture I take has a pretty good chance of ending up here :-)  Thanks family for a fun getaway!