yo mars, yurt unbelievable

a group of friends roadtripping out to utah to surprise another friend in a yurt next to her's & her husband's. that was basically the gist of the idea that birthed our fun 'camping' trip to utah this past july!

my friend jeremy, who planned a surprise trip last june 2016 for his then girlfriend glenys in order to propose to her (see this insta post of mine to see a snap of the result!), texted me back in march to let me know that he'd just booked a "now-that-we're-married" surprise trip for glenys. he said my trigger words, "in case you're up for a random adventure," & mentioned that the other yurt by the one he'd reserved was available. he said it'd be a bonus surprise if i & whoever i wanted to join me were at that yurt when he & glenys arrived. within minutes of reading his text, i'd reserved the yurt. what can i say, my people get me. =)

aren't summer roadtrips with friends just the best? of course i asked my 2 best friends, charlotte & esther to join me, as well as charlotte's boo thang/my friend ryan. the 4 of us left early in the morning, stopped at arches national park, & arrived at goblin valley state park by late afternoon.

glenys was a lil bit on jeremy's suprise trail. he almost gave in & told her, after she'd seen some stories & posts from us on our roadtrip. but instead they called us, asking where we're heading to. we all played it cool, claiming we were heading to grand junction... which wasn't a lie since we were actually heading that way & made a stop there! ;) esther, charlotte, ryan, & i made sure not to post anything to social media when we stopped at arches before heading to our yurt. that glenys can sense a surprise from a mile off after what jeremy pulled on her last summer!

you lose cell service before you even arrive to the yurt, so coordinating with jeremy through text about our arrival & such proved to be a lil difficult... plus i didn't want glenys to see my texts & then the surprise be ruined. turns out jeremy forgot about how we had planned for the 2 of them to walk over to our yurt & knock on the door to "see who their neighbors were..." so after charlotte tried to send some failed signaling via her car alarm, we walked over to their yurt instead. we knocked on the door, glenys answered, & seemed kiiiinda surprised... either way, we all had some good laughs. i mean, thought that counts, right?

we drove to the closest store (which wasn't very close) to buy some ingredients for hobo dinners & breakfast. side note ~ look it up if you don't know bout hobo dinners! jeremy & glenys introduced me to 'em last year when the 3 of us were camping at the great sand dunes national park.

we got back to our yurts & put on some music (ed sheeran, duh). we took photos, danced, flew a drone, explored a lil around our mars-like surroundings, & began prepping for dinner... no joke laughing 95% of the time. it was so much fun. these are the kinds of summer days with friends that i will always cherish.

after dinner we made smores, muching as we stargazed the night away. check out muh gurh charlotte's amazing photo below to get a glimspe of what we were enjoying in the sky that night.

photo cred: charlotte orrino. is she not a boss?! nbd.

the next morning we made some delicious breakfast, cleaned up, & packed up. we headed to crack canyon wilderness to hike around some slot canyons.

loved how crack canyon reminded me of antelope canyon in arizona where i visited last summer! we saw a snake while we hiked -- not our favorite thing. esther saw it first & yelped, "snake!" it was so camouflage that it took me a sec to see it in our path. ew. no thanks. thankfully, that was the only one we saw. (as much as i hike, this was my first time seeing a snake in the wild. i know, crazy.)

it was preeetty hot while we were there, but it was a blast of a trip. short & sweet, with some of the best company a girl could ask for. my 2nd time visiting utah in 2017, & again it delivered! (not surprising.)

for those wondering, we used reserveamerica.com to make our booking. definitely a great option for a getaway alone or with ya tribe. have fun out there!

photo cred: charlotte orrino