Home Again...

The travellers have returned from their summer jaunt. We deposited our eldest at Philmont Scout Ranch in New Mexico (where he had a fantastic time) and took off on our week long exploration of New Mexico and Arizona. Here are just a few highlights.

We rented this RV, which we affectionately called the "Desert Buggy." 25' long and slept five, but two adults and a twelve year old filled it to the brim, imho. We put 1,400 rattling miles on it over the course of the week, spending no more than 2 nights in any one place.

One of our first stops was the Painted Desert and Petrified Forest. Gorgeous and fascinating! We were there at noon, so the sun was very bright and the colors were not their richest. I would love to see it at sunset.


The Painted Desert and Petrified Forest are connected by a 28 mile National Park road. The road has many stops of great interest. One I found most intriguing was Newpaper Rock. I would love to have been a fly on the wall when the ancient petroglyphs were etched in the rocks.
http://www.scienceviews.com/indian/newspaper.html I was fascinated by the Kokopelli petroglyph and later found some Kokopelli fabric at a quilt shop. Now I can quilt myself a momento of our trip.

On to Giant Logs. The petrified logs seemingly just lying around are truly amazing! One can only say, "Wow" so much.


Later that day, we drove to Grand Canyon Village on the South Rim to the RV Park. Just before bed, a woman knocked on our door, "Yoohoo, can you help me?" I open the door to see a large woman in a mumu with a white cockatoo on her shoulder. Seems she as driven her Tahoe towing a very large trailer the wrong way down our road and was stuck, in the dark. My husband was trying to help her back it up (perhaps driving with a cockatoo on your shoulder inhibits your rear view, or was it that she had no back up lights or large enough mirrors?) The helpful next door neighbor was a trucker who finally squared her away. Whew! You just can't make up stuff like that.

The Village is wonderfully set up with shuttle buses everywhere, no need to drive again. Next day, we hiked the South Kaibab trail in the canyon to Ooh Aah Point. We thoroughly oohed and aahed and took a million photos. I loved this plant growing through the rock in a shady spot on our way down.

We went back to Yaki Point for sunset. There isn't a photo in the world that can begin to capture the beauty of the Grand Canyon. My recurrent thought was, "Yay God!"


Hunky Man taking in the beauty. While I was focusing this shot, we heard a rustle in the shrubs beside us and three very large elk emerged to nibble the junipers. I'm 6 ft. from the canyon's edge and the elk are about 15 ft. from me. Wow! And all Bob could say was, "Forget the elk Babe, take my picture, the light is just right!" Funny.
Sunset at the Grand Canyon was breathtaking. We loved it so much we were back at 5 a.m. for sunrise. Encore!
And finally, a photo only a 12 yr. old would take. Love the body language in this one! This was while we were trying to figure out how to dump the tank of the RV for the first time. (The photographer was giggling his head off.) A few minutes earlier, I was laughing so hard I could barely take a picture. To make matters worse, a young couple in an ancient compact car held together with duct tape was driving back and forth laughing at us. I was tempted to yell, "Yeah, well you're driving the real rolling terd!" but I held my tongue. If I was a young kid, I would have thought the family in the 1-800-RV4-RENT ride trying to dump the load out would have been pretty hilarious!

Cheers,
Donna