Sunday June 26
We have been on the road for 2 weeks. Yesterday I calculated we had driven some 3,400 miles since we left home. We have done laundry twice, gotten groceries twice, visited some 10 states and visited 7 state or national parks or monuments. WOW. I’d hate to add up the fuel bills but we get diesel at least once a day, sometimes on travel days we fuel up twice. The good news is the kids have NOT watched all their movies yet (although Isabella loves Mrs. Doubtfire so much, she’s seen it 4 times). Today we are on the road to Arizona and the Grand Canyon. The Grand Canyon was the place we really wanted to see when we began planning this trip. We will be in Williams, AZ for 5 nights and we are excited to be staying in one spot for awhile. There is talk of having a quiet day at the camper so we can get rested, use the pool, get groceries, and possibly just see a movie. We have yet to have a campfire and I doubt AZ will allow fires now but the girls would still like to make smores one night with the grill coals.
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| Isabella at Glen Canyon Dam |
The drive through Utah is more canyons, mesa and buttes. Remember that steep and winding road we were on yesterday? The one Scott was glad we didn't have to haul the camper on? Guess which road we hauled the camper on...
As we near the Arizona border we notice a huge lake in the distance. This turns out to be Powell Lake and we notice a huge increase in boats being hauled in the middle of the desert. Sure enough there is a marina there. This area turns out to be Glen Canyon National Recreation Area with a dam and power plant. We stop and take a look around the visitor center with a small museum. The girls don’t bring their passports but there are stamps here- a total of 4 which Isabella puts on small pieces of paper so she can tape them into her book. It is about 100 degrees out so nobody wants to go back to the parking lot to get them. Scott would love to take a tour of the dam (we plan to stop at Hoover Dam) but it is already past lunch time and there is a wait. Here we notice that the clocks are an hour behind ours and we reset everything to 3 hours behind NH time (Arizona is in the Mountain timezone, but does not observe Daylight Saving Time).
Can you guess what Isabella is standing in front of in the above picture? Leave your guess in the comments, and we'll post the answer in a few days. Click the picture for a bigger version.
Driving through Northern Arizona is exactly as I pictured it: sparse with no vegetation, sand and a few abandoned homes. Periodically there is a Native American “flea market” beside the road where they are selling jewelry or beef jerky. Hard way to make a living in the heat, which at this point spikes above 100. The wind picks up and we really feel it pushing the camper around. In the distance you can see the sand being blown and it looks like a hazy day when its really sand. We see a little bit of tumbleweed blowing too. The soil is very dark and I comment how boring the scenery really is. Then we come to to a National Forest and there are a lot more trees, although only 6-10 ft tall. From here the landscape changes a lot and is more green.
We arrive at the Williams/Grand Canyon KOA around 5:45pm. The temperature is only about 84 and there is s constant strong breeze blowing. It is very pleasant, but very dry. [There are wildfires burning in much of Eastern Arizona, and there is a total outdoor fire ban in this county, so no campfires here.] I notice immediately that all I seem to smell is desert sand. The campground looks fairly new and is very spacious (as KOA campground go). We are about 5 miles off the highway and it is very quiet here- no trains, no highways. In fact, while we were up late, we heard owls in the distance. The sky is incredible with no lights and big open area. We dropped our reservations from 5 nights to only 3 so we can plan what we really want to do at the Grand Canyon. The girls and I hope to go on the Skywalk (a glass walkway overlooking the canyon) but I’m not sure where it is. The north rim is about 250 miles from here so we need to decide if we need to go there or not.
Scott discovered that either the bumps or the desert crosswind has broken the shock on the Companion 5th wheel hitch. It's probably not a big deal: We didn't notice any big difference and we can probably get by without it, but he'll try to get a replacement in the morning.
We have dinner and play States and Capital Sequence again tonight. It is a lot of fun and relaxing to end the day this way. We decide to have a lazy morning and then run errands around Williams. The girls are very tired from long days of touring around Utah and then a long travel day. For some reason they do not seem too keen on sleeping while riding in the truck. I dozed a few times on the ride to Arizona but really try not to sleep while Scott is driving. We decide to skip the North Rim altogether (it's too far for a day trip but it's not really worth moving the camper, and the Skywalk is on the South rim).
The temperatures during the night get down to the high 40s and we actually get too cold and have to shut the windows. But first thing in the morning with the sun beating down, we feel the heat building in the camper already.
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