Blogs from Arizona, United States, North America - page 16

Mom: Long day. We got up early and were sad to leave our beautiful place in Hollywood Hills, but the adventure was about to begin. I personally was rather happy to finally get out of the crazy L.A. traffic. We set Waze with our destination and followed where it led. Went north a good bit first, then eventually wound up on I-40. I told Justin we could technically now shut off all GPS tracking, as all we need to do is follow 40 home. This was our longest leg. About 7 hours to Flagstaff. Beautiful drive! The traffic and mountains gave way to more mountains and scrubby bushes. A few things were different than my expectations: I thought the mountains would give way faster, but we were in mountains pretty much all day today. Beautiful!! I ... read more

Day 12 Mammoth to Young Leaving Mammoth our route started just off the main road in the middle of town. Onto single track gravel straight away with a bit everything. Sand, rocks, switchbacks & a washed out culvert with logs in it, This caught me out by approaching it too tentatively but no harm done. This Trail continued for a total of 24kms before we rode into Globe on seal It wasn’t until we were having a coffee & studying our maps in a Taco Bell we realised we had missed an expert section of the route over Pioneer Pass. Never mind that’s life. Out of Globe we were soon into an section rated expert by the BDR. It was rocky, sandy and challenging but an enjoyable ride with spectacular views from our elevation of 1700m. ... read more

We started the day at IHOP. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day - right? And Donald loves IHOP. It had only 2 other customers in there so service was quick. With our bellies full, we headed back towards I10 which took us by the aircraft boneyard again. This time we saw the other side of the boneyard which we somehow totally missed yesterday. I guess we were too busy looking at all the planes, that we never looked the other direction. We travelled along I10 for a bit and saw a sign that stated El Paso 300 miles. I tried to block it from Donald’s view for that was our end destination for the day and reading 300 miles just makes it seem so far away. But my efforts were ignored and reality ... read more

Waking up to another Blue bird day, we headed to Page, AZ. This was another long travel day. As we left the Moab area, the topography changed markedly. The cliffs and buttes gave way to immense prairies and rolling hills, with the mountains far off in the distance. Lots of cattle ranching in this area. After miles of this scenery, we finally approached Monument Valley. This is an Apache Tribal park, and displays a first hand look at one of the most tremendous natural structures created by erosion. The absorbant sandstone holds underground aquifers which give moisture to crops and adequate grazing for livestock. The Navajo reservation covers one third of the 130,000 square mile Colorado plateau. After checking out the visitor's center and talking to the photo-op Indian at the overlook, we headed out for ... read more

We started our day with breakfast at a local eatery called Camaleons. The food was great and the waitress was delightful!! When I travel I like to stay away from chain restaurants if possible. I always research or ask about local eateries! After breakfast it was off to the Painted Desert and the Petrified Forest. The Painted is so named because of the beautiful colors. It starts out with the browns, reds, and oranges then turns to the blues and grays. As you drive further southwest you run into the Petrified Forest. The petrified forest is full of archaeological digs, fossils, ancient petrified wood, petroglyphs, and Pueblo dwellings. It was beautiful!! Next stop was Four Corners. Four Corners Monument is the only place in the United States where four states intersect: Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and ... read more