On 27 Jan 2020 stories out of Wuhan, China about a new virus that had locked down the city. We have friends Tom and Wendy; Wendy was the first Consul General after the U.S. opened the Consulate in Wuhan following its closure during the Communist revolution in 1949. I read that the U.S. government was evacuating the U.S. consulate staff so wrote to them I bet you are happy not to be in Wuhan now! I hear the consulate is evacuating U.S. employees. When you were stationed in Guangzhou during the SARS epidemic in 2003, you were quarantined there for months. Times are changing. Little did I know at the time how much times were a changing! The world shut down, travel between countries was banned, and my plans for international travel in 2020 were cancelled. However, by June things were opening up again...no stay at home orders, but still orders to wear face masks, social distance, and wash hands often. At least now we could travel within the States. So plans were made!
First my sister Judy and husband David visited us from Texas from July. Mostly they just wanted to relax, but we did take
them to see the Garden of the Gods and the gold mining town of Cripple Creek. The day they left we drove to Denver International Airport to pick up our grandson Liam who had flown from San Francisco. He has spoiled by the flight attendants! He was with us in Woodland Park from 4 July until 29 July. During this time we took a ride on the steam from Cripple Creek to Victor, split shale to find fossils, visited the Ghost Town Museum and the Garden of the Gods, went fishing many times at Memorial Park where he made many friends, and basically had a good time.
Earlier our son Will told us that he was getting married to Mercy. Due to the virus they were going to have the civil marriage ceremony on 5 August and the wedding on 21 May 2021, when hopefully the virus was minimized and Mercys family could travel to the U.S. from China. So we planned to drive to Orange County, California where we would witness the marriage, and also take Liam home in Marin County north of San Francisco. We drove because we had to take our dog Bonnie
with us as she is blind and had diabetes and needs us to be with her. She the whole time, either siting on Lindas lap or sharing the back seat with Liam.
July 2020 As we had Liam with us, we had reason to take our time to visit the spectacular national parks in Utah. We left home early Wednesday morning and arrived at our hotel in Moab, Utah about 2:30 PM. The temperature was 104F, so we decided to swim first and visit Arches NP later after the temperature was cooler. So about 4 PM we headed out to the park which is just north of Moab. Driving through the park we were surrounded by magnificent scenery of wind eroded red rocks with erosion creating arches in the rocks. Our only stop and walk was at the Windows section. Liam wanted to run to Window Arch which was not that far from the parking area so I told him to go ahead and that I would catch up. As I strolled along I saw that he had already reached the Window Arch and was climbing up like a mountain goat. I was scared to
death that he was going to fall, so quickened my pace. The temperature was still 104F, so I soon felt the effects and doubted whether I could get to him on time. Fortunately he saw me desperately waving my arms down, and he did...disaster averted. We returned to town for dinner and an evening watching TV.
Thursday we got an early start hoping that the early morning temperatures would linger while we visited Canyonlands NP, just up the road from Arches. Our destination was the Green River Overlook and the nearby Mesa Arch in the Islands of the Sky section of the park. The walk to Mesa Arch is about a half mile from the parking lot, but well worth the effort made easier as the temperature remained in the 80s. Iconic photos have been taken of sunsets through this arch.
