This is our second annual couples trip to Manila, and it was amazing! We went with our friends, Kenny, Tiffany, Chris and Nick again. We have become good friends with these peeps from our ward, and hardly a week goes by without us getting together. We all have kids close to the same age, we all have four kids and we all just work well together. When we started doing a lot with this group, I decided to give ourselves a name. We are the CLAW Club (each initial from our last names makes CLW, throw in the "and" and it spells "claw"). I know, cheesy, but it's an easy way to refer to the group.
Anyway, we left Thursday evening and stopped off in Jeremy Ranch at an amazing restaurant called "Billy Blanco's". If you've never been, you've got to go!
I ordered the taco sampler and I will admit, my favorite was the mushroom taco.
We made it to Manila that evening and settled in, then played games.
While we were playing, Nick said he had something and went to his room. He came back with matching t-shirts! Holy cow, I thought that was the funniest, coolest, cheesiest thing ever!
We all put on our new shirts and played games until about 2am.
The next morning we got up early and headed to the Green River.
Tom helped hold the raft on the truck while we drove from the gas station to the river.
The girls sat and watched the raft while the guys dropped the truck off at the end of the river run.
When the guys got back they worked on getting their fishing poles ready.
It was quite crowded with several youth groups and family reunions. We fit right in with our matching CLAW Club shirts. ☺
Tom, Me, Nick, Chris, Tiffany & Kenny
The day started out gorgeous! The weather was that perfect hot.
I was feeling tired so I sat down in the raft and tried to snooze. It didn't work very well since water would get into the raft and slosh around my backside.
We then found a nice place to pull off for lunch.
However, while we were eating, the clouds started to come in, the temperature began to drop and so did the rain. Here's our emoticon faces when the rain started to fall.
Well, as "Whinnie the Pooh" says, "the rain, rain, rain came down, down down". Poor Tiffany had noticed the night before that she was starting to catch a flu bug and the cold, wet rain was making her fever and chills worse. Luckily, Nick had a poncho and we tried to get her warm and dry the best we could.
It's hard to tell from the picture, but the rain started coming down worse. Other rafters were pulling off to the side and huddling under trees. We tried to keep going, but pretty soon it was turning into a hail storm. Plus, we could hear thunder in the distance.
That's when we saw a little overhang in the rocks and made a mad paddle for it! (Chris and Kenny did an amazing job paddling most of the time!) We quickly got under the rock and waited out the storm.
Here's what our view of the river and rain looked like from where we waited. It took probably 20 minutes or so before the rain let up enough that we dared venture back out.
It still drizzled a bit and there was a breeze, but it was a warm breeze.
Despite the three guys fishing the whole time, Kenny was the only one that caught anything. 
It wasn't the most ideal day on the river, but it was definitely an adventure!
And of course, as soon as we spotted the dock, the sun came out and the storm cleared away.
We deflated the raft (well, these four did) and we headed back to get the van.
We headed over to the Flaming Gorge Dam and we're just about to go on the tour, when they canceled it due to lightning. Since it was the last tour of the day, we didn't get a chance to see the dam, but we always have next year!
Luckily, I brought a change of clothes and it felt good to be dry again.
We then headed to the Red Canyon Lodge for a delicious dinner.
(one of these kids is not like the other...)
It was funny because we'd ask people to take our picture and then they'd take a selfie with it! This guy was really cool and even gave us some free fish food for the fish in the pond. It's fun to meet new people when your out of town.
So Tom, Kenny, Tiffany and I (Chris was cold so her and Nick went back to the van), went down to the pond to feed the fish.
It was fun to see the fish jump out of the water and fight over the food (you can see one jumping right by the edge of the deck). The ducks and ducklings seemed to like the fish food too.
We went back, watched a movie and went to bed relatively early (12:30?)
The next day we were pretty lazy. Tom got up and ran 6 miles, Nick and Chris went for a walk, Kenny went to get some medicine for Tiffany, who was feeling worse with the flu, so when I got up, Tiff was the only one at the house. When everyone got back, we decided to go somewhere, so we just drove over to the gorge look-out.
I love the chance these trips give Tom and I to forget about kids, work and responsibility and just fall deeper in love. (awe)
It was a bit cloudy and cool that day, so we decided to just take it easy.
We went back to the house and made lunch and ate while we watched another movie.
Then we played a few games.
Afterward, we started to get a bit antsy, so we went for a walk around the block. We even talked to some cows.
When we got back, we prepared dinner. We ended up doing shish-ka-bobs like we did last year, because they are just so good!
That night, we watched another movie and again, went to bed at a reasonable hour.
Then next day we got up early, went to church (other than Kenny and Tiff, because she was still sick) and then came back and cleaned up the house. We are so lucky to have Kenny's mom who's willing to let us stay in her manila house for our vacations.
We filled up the van and started our trip back home.
We made a stop at Pizza Hut for lunch on the way.
Then we were back home. The weekend went by way too fast.
My sister-in-law, Candalyn was so amazing to watch our four kids (plus her own) while we were gone! It always makes a vacation that much better when you know your kids are well taken care of.
I Love my friends! And I can't wait for our next adventure!
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