After several months of prep, numerous southwest adventures and many appointments attended in California, we are now finally on the road making our way slowly into Alaska. Our first stop out of LA was a visit up the coast to Santa Barbara. I spent a couple of days working in Read more…
In between doctor’s visits and other family obligations while we are in southern California, we try to spend as much time in the Southwest this time of year as possible. For the last few years, we have made it a tradition to hit a few of our favorite spots and also try to see some new ones. We once again left the bustling highways of Los Angeles and headed for the dusty desert roads. This time, we started at Mojave National Preserve.
We took the same route out of Page as we did last time we were there. Going north into Utah and meander along the Arizonia/Utah border all the way to St. George, Utah. We decided to stay the night at the Walmart while the Works continued on to Las Vegas.
We made a mad dash for Page, Arizona after we left Wupatki National Monument because we knew that we would want to catch Horseshoe Bend at dusk. The last time we were there, we were running late as well and ended up catching it at just the right light. Admittedly, this is a place that is hard to get a good photo of. Almost every moment of the day will cast shadows in some part of the canyon and getting enough light to show it at dusk is always a challenge.
From Page, Arizona there are basically 2 routes out. One is to head south on Highway 89 back down to Flagstaff. We’ve been through Flagstaff several times and it is not that exciting so we chose the other route to head north west through southern Utah. As far as I am concerned, anything involving southern Utah cannot go wrong.
After we left Holbrook, we headed over towards Flagstaff, Arizona to stock up on some supplies and do some housekeeping. One of the things we noticed while living on the road is that we do not spend nearly as much money at Target as we do otherwise. Maybe Target needs to allow RV overnight parking and they will make a lot more money from us.
We are at one of our most favorite places in the entire country. Southern Utah. When we came through here in 2012, we did not get to see Zion because of the hot weather in the lower elevations. Bryce Canyon is significantly cooler but we knew that we will need to come back to Zion. Today we did.
After such an amazing time in the Tetons, we sadly parted with our friends and started to head south. This loop is winding down to the last few days before we will find ourselves back in southern California. Until then, we will try to make the best of the road between here and there.
Our time at Capitol Reef National Park has come to an end. Tomorrow is Monday and I have pushed off my work obligations as long as I can without causing any serious pain for myself and others. It has been an awesome and unexpected experience as we knew very little about it prior to our arrival.
Today is our only full day here in Capitol Reef and we have a full agenda. Yesterday we completed the girls Junior Ranger program and got their badges so today we can just have fun and do some exploring.
Our night at Wonderland RV Park was brief. In a more populated area, we would have found a place to boondock instead. But since our 3G card doesn’t work real well, we opted to pay for the night since they promised a great wifi connection. Well, the connection was less than great up until about 11PM. Once everyone went to bed, I was able to take better advantage of it.
Last night’s drive-in really pooped the girls out. They were so into the Looney Tunes, they stayed up through the whole movie and slept in until almost 10am.
