Greetings from Hot Springs, Arkansas! The eastward push has begun. Then end is near. Fortunately it is has been an amazing trip. Since the last post Alicia and I shopped in Vegas, paid too much for a mediocre buffet and just all around spent way too much in Las Vegas. It was all really fun though, just really, really expensive. Wednesday morning we got up and drove down the strip to see all of the casinos before heading northeast into Utah. Southern Utah is very beautiful. We escaped the barren wasteland and 115 degree scorching heat of Nevada for trees (we hadn't seen those since Sunday) and temperatures under 90 degrees (ditto). We first drove through Zion National Park, which had beautiful reddish rock formations. We were through the park in less than two hours but like practically every other park, was incredibly gorgeous. After another two hour drive we reached our nightly destination of Bryce Canyon. Unfortunately we arrived about 30 minutes too late as we couldn't find a campsite. Fortunately there was a RV park/campground just outside the park. It was more spacious and less cramped than the National Park was anyway. Just a few Europeans were camping nearby. The RV park on the other hand was filled. With Americans, mostly. One thing we've noticed on this trip is that most of the National Parks are filled with Europeans. There really hasn't been a whole lot of Americans out there, espeically any our age. All of the Americans have been old or with kids.
The next morning we woke got up and went back to Bryce Canyon. The canyon area was truly breathtaking. The canyon is made up of hoodoos which are stone spires and formations. It looked like a red castle city made out of rocks. Also very hard to describe. After Bryce we headed south to Flagstaff, Arizona for two nights with my Aunt Nancy and Uncle Larry. After four weeks on the road it was nice to see some familiar faces. After eating lunch and catching up for a bit we took a walk on the urban trail to a pond and then around the neighborhood. To celebrate our engagement, Nancy and Larry took us out to Buster's for seafood and steak. The next morning we walked downtown and saw Nancy's vintage clothing store, Incahoots. We were also on a quest for a southwestern nativity scene for my mother. We were told to find one we wanted to inherit. We had no luck in Flagstaff, but I did have a delicious burrito at the Lumberyard. That afternoon Alicia and I went down to Sedona. No luck finding a nativity scene down there either. The one we did find cost $525. That evening we came back for some presumably organic pizza before presenting a 2 hour, 2500 picutre slideshow of our trip. And that was from only one of three cameras.
The whole time we were in Flagstaff all we heard about was the impending monsoons. It apparently hadn't rained there in three months. After two days of lightning, drizzle and hope, the monsoon finally arrived just as we were leaving on Friday. I'm sure there was much rejoicing.
Unfortunately Flagstaff meant that we had to head east for real. We drove through the monsoon, but did not stand on a corner in Winslow, Arizona (I hate the Eagles). We stopped at an indian store and found a southwestern nativity scenes for $800. I saw another scene that was intricately beaded by the Hopi tribe. I didn't see a price tag on that one, but I could only assume it was even more expensive. The beaded one was absolutely beautiful. We stopped for lunch in Gallup, New Mexico at a Mexican Restaurant. The food was good, but about every three minutes a Native American came in carrying some kind of art or craft and went from table to table. No less than twelve came in while we were there. After lunch we continued east before arriving in Alburquerque, NM. We went to the old town to continue the search for the southwestern nativity scene for my mom. We actually found some in the $30 range, but they were made by Peruvians. Peruvians are indians, technically, but Peru is more midwest South America than southwest South America so we passed. I will not be inheriting a southwestern nativity scene. We drove on for two more hours to Tucumcari, NM.
Sunday morning we got up headed east with a destination of Corinth, Texas to stay with Alicia's friends, the Uridales. After visiting the Cadillac Ranch near Amarillo, Alicia was pulled over for going 75 in a 70. She was given a warning. The highway cop made it seem like he was doing us a favor by stopping us because the city cops don't give out warnings, but all it did was waste 10 minutes of our day. Around 6 we finally made it to Corinth, the land of French Bulldogs. One dog was about to pop. This morning she had 7 puppies by C-section. Not at the house. They were really cute, though. Smaller than a Guinea Pig. We left around 3 and made it Hot Springs, AR by 8. We're staying in the Romance Literature room at the B Inn a bed & breakfastesque motel. We have about 500 or so romance novels in our room. I also took a shower in the smallest shower ever. It as literally 2.5 by 3 feet and the shower head came to about my chest. I think I got all the soap off.
Tomorrow we take a bath in the hot springs and then drive as far east as we can with the hope of making it past Knoxville.
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