Camping near the caves

Thursday (and Friday) were days of firsts. Our first camping trip as a family. Our first time sleeping in a tent (that Maddie was afraid to sleep or even be in). Maddie and my first time at the Timpanogos Caves. We went with Misha and Joe and camped out 1 night in American Fork Canyon. We got up there late, so I didn't take a picture of our fire that night, but we did have s'mores. Madilyn did go to sleep although she cried and said "no" when we were climbing in the tent, but it was so late that she was exhausted and slept through the night. We were a little cold(next time we'll take sleeping bags--we only brought blankets), but we warmed up quickly on our hike. Joe started our morning "fire". We had wood, a fire pit, ashes, and smoke, we were just missing many of the flames. That's ok because we could still eat our granola and chocolate chip muffins (look at Maddie's face). During breakfast, Joe spotted a moose (or as Maddie called it, a horse) very close to our campsite. You can see in in the background drinking from the creek. We then went and hiked up to the Timpanogos Caves. We borrowed my sister's hiking backpack which was good because it is 1&1/2 miles uphill with switchbacks and no strollers are allowed. The bad part, Maddie decided that only Mommy was her friend and wanted me to carry her--she did finally ride in the backpack as long as Mommy was the one wearing it. I was worried she might not like the cave, but she loved it. She had no problem with the dark, wanted to dangle from the handrails as if they were monkey bars, and would point to the baby that was ahead of in the tour. It is really an impressive piece of nature and I'm glad we went. Thanks Misha and Joe for inviting us.