Behind the Scenes: Tie-dye photo shoot at Mount Charleston (part one)

If you've been following this blog for any extended length of time, you may have noticed that Antho and I will take just about any excuse we can to get out of dodge. While we both grew up in the fabulous city of sin, aka little old Las Vegas, and have a lot of nostalgic memories in the city, we're always happy to stretch our legs or put some miles on our vehicles if it means taking in some new sights in a new location. We've gone to San Francisco and walked from one end of the city to the other (or damn near it), driven out to Mesquite together, explored Santa Monica and Venice beach together, not to mention all the time I spent exploring in Japan and South Korea all by my lonesome. There's a deep-seated wanderlust in us, needing to be satiated, so outward we go seeking adventure. There are certainly worse addictions to have, like crack or heroine, and our adventures in the great outdoors often lead us to discover fun new things we can capture on film. Like, check out this spiky little dude below- I think he's a tachinid fly, which is a fancy way of saying he looks like some kind of punk-rock alternative bee, but is actually a fly, because nature is a weird one with an endlessly inventive imagination. 

One of our favorite places to go near Las Vegas is Mount Charleston. We've been going there together for years, and find something new everytime we find ourselves there. Not only are the beautiful trees and flowers always changing with the seasons, but wildlife like deer, wild horses and burros all make their homes out in these parts, so sightings are not entirely unexpected. We even saw a batch of burros on the trip out, as you might remember from a previous post! While we typically make our way out to Charleston for recreation, of which there's a bounty of options (hiking, camping, skiing, etc) but this trip we were specifically aiming to try and get some tie-dye photos so we could update our shop inventory on Etsy. Of course, we couldn't help but to have some fun in the process! 

Road Tripping: Scenic drive through Valley of Fire State Park

If you've been to my blog before, you might have noticed that we've got a bit of a love affair with Valley of Fire State Park. We've gone camping there a few times during the cooler winter months and have returned for day trips several times, too. It's not far from Vegas, only about an hour down the freeway, and has such stunning stone formations and scenic views that it's hard not to be blown away by the beauty anew with each visit. There's always something new to discover or see, and the serene seeming desert hides a complex ecosystem full of life, from adorable ground squirrels skittering about the campsites to coyotes and mountain lions lurking in the distance during the deep, dark nights. You can catch the glow of Vegas peeking out behind the mountain ridges at night, as the stars come out to glisten, but despite the distant glow it's easy to feel almost entirely cut off from the rest of humanity on some far and distant alien planet (with conveniently paved roads). 

We were quickly running out of sunlight and wanted to stop and get a photo shoot in, since we've accumulated a huge backlog of ready-made shirts needing to get added to our inventory. I'm sure if I weren't such a perfectionist we'd have an easier time getting them online- because we can't sell what people don't know we have, right? But first I need to process the photos we've already taken, add those to our inventory, sort and organize our standing inventory to make room for the new additions, measure, post... it's an entire process, my friends, and it's a time consuming one. It's worth it in the end, though, because each time we sell one of our tie-dye shirts there's so much joy and pride!  Some day it will be my day job, but you've gotta build it from the ground up first and that's going to take a lot of work and effort. It's not always easy trying to start your own business, and I'm grateful that I'm in a situation that allows me the flexibility to work on it and grow it in my free time while still bringing in an income to support our basic needs.  

Even though I definitely had work on the mind, it's hard not to marvel at the scenery when in Valley of Fire. The massive stone formations jutting out of the ground in bright, stark colors contrasting the sands and shrubs surrounding them with the endless blue sky above can take your breath away. Even just driving down the roads and enjoying the view from the comfort of your air-conditioned car is well worth the trip from Vegas! During our trip this time we passed a wedding party posing for photos, so that was an unexpectedly romantic thing to spot. There was also an art installation involving mirrors that we saw in passing, but that was only there for a very short window of time. It was gone by the time we could've gone back out to inspect if closer... shame, but that's the ephemeral nature of things sometimes. 

Luckily for us, photos can help us capture the fleeting moments in life and preserve them.

Good thing, too.

Road Tripping: Leaving St. George, Utah

Well, St. George, it's been lovely. We didn't get to partake in too many of your bountiful offerings due to our limited time available, but what we were able to see was lovely. From the giant, creepy spider statue and flinging-babies statue adjacent to it in the Historic District, dipping our feet in the water in the park, greeting the velociraptor and enduring parking challenges nearby in the shopping district, to hiking among the beautiful red stones and posing on a giant boulder overlooking the city, it was fun. It's not too hard to see why people are moving there in droves. It's easily accessible to other, larger, cities like Salt Lake City or Las Vegas, but it absolutely feels like a small town. Families gather in the public spaces and let their kids splash around together in the water, ice cream men roll up on mountainside parks with sweet treats to cool off the family, it seems pretty sublime. We did see someone getting battered about the face while sitting next to the road when we were driving through their downtown area, so obviously, it's not all picture perfect sitcom-worthy bliss, but it's nice. I'm sure if we spent more time and dove more in-depth into the area and the recent population growth explosion it's been experiencing, we'd hear some fascinating stories. Any city that experiences the kind of rapid growth that St. George has will undoubtedly undergo some degree of growing pains in the process. Each municipality and governing body deal with it differently, which can lead to a city's thriving or declining. For the time St. George seems to be on the up and up, and I imagine that as populations continue to become more mobile it will likely continue to experience a surge in traffic. 

Not only is it a hot spot for young families looking to settle down somewhere quaint, but Dixie State University brings droves of youth from nearby towns looking to glean and education with a side of independence. Many of the graduates I talked to from Mesquite mentioned that they were planning to go to DSU for their post-high school education, which makes sense. It's not far down the road so they can easily make a trip home to visit their families, but it's far enough for them to feel their first bit of freedom. It's not hard to imagine that some of these starry-eyed young dreamers will meet some other lovely youth and fall in love, and potentially end up settling down in the area. Storybook romance, right? The cycle continues. The force has balance. 

Yadda yadda. Anyway, we weren't looking to put down roots here, not this time. We packed it into the van again and started rolling out, with our end destination being home with a few side quests along the way. Join our adventure!