A Must Read: Death in Grand Canyon

          My husband said I should blog more. He wants this blog to be all about hiking and backpacking, which I am okay with, but we will see. I did not really know what to blog about until I thought I would share this book with you that I am currently reading:

 Over the Edge: Death in Grand Canyon

by Michael P. Ghiglieri & Thomas M. Myers

          I came across this book on my last visit to the Grand Canyon in 2010. I had finished a day hike to roaring springs and back with some friends and stopped in the gift shop on the way out. I thought it looked cool, listing all the deaths in the grand canyon and bought it. 

          I finally have had some time to read it and I decided it is not just interesting, but it holds a lot of truth. I love hiking and I always have considered myself safe, but this book has opened my eyes to yet more dangers of hiking. It goes over how important water and food is. It reminds you to tell people where you are going before hand, talks about flash floods, and many other things. 

          Now, the first part of the book goes over some silly but serious accounts of death in the canyon, many of whom simply fell to their death. The authors give some statistics how many of these deaths are male and how men need to think more and yadda yadda yadda. A sentence I enjoyed, being a girl, is the following:  "A possible culprit in many of these fatalities may be the male urge to urinate off high places combined with dizziness."
          Anyways, the book is a little silly and sad at the same time, but I really believe it would be a wise book to read in order to grasp the reality of how dangerous the outdoors can be.
          The following are just some photos of the canyon that I have take in the past. the first three are actually from a geology field trip I attended in 2008 and the last 2 are from 2010. The last two are also examples of places where people have died in the book by slipping while taking photos. I honestly do not think I would have stood that close to the edge if I would have read this book at the beginning of that trip instead of the end.

   

The signs say don't feed the squirrels. Don't worry I didn't, i just taunted him.

Granola

          We enjoy hiking and backpacking and trail mix is essential to those activities. For the most part when buying it from the store it is either unhealthy and does not give us the real essentials needed during the strenuous activities, or is expensive. We have been making our own granola and making that into trail mix. Sometimes we eat just the granola for a tasty cereal. It is very yummy and I thought I would share it with you.

   

       

Amylyn's Granola
Dry Ingredients:
15 C Oats
1 C coconut
2 C nuts (We use 2 cups peanuts and then add some almonds as well)
1/4 C sesame seeds
3 T cinnamon

Wet Ingredients:
1 3/4 C honey
2/3 C molasses
1 1/4 C oil
2/3 C water
4 t vanilla

Mix the dry ingredients together. Heat the wet ingredients on the stove until all is one solution. Pour the wet ingredients over the dry ingredients in a bowl and mix. Cook at 350 deg. spread out on cookie sheets on about 5 to 6 sheets for: 8-10 minutes for soft granola, 12-15 minutes for crunchy granola.

After the granola is made we add raisins, crasins, m&m's, more coconut and peanuts, other nuts, and whatever else we want.

The last time we made this we added some flax seed and wheat germ into the dry ingredients to add more nutrition.

Boredom brings interesting things

          So today I updated our 72 hour emergency packs, inventoried it all and wrote down what we still need. I did this because I was board. I recently graduated and I live in a very small town with 15,000 other students. This, along with the economy, makes it very hard to find a job. I have been looking for a job the past few weeks from 8 to 5. My husband told me to do some things I enjoy during the day so I don't go crazy, hence the emergency kit.
          Now we are not the crazy people who think the world is going to end tomorrow, we simply want to be prepared for whatever lies ahead. We have packed essentials, like flashlights, candles, camping stove, water purifier, toiletries, food, clothes, etc. We are keeping them in our backpacking backpacks when we are not using them, and we will move the gear when we are out camping. We still have a few things to purchase to make our kit complete, but I think we are doing pretty good for where we are in life right now.

Some of the items packed in my awesomely blue pack