It had been 4 years since we’ve been camping and so we were very excited to head up American Fork Canyon to Granite Flats for 2 nights camping with Kim & Kathy’s family. We had a wonderful first night—the air was clear which was so nice since we have been breathing bad air from the wildfires down South. The kids loved exploring the campsite; even Amelia did some exploring with help from Clark who helped her maneuver her walker over the bumpy rocks. For dinner we cooked dutch oven pizza and roasted some s’mores. We kept the kids up late but we all slept well in our large tent.
Tuesday morning we got up and ate a delicious blueberry pancake, sausage, and egg breakfast. We drove over to Cascade Springs and walked around the springs. We went back to the camp spot for some lunch and then played in the water at Tibble Fork Reservoir. Kathy rented a canoe and we had a great time paddling across the small reservoir. I kept thinking that it was too bad the whole Toone family couldn't come, we were having so much fun.
After swimming for a while we noticed a fire had started just over the peak of where we were at. When we got back to camp we asked the camp host about it and he said that he had just been to see the fire and there were no problems, we weren’t going to be evacuated. We went back to camp, and within 30 minutes from when we talked to the camp host sirens started to sound and we were told to grab our kids and get out, not to pack. We did grab a few things and were ready to go when Jared said “Where’s Amelia”? We found her walking around with her walker through the trees, oblivious to the haste we were in. The kids started crying saying they didn’t want to leave their tent. We headed out the canyon- most people below were not rushing out, I think we were the first to get word, but by the time we got to the bottom of the canyon there was word that the whole canyon had to be evacuated.
The latest word this morning was that the fire has not gone into the canyon and that all our camping equipment should still be there. We’ll hope that the squirrels don’t get to it before we do.
