Goblin Valley & Capital Reef

Well, we've come as far as Capital Reef so far. It's taken us a bit longer than expected, but we've finally made it!
We are staying in a town called Torrey tonight. It is just west of Capital Reef and VERY beautiful! I've never been to this part of the state and I'm just as enthrawled as the kids (if not more!)
We were going to stay in Goblin Valley Tuesday night, but got tired and didn't want to keep driving, so we pulled off at Joe's Valley and camped for the night. The next morning we got up and tried to get an early start. We plugged "Goblin Valley" into the trusty GPS and headed out. Now remember, we are pulling a triple...Truck, house trailer, and 4-wheelers on a trailer!
Well "Jill" (as our GPS has been named) lead us on some little dirt road. We finally found a place to turn our rig around and decided to follow a road that looked much better maintained and a few trucks had even driven by. We followed the road for a while to a....dead end! So we decided to just turn around and head back to Castle Dale and take the main highway down. As we were turning around, one of the tires on the trailer hit a sharp rock and split. Luckily we had a spare, so we changed it and were on our way, no problem right? Wrong...As we are driving back, on the state maintained road we hear a bang! You guessed it, a tire on the other side blew! Now, here we are at Joe's Valley Resivoir with 2 flat tires and no spare. We dropped the trailer and went into Castle Dale to see if we can find a tire shop. We found one, bought 2 new tires, headed back fixed the flat, and headed back towards Castle Dale. Dan decided to show me the San Rafael Swell since I had never seen it, so we headed that way. We made it to the swell and it was amazing! I loved every minute! We got some fun pictures and we all hit golf balls off the rim! Man those things can really fly! We soon got on our way to Goblin Valley and had a blast looking at all the fun rocks and Indian caves and Petroglyphs and the swinging bridge. Just as we get to the swinging bridge Brayd says "Hey guys, one of the tires just blew up again!" Dan and I both say no it didn't, they're all just fine.
A little while later, he Brayd tells us again "one of the tires popped, we better get out and change it", we just keep driving. Finally we see the Interstate ahead, but can't figure out why we're kicking up so much dust. We get out to investigate, and sure enough, one of the tires is shredded! We pull off to change yet another tire! We timed it this time and had it down to 18 minutes 7 seconds!
Still haven't made it to Goblin Valley! The one place we came to see!
We had to go into Green River to buy yet another tire, and be on our way.
We finally made it to goblin valley at 8:45 that night! As we arrive we see a sign that says, "Campground Full". You have got to be freakin' kidding me! We took the kids in to see the valley anyway and soon left to find a camping spot. We found one, got set up, got the kids in bed and they were asleep before I could even get my PJ's on! They'd had a VERY long day!
We got up early this morning to "go exploring" and then headed over to Goblin Valley to see it in the day light! The kids had a blast climbing on the goblins and playing. We played for a while and then headed out to Capital Reef. The drive was beautiful! Now, I'm sitting here in the campground doing laundry, and Dan has taken the kids for a ride on the 4-wheeler.
Tomarrow we will head into Capital Reef and do some hiking and exploring and then head over to the Beaver Mountains and meet up with Todd in Circleville to stay and hunt for a few nights, then who knows where we'll end up!
We have had a great time, even through a few setbacks. I'm loving spending this much time with Dan, and the kids love having his undivided attention all day long! It's exactly what I was hoping for!
Good luck to you all, and I will update again soon. Oh yea, I will post pictures as soon as I can find somewhere to develop my film, that's right, I forgot the digital camera! I'm glad I brought my good SLR though, I've gotten some amazing pictures. I hope to have those soon!

So long for now, and good luck to ya!
Steph