Whatcott Reunion - Aug 2010

About a year ago, Mom decided to try to get a Whatcott reunion organized.  After much time spent, she and her siblings arranged for the park in Tropic to be booked and set the whole thing up for August 5th.  After our trip to California, we made a brief stop at home and then headed up to Utah to go to the reunion.

We all began gathering at the town park on the morning of the 5th, with breakfast to begin at 8am.  We had a good time quickly getting re-acquainted as we ate a light breakfast.  I saw cousins I hadn't seen in 15-20 years, like Kim, Katie, Shelly, Bonnie, Toni, and Amy.   It was great to see others that I don't see often, like Mitch and Wendy, but have seen a little more frequently.  Fortunately, as we live in the same town, I get to see Trent relatively often.  Kelly and Troy were not able to make it, which we felt bad about.

Soleil and Jesse Next to the Creek

Rhett Jumps the River

After breakfast, Mom had arranged for several activities to be available.  Some were horseback riding down by the Paria River, going to the Bryce Natural History Museum, hiking to Mossy Caves, and going on ATV rides.  Ang and I took our family to hike to Mossy Caves first.  There was a solid stream of water flowing through the creek, which made the hike nice, especially up at the waterfall.  The kids loved it, and we even had "boat" races back down to the cars after we'd reached the top.  Soleil won the boat races, having picked out the best stick.

Next we went to the Bryce Natural History Museum, up on Highway 12.  I have heard for several years that it is very well done, but just hadn't taken the time to stop.  This time we decided to do it and we were in for a treat.  Well done is a bit of an understatement.  Most of the wildlife is of the type that would be found in the US.  All exhibits are extremely well laid out with beautifully painted murals as a backdrop.  Additionally, they have an African section complete with Giraffe, lions, etc...  There are also fish and insects.  Anyone with interest in wildlife could easily spend a few hours in the museum, and even the casual wanderer is going to be very occupied for 45 minutes or more.

After this, we headed back to the park for a nice lunch.  The weather, meanwhile, was threatening to storm, but luckily held off.  After lunch, we had several activities at the park, including the Country Store, to help fund the reunion and allow us all to share things we'd made or enjoyed with others, siamese baseball, balloon missles, water balloon wars, soccer, and others.  We also took family pictures during this time.

Afterward, we had dinner and continued to visit until it was time to wind things up, with the evening culminating with a very nice slide show that was put together by Wendy.  It was nice to see all of those family members after so long and to find out how there lives had progressed over the years.