Places I have been: Arizona

I went on this family trip a few years ago so the details are fuzzy, but here are the places we visited and things we did in no particular order (since I forget).

I know we flew into Phoenix. This was exciting for me because this was around when I was reading Twilight and a lot of parts of the Phoenix airport were mentioned in the book.

Once we left the airport it was like a whole different world. There were not many trees. There was desert and cactuses. REAL cactuses in the wild, haha. I had never been somewhere this different before. And it was hot. But not humid, which was different as well. Our hotel was beautiful! I also remember being at the pool and having the wear flip flops round while walking on the deck because it was SO HOT. The pool water was not refreshing. It was wayy to warm.

One trip we took while staying in Phoenix was to Tuscan and the OK Corral. On the way back, we stopped at Saguaro National Park and looked at the scenery of all of the cactuses.

Saguaro National Park

The next place we stayed at was in Sedona. On our way there we stopped at Montezuma's Castle, a 'castle' built into the rocks.

Montezuma's Castle

With the beautiful red rocks, it was amazing a place like Sedona existed in the USA. We drove around the town then went back to our hotel because the little that was around closed early. The next day we got ready for our "Pink Jeep Tour" that would take us onto the rocks. I just couldn't get over how pretty this place was!

 It was kind of scary being on the edges of these rocks, but it was beautiful!

"Standin' on the corner in Winslow, Arizona"

As a side trip in Sedona, we visited Winslow Arizona, from the song "Take It Easy" by the Eagles. This song was playing continuously while we were here.

We also visited Meteor Crater, the site where a meteor hit the earth. It was literally IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE. There were no cactuses. Nothing. Just a small campground for campers and Meteor Crater. Things being in the middle of nowhere was a theme on this trip. Our GPS navigated us to a Dairy Queen in the middle of nowhere too. We didn't thing there would be one where we were headed, but sure enough there was one there. We got to all of these sites via historic Route 66 which was cool.

Meteor Crater

Our last major stop was in Flagstaff, Arizona near the Grand Canyon. The Grand Canyon really was Grand. It almost seemed fake from the perspective of it all. It looked like a painting.

We saw the donkeys, hiked a little bit down the trail and saw the goats! Definitely bring water if you plan on hiking! Because of the elevation, it gets warmer as you descend down the path.

On our last day, we stopped at an Observatory (I forget the name of it), another crater/Volcano and the edge of the painted desert.

Painted Desert

Crater/Volcano