Last Entry?

When we left Albuquerque we decided to skip by Santa Fe and go straight to Taos. We wanted to see the town and the ski mountain. We got to see both. The town of Taos was filled with stores and very pricey galleries. We both really wanted to buy a southwestern picture but they were out of our price range and very few prints to choose from. Disappointing. The mountains leading to the ski mountain were beautiful. Check out the next photo - we saw little of the trails - leave it to your imagination!




We did discover the Rio Grande Gorge park and took 2 good hikes there. I quit early on the second one and headed back to the car since we were hiking an open trail with no escape from the blistering sun. But Ken persevered on, my hero! We also met up with another tarantula, not as big as the ones we saw in Zion but still fuzzy and ugly and scary!

Great plants still flowering.


Can you see part of the trail behind me that we took up?



The mighty Rio Grande Gorge




Today we are in Salida, CO, a pretty town. Tomorrow we'll head to Golden.

So our final note will be about our drive up to Monarch Pass. We left in the sun, then it started to rain and by the time we got to the pass it was snowing, temperature at 32 and we're at an elevation of over 13,000' seeing nothing of the Continental Divide.

Ken's parting shot - (yes, he is still in shorts!)



it's been a great trip. We fly back next Tuesday. Looking forward to catching up with everyone in person.

j/k

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Albuquerque, New Mexico

Today was a fun day in the city. We started off by having free pancakes at our campground (yummy) and then drove to the Petroglyphs National Monument. There were 1000s of petroglyphs dating from 1000 BC to 1700 AD. They were all etched into the black basalt from the lava flows from the 5 volcanos that had erupted here. The outside is all black and when they etched below the surface it exposed the white stone below. No one knows why the Ancestral Pueblos left these pictures. Some believe that the lava rocks were considered sacred, others believe that it was a trade route. But the pictures are not where they lived. Ken's opinion is that they were bored. Leave it to Ken to come up with such an observation! But there were a plethora of graphics and I am pleased to report that Danny Loves Ann Chavez (dully noted in a more recent etching!)



Once again it was very, very hot in the sun. After lunch we explored Old Albuquerque. It was very nice, but not as extensive as Santa Fe which was a favorite from last year's trip. But we did manage to find a nice watering hole and both experienced our first Frozen Margaritas, which were delicious. Ken says that he could have stayed there all evening. But I drove him home to our Casita.







Must add that the Pueblo style adobe homes are really nice and look so wonderful in this environment. Ken is especially fond of the pebble lawns. Some are even green pebbles (yucky looking) but when you see grass it is so out of place. Another observation is that the highway overpasses are nicely painted and often with a southwestern motif. Even the landscaping is very southwestern. All very attractive. Could get use to these places (but never in the summer heat!)


Tomorrow we will take a scenic drive between Albuquerque and Santa Fe and probably spend the night in Santa Fe before going to Taos on Sunday.

Hope you are all well. We are missing everyone but not quite ready to come home yet. We have even started talking about our next adventure.

j/k

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Phoenix and more

Our drive from the South Rim took us through Sedona, what a beautiful place. I wish that we could have spent more time there but we were pulling the Casita and the roads were narrow and it was very, very hot.

One shot of Sedona




So we moved on to Phoenix (really Sun City) to spend a couple of days with my sister, Mary Jo. We got to meet many of her friends who were all very welcoming and a lot of fun. And we did city things. We went to a brand new music museum. It was wonderful. We were there over 3 hours and only made it through 2 continents. They gave us head phones and you would stop anyplace where there was a white box and music would play, from a particular place or time or a particular instrument. The collection is huge and there was more than you could see and hear. I only wish that there were a few more places to sit down. One of my favorite spots was where they showed how a Steinway piano is made (in the USA!) Did you know that Stevie Nicks was from Phoenix as well as Alice Cooper?

And so much great country, as in Duane Eddy's guitar below.



Our next stop on Tuesday was to go to Frank Lloyd Wright's home,Taliesin West in Scottsdale. What a day to forget our camera. The house and school were just amazing, how everything was built to flow right out of the desert. When he started this home there was nothing there, they lived in tents in the desert open to nature (as in snakes, lizards,etc!). His apprentices did all the work - moving the rocks, cutting the rocks, hauling this and that and he did the design and watched it evolve. There is still a school there with only 35 students and the first year they have to live outside in tents as the early apprentices had to do. But the space was just amazing.

Phoenix is HOT! When we left this morning the radio said that it was going to reach 104 (yesterday it was 102 degrees when we were exploring Frank's house!).

The sisters


So off we went to the Petrified Forest. And you probably know the science of how this all happened - the trees fall down, they float down the river, get water logged, sink to the bottom, get covered with sand and ash from the volcanoes (a key ingredient), get pushed up in time out of the water (still covered with all that ash and no oxygen getting in) and voila!, the wood turns to stone but what beautiful stone. So beautiful that over the years people have carted it away and turned it into jewelry, etc and tons of it are gone. The park receives packages every year with the rocks being returned with a letter saying how sorry they were for taking what they were not suppose to take. We resisted and took nothing but there were some real beauties.
And some amazing petroglyphs too!
















Time to turn in for the night. We leave tomorrow for New Mexico to see what we can see. We've been on the road for 4 weeks and it is going by much too fast. We leave for Maine in 13 days!

Hope you are all well and we miss you all!

j/k
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The Grand Canyon - South Rim

It will be impossible for me to convey in words or with photos the beauty and grandeur of the Grand Canyon. The views just take your breathe away, and this happens over and over again. We walked over 5 miles along mthe rim, and found that if we just moved a bit beyond the bus shuttle stop we were able to get away from the crowds, and what crowds there were. The last time I was here was in January and no one was here, not the case this time. So many buses, so many cars, so much lodging, you really have to work at it to get away from the crowds and we did. Plus the variety of languages that we heard. English was definitely the minority. It always amazes me how many people from away come to the USA to travel. Ken says that there are 4 million people a year who come to the Grand Canyon - amazing.








When we woke up yesterday it was very cold. We bundled up and headed for the shower facility in the car. I turned on the seat warmer - pure heaven. When we got to the shower facility there were 3 elk between us and the door, one was a very large and beautiful male with a full rack. Ken said to just walk on by it since he was interested in the green grass, but I waited for him to move over instead. That was the first of many sightings, the elk and mule deer were everywhere. We even had a condor fly right in front of our bus. They are the ugliest bird, our eagle is much better to look at.




On one of our walks we met a lovely older woman walking alone. We walked with her for a spell and she told us that she was from Tuscon and came back to the Canyon every year. She was a patron of the Canyon and every year artists come and paint for a week. The paintings are auctioned off and the money is used to support the Canyon. She had purchased more than one painting the night before. She also told us about the Trail of Time. We went there for our afternoon walk. It started at the present and had markers on the ground counting back 2 billion years, which is when the Grand Canyon began it's formation. Along the walk were samples of rocks dating to that point in time with a rock sample from the Canyon. The rocks were beautiful - granites, limestones, sandstones and rocks that we had never heard of. Two miles later we had covered 2 billion years in the story of the formation of the Canyon, and over our right shoulder the entire way was the view of the Canyon. A wonderful way to end our visit here.






I must add that we were quite take with all of the flowers that we saw - yellows, purples, reds, oranges and white. Of course I forgot to take a picture of them but they were beautiful!

I am late getting this update posted. We have already been toPhoenix and are moving on but I will update you on all of this soon.

Hope you are all well. Only 2 weeks left on this adventure. It is going by much too fast!

j/k
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On the road from Vegas

We left Vegas early this morning and started toward the South Rim of the Grand Canyon.

Vegas was a definite experience - so many people, so much concrete and so much heat. A real sensory rich spot!

We walked until our calves ached checking out the lobbies at each of the casinos. We are lobbied out! The decor from one to the next is just richer and more over the edge. But Wynn was definitely our favorite - beautiful fresh flowers and gorgeous marble floors, wonderful restaurants (at least they seemed to be from reading the menus).
Pics from the Wynn lobby










And there must be a pic from the Bellagio - amazing glass work!




But the best of all was going to see The Beatles at Cirque de Soleil. Ninety minutes of amazing joy, wonderment and thrills. It was worth the trip to Vegas just to see this show. I've wanted to see a Cirque de Soleil show for years. Ken thinks that this will satisfy me, but little does he know that I'm already thinking about going to another one!

We did stop to see the Hoover Dam but we missed the turn that would have let us walk out onto the new bridge, will have to save that for another trip.

Nothing special about this drive - lots of open space, few cattle and even fewer homes. Signs for average sales, only $795/acre, a real deal!

We will be at the Grand Canyon South Rim until Sunday. We are camping in the Park and will be without electricity again, and probably no Internet or cell coverage again.

Will be in touch again whence get to my sister's in Phoenix.

Hope this funds you all well and happy!

j/k

Didn't get to post this until Saturday - sorry!

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Zion National Park

Hello Everyone!

We have been in Zion since Sunday. The geology here is different from what we have seen before. Instead of being on the top of the plateau or Mesa as we were at the North Rim and at Canyon de Chelly, we are pretty much in the canyon looking up at these magnificent 'mountains' of sandstone, limestone and other rock. The colors are beautiful and the shapes are so intriguing. Of course those religious folk were the first ones here and most of the peaks have a religious leaning. Here 3 neighboring peaks are Abraham, Issac and Jacob, whereas in Arches National Park, 3 neighboring peaks were called The Gossips!

The 3 Men



The view from our campground is really amazing. The shuttle bus is right outside on the street and we can pretty much go wherever by shuttle or foot. We also saw our first 2 tarantulas (not a warm and fuzzy feeling), deer on the side of the road and 1 in the brush that looked like a statue but it did move, and a lizard with a grasshopper in it's mouth (with the legs of the grasshopper frantically moving!).




Views from our campground




Yesterday we did the drive over to the East side of the park. Once again the views were spectacular but different. The following is a picture of Checkerboard Peak on the East side.



Started this blog 2 days ago but will finally get it off today. We are all packed up and ready to head to Vegas. The finger tips are twitching, hmm, how long will it take to lose my $20!

A few parting shots of Zion, so hard to decide which ones to include.

















As we drive this morning we are listening to the news about the attack in Libya. We keep in mind those men and women who face every day the duty of defending our freedom.

We hope that you are all well and we send you all our love.

J/K
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North Rim Grand Canyon

We have been at the Grand Canyon since Thursday. This is a first for Ken and we are both impressed. The campground in the park is very nice, mostly tenters, no electricity but the gas is fueling the refrig and the headlamps are great for reading. Jeff lent us a great lamp that gives lots of light.

The view from the North Rim. Impossible to capture the colors with the haze and the smog.



Yesterday we woke up to clouds and the morning got progressively worse (great thunder and pouring rain) but we were scheduled to go into the canyon on a mule ride. And we did it! We were drenched but then it pretty much stopped raining. We met hikers in the canyon who had come over from the South Rim, camped there and then continued across the Canyon and up the trail to the North Rim! Pretty rugged. I was glad to do what we did on the back of a mule.

The view on the way down and both of us with our mules! Can you see the trail below?











Today turned out to be a gift of a day. After taking a short hike from the campground to the lodge, we were eating lunch back at the Casita and a couple stopped to talk. They told us about Marble Point outside the park but in the National Forest. We decided to try to find it. What a ride! All dirt road, thank goodness for the Expedition. We ended up on the Kaibab Plateau and what a view back toward the route that we took from Canyon de Chelly. We were above the beautiful Vermillion Cliffs, we could see for miles. There were people dry camping there and views were unbelievable. Again, the camera just does not do it justice. Anyone coming out this way, must go to this place.



But the best was yet to come. We finally made it to Marble Pt and met a group of Conservation Corp young people. They work on the trails and they work HARD! The view was good (not as good as the previous plateau) but then we saw this road with an open view at the end and we walked down. What an amazing sight. We walked over to a cairn and behind it was an army surplus ammunition box. Inside was a notebook and photos. A couple had married at this point. The young bride looked resplendent in her gown and they looked so happy. But 6 years later she died while backpacking in the Grand Canyon. Her husband had a memorial at the same place and left the memory box along with their story. But his message was an uplifting one. It was to enjoy every day and to listen to those that you love.








So that's the ending for this entry. It has been a wonderful visit here at the North Rim. Tomorrow we head to Zion National Park but first we need to stop at Jacob Lake for breakfast. Two very nice (older) women from Ottawa told us that the breakfast there was great, as they munched on the cookies that they bought there this morning and now it was 5 pm and they had no idea where they were sleeping tonight! That's living on the edge.

The view where we met the ladies from Ottawa



Hope you are all well and enjoying the bounty from your gardens. And I hope that Jeff is freezing my tomatoes (he did extract 2 large bottles of honey from my bees), thank you Jeff.

J/K

Happy Anniversary Seth and Hope!


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Canyon de Chelly

Welcome to Canyon de Chelly




Today was an interesting day checking out this area. We started the day by driving along the North Rim of this National Monument stopping to walk to several overlooks. At almost every stop there were Native Navajos selling their art. But one young man was playing his flute. We realized after talking with him that he was the person playing his flute last night at sunset and this morning at sunrise in our campground. He explained all of the symbols on
the folk art and talked about his heritage. Of course we bought his CD, plus a necklace that his girlfriend had made. It is from the juniper tree berries. We have seen many natives collecting them along the road. Their necklaces and earrings are really beautiful and it is very hard not to keep buying.
We decided not to take a hiking tour but to take a jeep tour instead and what a wonderful decision that was. We hired Howard who owns the campground we are staying at. We were in the Canyon for 4 hours! We saw more cliff dwellings than I could count and many petroglyphs, but the best part was listening to Howard talk. He was born here and remembers the Canyon as a very different place growing up and playing in it. His family owns land in the Canyon and he took us there. On the cliff were the remains of a 7 story dwelling that was destroyed when the overhang collapsed when he grandfather was 18 years old. He also wove into his stories the history of his people going back to the Athabaskans going back to the First Nation People of Canada. He said that the language is very similar and having just returned from a trip to Alaska where they joined a gathering of First Nation People, he also found similarities in both their language and beliefs. It was a good day.
So many wonderful pictures that it is hard to decide which ones to send!
They built their dwellings not only on the cliffs but also in the canyon.








Our guide Howard at his ancestral land. The second picture shows the remains of the rock walls used in the terracing gardening. Most of the gardening area is now covered by the collapse.








This is the view that Howard woke up to every morning as a kid - not bad!




We asked Howard about water because we noticed that everyone has to haul water, there is no water in the Canyon and none on the South Rim where our campground is. Howard said that he remembers water in the Canyon but then 'they wanted a fishing lake' and built a dam which diverted the water from the Canyon. Hmm, I wonder who 'they' are???
This Canyon and the surrounding area is rich in Native American history, a really worthwhile adventure. It is very different from Mesa Verde, much larger in area and with more dwellings, but you also feel like you are on a reservation. The town of Chenle that borders the Monument is not a prosperous one and you have to wonder what people do for jobs. Howard said that very few of their youth leave the reservation.
Tomorrow we will drive through the Hopi Reservation on our way to an overnight at Tuba City, also in the Hopi Reservation. We need a campground with electricity and hot showers. The we head to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon for 4 nights camping in the Park.
We are very hot by day but cool at night. The Casita has served us well with no electricity. The fridge is running off propane and doing just fine.
We probably will have no internet at the Grand Canyon so we won't be in touch again for several days.
We hope that you are all well and enjoying the local apples!
j/k
From the bottom of the canyon to the top




Sunset at Spider Rock Campground




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