Arizona

We left on a Saturday morning to arrive in Phoenix early afternoon. We picked up our rental car and headed toward the Grand Canyon. On the way out of Phoenix the landscape changes from developed land to desert type land and full of very tall cactus. It took us about 5 hours to reach the East Rim Drive. We stopped at the Little Colorado Scenic Overlook to take in the small canyon. We were excited about what lay ahead. That day happened to be National Parks Day so we got into the park for free. Our first stop was Desert Point. We walked to the overlook and took in the grandeur of the canyon. It was spectacular! No picture can ever show you how beautiful it really is. We were expecting a crowd because all the information we gathered told us to expect huge crowds. Well, they were wrong. It wasn't crowded at all. As a matter of fact there weren't very many people around. That was fine with us.

We climbed up the Watchtower, got an ice cream cone, saw huge birds, little bunny rabbits, and a few lizards. We then drove along East Rim Drive to Navajo Point. We were the only ones there. It was nice having the view all to ourselves. We read that one of the places to watch the sunset was Lipan Point and that was our next stop. We picked out the best rock to sit on, brought our water and the camera. We were ready. While we were waiting we saw a lizard that did the funniest thing. It was doing pushups. I kid you not! Gave us a good laugh. We also saw a couple of rock squirrel. They are smaller than a squirrel but bigger than a chipmunk. The sun was finally going down and the colors on the canyon walls changed. It was a very nice show and hard to catch on film.

We drove to Maswik Lodge and checked in. When we got to our room it was like an oven. Carol called the front desk and the desk clerk told her that they don't have air-conditioning in any of the rooms. We couldn't believe it! As hot as it gets there and they don't have AC. We'll never stay there again. It was almost too hot to sleep.

The next day we hiked between Yavapai and Mather Points. At Yavapai Station you can see Phantom Ranch which is a two-day trip by mule. Who knows, maybe we'll do that someday. We made stops at Grand View and Moran Points. No matter how many pictures you get of the Canyon, they won't show the true dimensions and beauty of it all.

Believe it or not, we drove to the Petrified Forest and Painted Desert after we left the Canyon. Carol slept most of the way there. It was mostly flat desert anyway so she didn't miss anything. We did a little hiking in the Petrified Forest and marveled at what used to be wood, which is now rock, but pretty colored rock. We arrived at the Sedona Hilton around 8pm that evening and were too tired to venture out to look for a good restaurant so we ate at the hotel.

We woke up and stepped out to the patio and had a magnificent view of Bell Rock. That's exactly where we headed after breakfast. We found a place to pull off the road so we could hike to Bell Rock. The trail is pretty well marked and we made it up half way. Sarah climbed higher than Carol. Carol is way out of shape to be climbing around like a mountain goat. Since Bell Rock is one of the vortex locations we decided to try to feel the energy. There we were, in the middle of this rock doing the moves to feel the energy. I'm glad no one was around to witness this except the cars on the highway and I doubt they could see us clearly.

We then drove to Cathedral Rock - another vortex area. We also hiked this rock. Sarah made it to the top and Carol was about 6 feet from the top but it was practically straight up and she couldn't muster up enough energy to climb. It was a great view from where we were and would have been perfect if not for the construction crews building new subdivisions or whatever in the distance. We expected more people around but we only ran into 2 people on the way up and 2 people on the way down. The reason - only crazy people like us hike in such hot weather! It felt good to get back into the air-conditioned car.

We drove the Red Rock Loop and then through Oak Creek Canyon. We went to Montezuma Castle, which is a 600 year old, 5-story cliff dwelling that the prehistoric Sinagua Indians dwelled in. After that we drove to Jerome, which used to be a copper mining town. We ate dinner at the Haunted Hamburger, a rustic place with excellent views and good food.

On the way back to Phoenix, we saw a coyote. Pretty cool since neither one of us had ever seen a wild coyote. Again, Carol slept until we got to Phoenix. Despite having only two days, we saw an awful lot. We drove a total of 940 miles, saw dramatic changes in the landscape, beautiful sunsets, and drank about 15 bottles of water, and I'm not talking little bottles either. The speed limit is 75mph, oh how wonderful it was to drive that fast legally. There's plenty more to see and do so we'll go back.