Way Out West (part 2)

 Day 8, Sun. - After worshipping in our room, we loaded up and headed west to Nevada. We had a room reserved about 20 miles north of Beatty. We stopped in town to stock up on groceries, then drove to our "inn". We were shocked! This nice little B&B, that had such good reviews, was a trailer house with small bedrooms to rent. The host was super sweet, but the house smelled like dogs, and the room was barely big enough for our overnight bags...much less the other things we needed. We went back to the car, did some frantic searching (there are NOT many places to stay in this area!), and finally found a room at a hotel right before entering Death Valley. I made our excuses to the lady at the "inn", and off we drove. I'll never live that one down (since I was the one who had booked the room)! The place we ended up staying was perfect for our needs, and even had a couple of restaurants that we could eat at.

view from our desert inn

another view from the inn

sand dunes in Death Valley

mountains in Death Valley

Day 9, Mon. - We got up early the next morning, ate breakfast in our room, and headed into Death Valley. It wasn't at all what either of us expected. It was very interesting, quite pretty in places, and not too hot. The temperatures in the park ranged from 77-97 degrees. We stopped for lunch in Bishop, CA, then took the Tioga Road to Yosemite. That was probably the prettiest drive on the whole trip! We saw lots of snow, and wildflowers were everywhere. They were beautiful! We drove to our cabin in Foresta, which is a private community surrounded by Yosemite National Park. Such a quiet, peaceful place to stay...and even had a washer and dryer that we could use.

Day 10-11, Tues-Wed. - We spent the next couple of days exploring Yosemite. It is a gorgeous place, but the crowds were crazy. We tried to time our outings to avoid the worst of the crowds...didn't really work. Since we had a fully equipped kitchen, we were finally able to do a little cooking to avoid eating at pricey restaurants. Everything out there is EXPENSIVE! I'm really glad that we were able to go and see the sights, but I have no desire to ever return to California.

moon over El Capitan

These guys are everywhere!

Bridal Veil Falls

Day 12, Thurs. - As we were leaving Foresta, a cinnamon colored black bear ran across the road, right in front of us. We stopped the car to watch him, and he stopped at the edge of the woods to watch us. We didn't have time to snap a picture, but it was a real thrill to see him!

Our next stop was Lindsay, CA. When we were making our travel plans, it was the closest town (not including cities, which we were trying to avoid) to the Sequoia National Park that we could find. It ended up being between an hour and an hour and a half to the park. Since we got there so early, we decided to drive up to Kings Canyon in the park. I have never in my life driven on such a curvy road! It was insane! We really enjoyed Kings Canyon though! This was Dennis' first time to see giant Sequoias. He loved it! After a light picnic supper, we retraced our steps down that snaky road back to our motel. When we were a few miles north of Lindsay, we got a really nice view of the valley below us. What a sight! There were orchards and vineyards as far as the eye could see. We also stopped at a fruit stand and picked up some apricots, peaches and plums for snacking on. YUM!

General Sherman

General Grant

3 Sisters

Day 13, Fri. - The next day we found a better road leading to the main section of Sequoia National Park, where General Grant is. (General Sherman was in Kings Canyon.) We walked among the giants and were amazed at their mass. I'm so glad that Dennis was finally able to see these magnificent trees! I had seen them the summer after I graduated high school, but I enjoyed them even more this time around.

Day 14, Sat. - We had seen everything we had come to see in California, so we cut our visit short by a day and headed southeast. For a state that has so many people in it, that section of the state is desolate! We were happy to reach Arizona!

Day 15, Sun. - We worshipped in our hotel room, then headed east for Holbrook, AZ...the gateway to The Petrified Forest National Park. We spent about 3-4 hours driving through and looking at the sights...even doing a little hiking to get a better look at the beautiful petrified logs. We had a late supper, then collapsed in our hotel room for the night.

historic inn

Blue Mesa

Day 16-17, Mon-Tues. - We had a hard day of driving on Monday, making it to Amarillo for the night. On the drive through New Mexico, we saw miles of blooming chola cactus. It was beautiful! I guess we hit it at just the right time, because it seemed as if every cactus was covered in pretty pink blossoms.

Just as it had happened on our way out west, we were met with storms. Amarillo must love it when we come through...we seem to bring the rains with us. Then this morning, we got up early and drove home. I have to say...seeing our house at the end of our long journey was one of my favorite sights of the trip. After 17 days, about 4000 miles, and having visited 6 national parks (and 1 state park), it feels SO good to be home! 

Way Out West: vacation 2025 (week 1)

 Day 1: After a year of planning and anticipation, we finally left home on Sunday, June 8, after lunch. Our first stop was in Amarillo. Easy, right? We thought so, too. We could see a lot of storm clouds and lightening in the distance about the time we got to Childress. Ricky called us, because he'd been watching the weather and saw tornados, high winds, and large hail on our direct route. We stopped at the DQ, had a treat, and watched the weather...weighing our options. We decided to drive south to Paducah and make a big circle south of the storm's path. Boy are we glad we did! We could see it to the north of us, but we avoided everything except a few sprinkles. When we got to our hotel for the night, we saw another vehicle that had its windshield busted out and hail pockmarks all over the driver's side of the car. I'm sure glad we managed to avoid that!

Day 2: The next day's itinerary was to drive to Albuquerque. I was having stomach problems when I got up Monday morning. We got a later start than we had planned, hoping that I would feel better before hitting the road. Didn't work. It was supposed to be a light day of traveling but ended up taking about 2 hours longer than it should have due to all of the stops we had to make. I was SO glad to get to our hotel room that afternoon. We just snacked in our room and rested up that evening.

Day 3: I felt much better Tuesday morning, so we headed out early. We saw about 6-8 hot air balloons flying over Albuquerque as we were heading out of town. What a treat! Then as we headed west on I40, we saw a beautiful full rainbow. We found a really nice roadside park several miles east of Flagstaff, so we stopped and picnicked for lunch. Then we turned north towards Page, Arizona. We visited the dam at Lake Powell and enjoyed the view, then went back to our room for an early bedtime. Dennis ended up having my stomach bug overnight but felt ok for traveling by morning. 

Day 4: Our next destination was Bryce Canyon. We stopped in Kanab, UT to try to find some compression socks. (My feet swelled after our long day of riding Tuesday.) It took a couple of tries, but we found a pair that fit, and we were off. As we were heading north, we saw a sign pointing to the Pink Coral Sand Dunes State Park. Neither of us had heard of it, and we had a light day of driving, so we decided to go check it out. I'm so glad we did. We saw some pretty wildflowers and the dunes were really interesting. It made a great place for our lunch picnic!

We made it to Tropic (which is where we were staying for a couple of nights) around 3. We settled into our room, then decided to go check out Bryce Canyon. What a beautiful place! We loved it! We had supper at a restaurant just outside of the park, then went back to see Sunset Point. We also saw some mule deer and antelope in the park, as well as chipmunks and ground squirrels. It was a great day and full!

an interesting plant at Bryce Canyon

skittish chipmunk

Day 5: We got up before sunrise (which comes mighty early out here!), so we could go to Sunrise Point to watch the sun come up....us and about a hundred other people. We had to park quite a ways away, then hoof it to make it up to the point by sunrise. This old lady has a had time hoofing it uphill! But we made it just in time, and it was beautiful! Afterwards, we strategized that if we drove to the furthest point in the park and worked our way back to the front that we might avoid the crowds. It worked! When we got to Rainbow Point (elevation 9115 ft), we had the place to ourselves. We really enjoyed it! we checked out all of the viewpoints that we'd missed the day before, and revisited a couple of our favorites to see how different they looked in the morning light. Such a beautiful place!

I love how the sun makes the rocks glow!

As we were driving along some of the mountain roads that day, I heard the brakes grinding and felt a shimmy while downhill braking. When we got back to our room that evening, Dennis checked them out and discovered they were worn to the point that we REALLY needed to replace them before doing any more mountain driving. Our hostess happened by that evening and told us where to find a good auto parts store (about 30 miles away), so Dennis decided to get up early the next morning, drive up there to buy new brake pads, then come back and fix them. So we had another early bedtime.

View from our front porch in Tropic, UT

Hooded Oriole feeding next to our front porch

Day 6: Things went well for Dennis going after brake pads and repairing the brakes, and we left Tropic about 9:30 on Friday morning. It was a short drive to Zion National Park. We were just a few miles in the park when Dennis spotted a herd of desert bighorn sheep. We pulled into a turnout and walked back as far as we could to get a better look. They were coming down the mountain on the other side of the river. We were close enough to them to hear their hoofs on the rocks! It was pretty exciting! 

To get from one end of the park to the other, you have to drive through a tunnel that has been carved out of the mountain. It is 1.1 miles long! There are several windows along the way, which offered an amazing (quick) view of the scenery along the way. It was so cool...and a little scary. We wanted our first stop to be the visitor center, but there were NO parking places left. That place is crazy crowded! So we drove up to the lodge where we were staying and had lunch. We still had about 4 hours before we could check into our room, so we just hung out in the lobby and the plaza outside the lodge...with HUNDREDS of other people. Once we were able to get into our room, the crowds had subsided quite a bit, so we drove back to the visitor's center to get some useful tips from the rangers there. We saw a few mule deer on the way. Then another early bedtime for us (after sitting out on our wonderful balcony!).

view from our balcony

Day 7: We rose early again, had a hearty breakfast at the lodge restaurant, then hiked to the Lower Emerald Pool. The morning was glorious! It was in the low 40's, so a long sleeved shirt was perfect for hiking. We saw some deer along the trail and enjoyed the sights. Afterwards we drove back to where we saw the sheep the day before, and they were there again. We love seeing wildlife! My bum heel was giving me trouble after the walking we'd done, so I rested up all afternoon.

mountains in the early morning sunlight

sheep

deer on our hike

Virgin River (view on hike)

That gets us through our first week. I hope to share many more pictures and memories with you next week!

Springtime Pleasures

 Can you believe that it is April already?! 

March was filled with good times with loved ones! Right after we returned from our vacation to Big Bend, Stephen's family came to stay a couple of nights. We enjoyed their visit so much! They showed up Sunday afternoon, along with Ricky's family (who they had spent the previous night with). It was great having them all here together. Monday morning, we went shopping at The Crazy Water Hotel. The kids loved exploring the toy store! (I always enjoy it, too!) We still had some time before lunch when we finished, so we headed out to the state park to do some hiking at Penitentiary Hollow. It is a beautiful trail with LOTS of rocks for the kids to climb and pose on. I have to admit, this Granny was a bit nervous at times...those kids are fearless! We got a good workout and then grabbed some lunch before heading home to rest up a bit. That afternoon, Stephen and I took the kids to the city park for an hour or two, while Rosie stayed home with Mom and Grandad to nap. After supper, Stephen took the kids BACK out to the state park for even more hiking! I stayed home to play with Rosie that time. I was pooped!

Stephen's family headed out after breakfast the next morning, and I went to the eye doctor. I had been a couple of weeks earlier and he had checked me really well because of a new floater that had appeared. He said everything looked good but to return if anything new or different showed up. Well, that morning, the floater changed...it looked like an additional one had appeared. He checked it out really well again and said it probably just changed position...there were no new ones. I go back in a couple of weeks for a final checkup. He said if there still are no new ones, we can relax and it will eventually fade away. His fear has been that I might be developing a retinal tear, which if caught early can be repaired. If it leads to a full detachment, it is much more serious. It is still annoying, but I haven't detected any new changes, so I think it is going to be nothing but an annoying floater.

Dennis' latest dental implant failed. UGH! The oral surgeon said the risk of failure is quite a bit higher when the implant is put in at time of extraction, which this one was. So he'll go back in another couople of months and have it done again. Thankfully, the doctor doesn't charge us for the "makeup" implant surgery!

Sheila's family had originally planned to come over when Stephen's family was here to go hiking with us. Unfortunately Caleb ended up with a stomach bug, so they bowed out to keep from possibly infecting anyone else. So they ended up coming over that Saturday for lunch. We had a great visit and fun game of Mexican Train. With school and work, we usually only are able to get together about once a month. But it was really nice being able to visit with all of our kids and grands that week...even it is wasn't all at the same time.

Diane came and spent the night the next week, then we did a little shopping at The Market downtown. We also enjoyed a leisurely lunch before time for her to head back home. As always, I enjoyed our time together. This time, however, Dennis got to enjoy visiting with her too!

That Saturday, Rick and Amber invited us over for dinner. We spent all afternoon visiting and playing with the kids. Archer is at such a fun age! He is learning new things every time we see him. We can carry on conversations with him now, which is a blast. We don't always understand what he's saying, but we can usually get the gist of it. They ended up coming over and going to church at Eastside and spending the afternoon with us the next day, too. We love having them so close!

Last week, on Wednesday, we took Amber and the kids to the Fort Worth Zoo. That is always fun! The weather was nice and the kids were great. The next day, Dennis had his chemical stress test/PET scan done in FW. (The results were normal, thankfully!) Afterwards he wanted to go to Arlington to the Rockler store to get a new tool. We stopped for lunch at Luby's and bumped into Marlin. So we ended up having lunch together and catching up. It was good to see him!

Saturday we went to the meeting in Hurst. They had a houseful! Everyone went to Koh and Michelle's for lunch and visiting afterwards. We SO enjoyed visiting with so many that we hadn't seen in years! Ricky's family also showed up, so we even got extra time with the littles. Archer rode with us to the Box's (which was about a 40 minute drive) and never quit talking the whole way! 

Driving home through the country from Koh and Michelle's was a delight. The bluebonnets and Indian Paintbrushes are at their peak right now. They were gorgeous! We saw large fields full of color. Such a pleasant conclusion to a wonderful day!

Yesterday was a 5th Sunday, which we normally have a guest speaker come and then have a potluck. Since we knew most people would have other plans we decided not to do the potluck, but Jett came and spoke for us. He did a really good job, too! It was the first time I'd heard him speak. We were pretty tired from the week's activities, so Dennis and I just came home (after our weekly lunch at Whataburger) and rested the remainder of the day. 

I have been working on Gracie's birthday gifts the past couple of weeks. I decided to do homemade presents this time. I've finished most of them, but still have one last thing to make. It is going to require more time and skill. I hope to get it made this week. If it turns out like I hope, I'll share a picture after it has been gifted. It is going to try my meager abilities!

I hope you have been enjoying your Spring! Be sure to take the time to appreciate the beauty around us!

Isa 35:1-2 The wilderness and the wasteland shall be glad for them, And the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose; It shall blossom abundantly and rejoice, Even with joy and singing. The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, The excellence of Carmel and Sharon. They shall see the glory of the LORD, The excellency of our God.  (NKJV)

Some Peace and Quiet in the Bend

 While the rest of you were having to endure election ads and news, we took off for the Big Bend. One of the things I love the most about that country is how wild and remote it is. There isn't any internet except in the Chisos Basin Lodge Visitor Center and restaurant (not in the rooms), and cell phone reception is mostly not available. So you are pretty much cut off from the rest of the world. Ahhh! How wonderful!

We left Sunday afternoon and drove to Monahans, stopping to eat in Midland at Clear Springs Restaurant. We didn't realize until we got inside and looked at the menu that it is the same kind of restaurant that we had in Nacogdoches. We enjoyed a good supper and then made it on to our hotel for the night. Monday morning we headed south, stopping for lunch at a nice little diner in Marathon. Our next stop was the Big Bend National Park. It is so remote down there that when you head south out of Fort Stockton, there are only two destinations that signs give you mileage for...Marathon and Big Bend. That's all that is down there!

Marathon, TX

The mountains started coming into view when we left Marathon. I always get excited when I see mountains in the distance! The closer we got, the prettier the landscape was. We saw some mule deer off the road before getting to the park. Big Bend isn't the best park we've been to for seeing wildlife. Most of the animals are nocturnal, since it is desert. But we always keep our eyes peeled, just in case!

The Window

Cholla

The mascot of Big Bend! They are everywhere!

After getting settled into our room at the Chisos Basin Lodge, we went out for some sightseeing. We started out going to the Rio Grande Village, where we had a picnic supper, walked down to the river, and walked amongst the cottonwoods. The fuzz from the cottonwoods looked like snow, flying through the air and covering the ground. We went specifically to look for javelina, but they (as most wildlife) normally come out at dusk, so we had some time to kill. We drove down to the Boquillas Overlook, where the villagers from across the river have a little "store" set up on some rocks. They have pottery and glasswork and other items laid out with prices listed and a "till" where you can insert your money. There are watchers with canoes across the river, keeping their eyes on their wares and rowing across when they need to retrieve their money.

The view from our back balcony

cottonwoods in Rio Grande Village

Fluff from cottonwoods

By the time we got back to the Rio Grande Village, the javelinas were coming out to graze. Dennis got out and got close enough to get some pretty good pictures. I kept my distance! They didn't seem to mind us being there at all though. We also saw some quail and jackrabbits alongside the road as we headed back toward the Basin. Once it got dark, we saw a bright light in the sky. At first we thought it was just a really bright star or planet. Then it started "growing". It would expand to a certain size, growing fuzzier as it did so. Then it would shrink back to a bright light again. It would repeat that cycle over and over. Dennis thinks it was probably a border patrol craft that was surveilling the area. I prefer to think of it as a UFO. Ha!

Tuesday morning, after a wonderful breakfast at the Lodge restaurant, we headed west. Our first stop was at the Sam Nail Ranch ruins. It was a short hike down to the old homesite, where there were a couple of old windmills, some kind of old animal shelter and some broken down adobe walls from where the house had been. There was also a big green tree that they had planted, which you could see for a long ways off. Trees are rare except in the Basin and along the river. 

Sam Nail Ranch

We stopped to get pictures of the Mule Ears and Santa Elena Canyon (from a distance). There were a few different vantage points to see the Canyon as you approached it. We finally made it to the river...right at the mouth of the canyon. As we were standing beside the river admiring the view, I heard and felt a big "whoosh"! I ducked, then looked up and saw (what I am pretty sure was) a peregrine falcon soaring away rapidly. It was really exciting! Dennis heard the noise, but by the time he looked up, the bird was too far away for him to identify. Peregrine falcons are currently nesting in the area, and the speed that it was flying makes me believe that is what it was. I wish I could have seen it before it dive-bombed me!

The "trail" up the wall of Santa Elena Canyon

We hiked over to the base of the canyon wall and started climbing. There were steps and ramps to make the ascent fairly easy. We got almost to the top, when I chickened out. I don't like heights and it was getting pretty hot. We had accidentally brought the wrong ice chest with us (containing food rather than drinks), so we decided to call it quits and head back down. When we reached the ground, another group said they'd been watching us descending to see if they thought they could make the climb. I guess they decided if these two old folks could do it, they could too! We stopped at the little store at Castalon to get some drinks, then headed back to the basin for lunch. 

After resting up a little, we decided to try our luck at finding some critters. We really wanted to see some desert bighorns, but they are mostly in the Dead Horse Mountains, to the northeast of the park. There was a gravel road which was supposed to go the the base of the mountains. We started out on it, but it was rattling our teeth so bad, we turned around and headed back to pavement. Then we exited the park and headed into the Black Gap Wildlife Management Area. We drove all the way to the river without seeing anything other than roadrunners and other birds.  We stopped on the side of the road for a picnic supper and then found a "guzzler" to watch at dusk to see if anything would come to drink at. (Guzzlers are a cistern-type contraption that pipe water to a trough for wildlife to drink from.) Nothing came other than some birds (possibly summer tanagers). As we were driving back in the dark, we saw a couple of javelinas, a coyote, and some jackrabbits.

One of the things that caught my eye as we got into the Big Bend Country was the appearance of pink and purple prickly pear cactus. I couldn't figure out if it was a stage that the cacti were going through or if they were a different subspecies. I finally asked a park ranger, who told me that they are a subspecies. They are really pretty!

Wednesday, we decided to head west to the Big Bend Ranch State Park. It is a very different experience to be had from the national park. It is a beautiful drive along the Rio Grande with mountains on both sides. We drove all the way through the park and onto Presidio for lunch. Then we decided to drive the gravel road that goes to Bob Armstrong Visitor Center, which is the headquarters for the remote camping area in the center of the park. It is about a 30 mile drive, one way (going anywhere from 5 mph to 40 mph). It was pretty and allowed us to see some plants up closer than in other areas, but it was a long drive to nowhere! We were very glad to get back on pavement after that little 2-3 hour sidetrip! One very exciting thing did happen though. We were heading back towards the main highway, when a javelina crossed the road in front of us. We stopped and watched him up close. He did NOT like us being there...raising his hackles and chomping his teeth at us! Unfortunately we weren't fast enough to get a picture of him. 

cliffs on Mexican side of river as seen from Big Bend Ranch State Park

We picnicked beside the river and then drove "home" in the dark...pretty road weary from the day. The next morning we loaded up and started for home. We decided to take the scenic route: going east through the Sanderson Canyon to Dryden, then north to I10. (I do NOT recommend taking Hwy 349 unless you have a sterner constitution than I do...it is like riding a rollercoaster!) We made a quick stop at Fort Lancaster, which was a buffalo soldier encampment in the 1800's. We stopped in Kerrville for the night, then came home today (stopping in San Saba to pick up our yearly supply of pecans). It was a great trip, but (as always) I am really glad to be home! We saw some beautiful landscapes, a lot of wildflowers in the Bend, plus a nice starting of bluebonnets and Indian paintbrushes between Kerrville and Llano. We thoroughly enjoyed the chilly nights and utter peace and quiet in The Bend. It is such a special place!

Ps 72:3 The mountains will bring peace to the people, And the little hills, by righteousness. (NKJV)