New foods: So far I have tried at least 6 new foods. I had foie gras, pig heart, chicken pate, shrimp and grits, Colorado sea bass, and moussaka. The goal was one new food a week and it has been 5 weeks. That means I am doing better than my goal! Hooray! It's been so much fun to try things. I don't always like what I'm trying, but the adventure of putting unknown things in my mouth is exciting. Actually, most of what I have tried has been pretty good. I'm not big on the animal organs, but the pig heart was the easiest to down. The foie gras I had was not very good at all. It was so super fatty that it was almost slimy in my mouth. Yuck. The chicken pate was alright, but definitely not my favorite. The shrimp, bass, and moussaka were my favorites by far.
Along with all the new food I've been trying, I also had the opportunity to eat some amazing food in the past few weeks. A couple of weeks ago Mr. Darcy and I went on a road trip through the southwestern states. Once we hit New Mexico I was in food heaven. I filled up on as much good Mexican food as I could while I was there. The one bad food experience we had was attempting to eat Thai food in a small New Mexico town. That was definitely not a good experience. In our defense, the restaurant came highly recommended by a local person. I guess a good general rule of thumb, though, is to not eat Thai food in the middle of the New Mexico desert.
New adventures: I've had several firsts in the past 5 weeks as well. I went to my first soccer game of any kind. A friend of ours came to visit and the three of us went to a Colorado Rapids game. We had fantastic seats right behind the Rapids' team bench. I loved it! The game was so much fun to watch and it was great to experience the fan culture of professional soccer.
The next thing I did was go on a road trip with Mr. Darcy. We have driven a few places together, but never for more than 9 or 10 hours and never stopping along the way to see things. This was truly our first road trip together. We stopped in New Mexico and saw White Sands and then stopped in Las Cruces for some amazing Mexican food at La Posta on Cinco de Mayo. It was fabulous! We almost didn't want to leave.
The next place we headed was Arizona to visit my family and see several of our friends. It was fun to catch up with everyone and we got to meet my nephew for the first time. There wasn't much in the way of adventures in Tucson, but we will be back for that very soon.
Then we headed to Nevada to pick up our friend from the Las Vegas airport. After getting him we headed to the Valley of Fire. This place was amazing! The rock formations were so strange but beautiful. There is a section in the park that has rock formations with strips of colors in them. Our friend said their were some structures that look like bacon and we kept looking for the "bacon rock". Sadly, we couldn't see it from the road and weren't prepared to hike, so we left it for next time. While in the Valley of Fire we did a short hike to see what is referred to as Mouse's Tank. Along the trail you can see several petroglyphs left by the native peoples more than a hundred years ago. You can also see more of the amazing rock formations that the valley is known for. It was beautiful.
After we left Nevada, we headed for St. George Utah to spend 2 days in Zion National Park. The park was absolutely incredible. Everywhere you look there are breathtaking vistas. This one was taken from a lookout spot on one of our hikes.
We did a total of 3 hikes while we were there. The first one was Angels Landing, which was a super crazy one. I didn't think I could do it, but Mr. Darcy and our friend helped me. I was so scared, I didn't think I was going to make it to the top, but I did! I made it to the top and back down. Along the way people kept cheering me on and helping me when I needed it. I cried when I reached the bottom. I am horribly afraid of heights and I felt like I was going to die on that hike. Being able to complete it was truly an accomplishment for me. Here's a picture of the trail we took to the top.
The next day we hiked the narrows of the Virgin River. That was a grueling hikes as well, but not nearly as scary. The most hilarious part was when Mr. Darcy and our friend hurled me up onto a rock, much like you would throw a football. We were trying to avoid a section of the river that we feared would be to deep to wade in, and were picking out a trail through the rocks that line the river. I couldn't pull myself up onto this one massive boulder, so the guys helped me out, lol. I don't think I want to repeat that, but it was pretty funny. We returned home from Zion very sore and tired, but happy for the adventure. It was a great reset for heading back to work. Here's a picture of us in the Virgin River narrows.
I haven't had any real adventures in the past two weeks, so I suppose it's about time to get started on one. The summer is looking like a great opportunity to try new things and I am excited to see what will happen. It's funny, but I didn't realize how much growing I would do in the process of trying new things. I know the purpose was to grow, but I didn't realize how much I would grow. I feel like the past month has such a time of change and transitioning for me. There has been a lot of self reflecting and a lot of learning. I feel like I have matured some and I am on the path to maturing more. I'm much more focused, but I'm also much more open to possibilities and new things. So, perhaps this quest is turning out to be exactly what it was intended to be. That would be good, indeed. :)
