Day 55: Hello Down There

Rest Day in Capitol Reef National Park, UT — 0 mi, 0 ft

Video script:

I woke up this morning in our massive four person tent but just aarushi and I shared it since Tatiana was staying at a hotel nearby with her boyfriend, Noah, who was visiting. Looking around the campsite it seemed like I was the first one awake because my circadian clock is tuned too well. We began a very slow and gradual morning as the sunlight and heat naturally woke everyone else up. We shuffled through our snacks to see what we could have for breakfast landing on the usual chips and cookies.

This morning’s plan was for Caroline, Nate, Tatiana, Noah, and myself to go on a short hike in Capital Reef while Aarushi, Carmen, and Drew would rather treat their rest day as an actual rest day and do some dilly dallying around camp or in the main town area. We originally planned to meet up with Tatiana and Noah at 9AM at the campsite but half an hour later at 9:30 they were nowhere to be found. Since we were staying in the national park, none of us had any data to communicate updates so we just sat around and waited for a bit. I convinced everyone to play a round of BS and right before Caroline could win, Tatiana and Noah showed up at 9:45. However they didn’t show up empty handed because they managed to steal us some apples and oranges from their hotel breakfast which we all happily munched on because our random junk snacks get tiring sometimes.

Caroline, our resident national park expert (she’s been to 36 national parks), chose a 5 mile trail through the canyons called Grand Wash Trail. Since it’s a rest day we still wanted to take it easy so this was more like a stroll than a hike. The hike kind of felt like walking through a giant amusement park and the canyon crevices were our play structures. It was very beautiful and we walked the whole thing out and back. Close to the end of the hike, it began to drizzle and we were worried that all our camping gear would be getting soaked since none of us put our rain so we hurried back to the campsite. I was thinking about all my clothes and electronics being drenched when we pulled up but lo and behold, Carmen, Aarushi, and Drew had already put on all our raincovers for us which was very sweet of them.

Afterwards, Tatiana wanted to go to the pie shop on the campsite. They make the pies fresh everyday. Their usual flavors include peach, apple, cherry, mixed berry, and strawberry rhubarb. By the time we got there they only had mixed berry and cherry left so we got a mixed berry to share and a cup of homemade ice cream each. It was seriously delicious.

After the pie pit stop, we planned to take the Capital Reef scenic drive. Earlier in the morning we passed by a sign that had a meter showing the likelihood of flash flooding, it read “not expected.” The second time we passed the sign on our way to see if our tents were covered from the rain, it read “possible.” This time, on our way to begin the scenic drive, it read “probable.” We ignored it and kept driving only a few more minutes before being stopped by a park ranger who was stationed specifically to tell cars to turn around because of the flash flood warnings.

We rerouted to go back to Tatiana and Noah’s hotel in which all the rest of us were leeching off of for the shower, pool, hottub, air conditioning, power, etc. The two of them dropped us off to loiter around while they went to take a nap. We waited for Carmen, Aarushi, and Drew to come from lunch with Mr. K (our car) and traded off to drive somewhere for lunch too while the three of them loitered around the hotel. We ended up going to a very yummy Mexican restaurant and split three things three ways—we cleared everything. At 3PM, we went back to the hotel to pick up Carmen, Aarushi, and Drew to go to the local farmer’s market which we had seen signs for the night before.

We wandered every booth before sitting down to listen to the live band sing and play some songs. I bought a fresh squeezed lemonade and a zucchini bread and banana bread to split with Aarushi and Carmen.

After the market, we went back to Tatiana and Noah’s hotel where we had some time to all blog and do other miscellaneous housekeeping tasks. Around 8PM, a group of us headed to a local film festival called The Bicknell International Film Festival (BIFF) in which they meet annually to do a showing of a “bad film.” Aarushi, Carmen, and Drew had seen flyers for the film festival that morning while wandering the town and so we were intrigued. It was Tatiana, Noah, Aarushi, Carmen, and I. When we got to the theatre we bought a large popcorn to share and found our seats.

The festival started with a very enthusiastic raffle of random items like water bottles and a small box of goldfish! They one by one called ticket numbers that were associated with the tickets that they gave us at the venue entrance. I was feeling particularly lucky as they held up this small box of goldfish and to our great surprise, Carmen and I’s number was called! I jumped up in excitement to claim our prize. As we sat and waited for the movie to start we read our pamphlets. “(BIFF) celebrates the cultural icon of B movies…” “B movies now have cult status with their awful dialog, cheap plots, or overall campy style. BIFF celebrates all three!”

The chosen movie of this year was called, “Hello Down There” released in 1969. It has a 5.7 IMDb rating and a 59% on rotten tomatoes. To be honest, I thoroughly enjoyed this movie. And maybe it’s because I had extremely low expectations going into it because of the context it was being introduced to us in but I can’t remember the last time I was so engaged in a movie that was actually very silly. Everything about it was so bizarre but in a way that kind of went well together and made me laugh. The best part of the whole experience was the audience. I’ve never watched a movie in a movie theatre where you can react so freely at what you’re seeing. Every twist and turn and funny moment had the whole audience laughing together, it was just so much fun. Definitely a worthwhile experience.

After the movie, everyone shuffled over to the afterparty which was at a local bar. Unfortunately, because not all of us are 21+, we realized we couldn’t go and turned around to go back to the hotel and then the six of us (minus Tatiana and Noah), drove Mr. K back to our campsite and tucked in for the night. As I fell asleep, the movie’s soundtrack played in my head as I appreciated our rest day full of loitering and side questing.