fun in the sun in southern california!

As much as we enjoyed our time in the desert and the gorgeous red rock landscapes, we were very happy to arrive at the coast! We've been enjoying Southern California since middle of last week, catching up with family and friends. We've spent some time with John's very special grandma - the kids call her G.G. (for Great Grandma). She's recently moved into a beautiful facility for active seniors with a pool as well as so many other amenities. We've loved visiting in the courtyard, swimming, and having dinners with her.

4 Generations - G.G., Bruce (John's Dad), John and the kids

Last weekend was spent reconnecting and getting to know John's Uncle Neil and Aunt Carolyn in San Diego.... what a fabulous weekend! The kids swam in their pool, we had a picnic on the beach in La Jolla, saw lots of seals and enjoyed the ocean, did a bit of thrifting, played games, ate lots of fresh fruit and other good food and LAUGHED! We were all so sad to leave!

                                   The billboard behind them says "Brave men run in my family"!

Little Miss "9 going on 19"! She had so much fun dressing up in Neil and Carolyn's girl's old costumes and beautiful shoes!

On the way home from our lovely weekend, we stopped at Venice Beach.... what a gong show that place is! Super busy, people hawking everything imaginable, a freak show, a drumming circle on the beach, ice cream, lots of people on bikes .... a little bit of everything.

The kids in front of the drumming circle on the beach. Some of these folks were groovin'!

Another neat place we spent an afternoon was at the La Brea Tar Pits near downtown Los Angeles. This is an area where tar (asfault) bubbles out of the earth and as far back as 40,000 years ago, animals were trapped in the pits and their bones were preserved amazingly well in the tar. Thousands of animals have been excavated from the pits here - mammoths, sabor tooth cats, giant sloths, dire wolves and many other prehistoric creatures. The pits are now in the middle of a city, but the tar continues to bubble up.

We drove home through Beverly Hills - always a fun drive - with a side trip down Rodeo Drive.... just because! Beautiful streets lined with palm trees, and fancy cars everywhere... including this Bugatti. (The most expensive car in the world.) Ahhhh.....only in Southern California!

a visit to sin city!

When I was a kid, we had a cat named Tuffy. He was put outside every night then came back in every morning. Sometimes I’d take Tuffy up to my room at night and snuggle with him until my dad came looking for him, then I’d reluctantly turn him over. While we were waiting for my dad to come find him, I’d sometime rub Tuffy’s fur backwards in the dark to see the static electric sparks fly off his fur. He was patient for a short time, then he’d scratch me or nip me to let me know he didn’t like it. Why am I telling you this story?

Well, we spent a day and half in Las Vegas at the beginning of this week and most of the time we were there, I felt like I think Tuffy must have felt when I rubbed his fur backwards! Unlike many of the other towns we have visited on this trip, Vegas is NOT a place I’ve ever wanted to go. But we figured since we were so close we may as well see it. Well, right from the moment we drove in I knew it was not where I wanted to be! Smutty billboards of mostly naked women plastered everywhere didn’t make it a nice welcome. They call it Sin City for a reason!

The afternoon we got there we swam in the pool, which the kids enjoyed, then headed over to Circus Circus. We had parked our RV in the KOA “campground” behind this casino. (If you can call a hot asphalt parking lot a campground!) The kids loved the rides at the Adventure Dome at Circus Circus. They enjoyed it so much we went back again the next day and spent more time. Zara and I rode the rollercoaster then she went on all the other “scary” rides alone. Zara was fearless! Bella and Thor enjoyed the little kid’s rides as well.

That next afternoon I decided to catch a bus down to the opposite end of the “the strip” to get tickets for the Lion King Musical that night. During the bus ride there and the walk back I just couldn’t get over the excessiveness of all the big resorts. Everything in Vegas is BIG, grand ….. over the top…. and I couldn’t help thinking of all the precious natural resources that went into building them, then running them, not to mention keeping “the strip” lit up all night, every night. What a waste of energy! This is a smallish city, smack in the middle of a desert, with a massive ecological footprint. I just didn’t feel comfortable there. It rubbed me the wrong way and sent sparks flying!

Speaking of sparks…. on my walk back, there were men on many street corners handing out flyers for “women to your room in 20 minutes”. The streets were littered with cards and flyers of naked women. These guys were shoving cards into the hand of every man who walked by INCLUDING men walking with their wife or girlfriend! I found it appalling and disgusting. If you had been near me, you would have smelled the smoke from all the sparks!

On a more positive note, that night we completely and totally enjoyed the Lion King - a fabulous show with amazing costumes and beautiful singing. It was a fun, late night outing! It ALMOST made the trip to Vegas worthwhile!

I hope that anyone reading this who likes Vegas will not take offense to my thoughts on this city. Everyone sees things through their own unique filters, and personally, I just couldn’t see past the excessive and ugly side of Vegas. It felt so “in my face” most of the time. I’ve seen Vegas touted as a family get-away….. oh my…. I can think of so many better places to take my family!!! This is certainly not a place we’ll be returning to!

It likely didn't help that we had just come from 6 blissful days in Sedona, a spiritual mecca with the most amazing energy! Vegas is at the absolute opposite end of the spectrum and the contrast was shocking. Two "h" words come to mind when I think of the contrast! Any guesses what those words are?!?!

From Vegas, we drove to Los Angeles, and have been having a lovely time with family. It was so nice to get out of the desert and to an area that is lush and green and full of beautiful flowers! The purple jacaranda trees are in full bloom as are the bouganvilla and so many others. Will post more about that soon. (I promise my next post will be much more positive!)

a walk through town

Yesterday we ventured out of the calm of our campground, into the chaos of hoards of tourists here in Sedona for the Memorial Day long weekend. We rode a free shuttle into the uptown area to look around. Found a cool store with lots of masks and we all had fun trying them on!

After icecream cones and little snack we were happy to leave the crowds behind and head back to the area of our campground. We explored some of the art galleries nearby and the amazing works of art that grace this town.

 Kicking back in a surprisingly comfortable rock chair!

 Gorgeous views in every direction!

Then back "home". We've been here for 6 nights and have loved exploring this area. Sedona will certainly hold a special place in our hearts.

another day in paradise!

We've been spending lots of time down at the creek that runs right behind our campsite. It's the same creek that we enjoyed at Slide Rock State Park  - Oak Creek. Before I get to today, here are a couple of photos from our afternoon at Slide Rock. It was such a fun place!

The creek is the kid's favorite place to be around here. Our campsite is right in front of the path leading down to it, so we're regulars there! It's shady, cool, and there's water! What else could you ask for when you're in the hot desert?!

Sweet time with the kids, playing in and enjoying nature. Taking time to breathe.

loving life in sedona!

It’s been fun to explore so many places that I’ve heard about for years and have wanted to see. Sedona’s another of those places and we’ve been enjoying our time here. (I was here as a young kid, but have no memories of that trip.) We found a wonderful campground right beside Oak Creek with big trees and lots of shade and some HUGE blue heron nests. There are baby herons chirping constantly and big adult birds flying around. The kids are enjoying watching them and getting a closer look at these majestic birds.

A few days ago we spent an afternoon at Slide Rock State Park, swimming and enjoying this natural wonder. It’s a natural waterslide carved into the red slick-rock surface of Oak Creek Canyon. Most of us found the water pretty cold, but Zara was in there having fun for hours! She and John jumped off some small cliffs a few times. Zara had no fear or hesitation about jumping. Other people went up there and hemmed and hawed, but Zara didn’t even count to three! She just launched into the cold water below! (I haven’t downloaded these photos from John’s camera yet, so will post Slide Rock pics soon.)

On our walk out of the park, we watched some teenagers jumping off some MUCH higher cliffs into the canyon lower down. These cliffs were at least 60’ high and Zara asked “Can I do that Mom?” No way Zara! Maybe when you’re their age!

It’s been nice to have some relaxing days here. It’s worked well so far to have a few days where we travel long hours and cover lots of ground, then find a place we want to stay and settle in for a bit before doing it again. We were only going to stay here until Friday, as it’s a long weekend in the USA and everything was booked up. But when I went into the office to pay for Thursday night, the woman at the desk was just getting off the phone with someone who had called to cancel their weekend reservation. There was a wait list for the site, but since I was standing right there, they gave it to us! I love the way the universe looks out for us like that!

So we’ve had some good down time. The kids are enjoying playing with their toys, and making friends with other kids. Zara is loving having some young girls to play with.

 It was quite a novelty to walk some dogs this morning. (Some of our neighbors are travelling with SIX little dogs! Can you even imagine?!?!?)

Yesterday we did a little sight seeing and saw some of the "prehistoric" buildings of one of the Native American tribes that inhabited this area from about 1000 - 1400 AD.

This was at the Tuzigut national monuement - remnants of a pueblo built about 1000AD. Some interesting history.  Thor refused to walk anywhere yesterday! It was HOT and he just didn't want to walk in the heat. Bella was happy walking as long as she could take photos!

Montezuma's Castle was very cool. Even Thor thought so! This is a dwelling built into the side of a cliff. Zara enjoyed reading the interpretive signs, we watched lizards and imagined what life must have been like back then.

As much as we're enjoying Sedona itself, we have almost had our fill of the desert! It's HOT and dry! The ocean is calling us.... loudly!

One more photo of the gorgeous red rocks in the area. It is definitely beautiful!

more red rock and the grandest of canyons!

Oh where to start! We are now in Sedona, Arizona, but I’m going to spend this post filling you in on what we’ve been doing since the last post.

In case you couldn’t tell from my last post, we LOVED Moab. There was so much to do, the scenery was stunning, and it just had a great energy about it. On Saturday last week, a dream came true for me when I spent the morning mountain biking near Moab. It’s something I’ve wanted to do for about 15 years, so it was wonderful to get out there and find out why the area is so well known for its biking. I went with a group of 5 others and a guide. They picked me up at our RV park and off we went about 20 miles to the trail head. We biked about 2 miles on dirt trails, then got up onto the slickrock and just climbed up and up and up. We saw dinosaur footprints in the rock, and amazing scenery all around. It was rough rock - not smooth at all - so my body certainly got jarred around. But nothing compared to coming down! At the very top, we left our bikes and hiked into a remote area of Arches National Park. So beautiful! Then down we came….. bumping all the way down the slickrock. Everyone else in my group had rented bikes with dual suspension, so I was the only one getting jarred around on my 17 year old hardtail bike with a trailer bike attachment on the back -  I got a few looks! But I had fun and I kept up with a couple advanced riders in the group, so I didn’t worry about it! It was just thrilling to be out there. I kept saying to myself…. I’m mountain biking in Moab…. I’m actually here!

The next day we did something completely different and somewhat incongruent, a hummer excursion into an area called “Hell’s Revenge”.

This area is famous for its jeep track and people come from all over the world to drive over these fossilized sand dunes. (What’s also called slickrock, or sand stone) We were driving almost straight up some steep hills and coming straight down the other side!

 It was quite an adventure. I probably wouldn’t choose to do it again, but we did get to see some areas we wouldn’t have otherwise and it was quite the experience!

That afternoon, we got into the RV and headed towards Bryce Canyon, stopping along the way at many other beautiful places. We stopped in at the Valley of the Goblins – a valley full of little hoodoos in so many different shapes and sizes. That was fun until the wind picked up and it started to storm! We took refuge in the RV then continued south-west. We drove through Capital Reef park, more amazing red rock and sheer cliff walls. We spent the night in the bush somewhere, then arrived at Bryce Canyon the next morning. It was very different from what we had been seeing but by then the kids were getting pretty tired of looking at red rock! So tired in fact, that we decided not to go to Zion as planned, but head straight to the Grand Canyon.

We did a long day of driving and camped at the Grand Canyon that night. Our first hike out to the rim that evening was so cool. What an amazing place! So grand, it’s hard to really take in the scale of it.

The next morning we saw the IMAX movie on the “Secrets of the Grand Canyon” – an amazing journey through the history of the people who have explored it. So well done and so fascinating. Then we went exploring ourselves!

It’s challenging keeping 3 kids engaged when we’re doing so much sight seeing! John and I were so excited to see the Grand Canyon - I almost needed to pinch myself to believe I was there. But the kids were squabbling, and cranky and just wanted to go back to the motorhome! Argh! So frustrating. But once we got to the rim and sat down and had a snack while taking in the view, they started to enjoy it.

We got on a shuttle bus and took a little ride into the Grand Canyon Village where we took in some more views of the canyon. The kids enjoyed watching the squirrels and chipmunks scampering around and the birds surfing the updrafts off the canyon walls.

I'm so happy we got to see this incredible place. I know the kids won't remember it, but I sure will! One day, when they are older, we'd love to go back and raft the Colorado River. One day......

From there, we beelined it for Sedona. We're here now, enjoying this magical little town. But more on that later. Internet access has been hit and miss and when we do have it, I often don't have time to sit down and write a post. It's amazing how much there is to do when travelling with 3 kids! It's not a vacation, but it's certainly an adventure!