Month: March 2018
The End of our South West USA Road Trip
Yesterday, we drove south-west from the Grand Canyon back to Las Vegas on the last day of our trip. It was mostly dry desert country – a bit similar to the vegetation around Central NSW. We drove nearly 300 miles but most of the trip was on a dual-lane highway with a speed limit of […]
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More of the Grand Canyon
We took it easy this morning and found ourselves just making breakfast at our hotel. Our hotel is just outside the national park boundary, about 10 kms south of the visitors centre in the little town of Tusayan where the Grand Canyon Airport is located. We planned to spend today visiting the viewpoints to the […]
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The Grand Canyon
We left Sedona this morning, travelling north up the Oak Creek Gorge. It was a narrow two-lane road with plenty of places to turn out and catch a scenic view. The road left the gorge with steep climb up to the plateau and through a number of hairpin bends. We found a scenic view at […]
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Sedona – The Healing Capital of the World
We are staying in Sedona, Arizona which must be the ‘wellness capital of America, if not the world! The town is nestled under enormous red sandstone formations that create a sense of awe and make for a wonderful landscape. The town attracts spiritual seekers, artists and healers from all over. Many New Age believers think […]
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Phoenix Desert Botanical Gardens
The desert may seem like the last place you’d expect to find beautiful flowers and flora. The main reason we came to Phoenix was to visit their world famous Desert Botanical Gardens. It’s home to thousands of species of cacti, trees and flowers from all around the world but it specialises in local desert species […]
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Five Different Worlds On The Way To Phoenix
Over our rather long drive from Gallup to Phoenix, we passed through five quite distinct surroundings. An early start got us on our way on this 455 kilometre day (one of our long ones on this trip). It was cold when we left. The minimum overnight temperature (just before dawn) had fallen to -8C and […]
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Culture and History along Route 66
We left our very nice hotel in Santa Fe (La Fonda on the Plaza) to head west early after breakfast. It was a sunny morning and the temperature was -1C. It took a little over an hour to get to Albuquerque. ( have awful trouble spelling that name!) It’s not the capital of New Mexico, […]
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Our Scenic Drive to Taos
Today, we had the idea of doing a scenic drive to the town of Taos, a little north of Santa Fe but it turned into a bit of a flop. Taos is the home to a World Heritage Pueblo community. We knew that the community was closed to visitors today, but we thought that we would […]
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Santa Fe
We are staying at the La Fonda on the Plaza Hotel right in the centre of Old Santa Fe. I thought it might have been named after the actor Henry la Fonda but the word ‘fonda’ in Spanish simply means an ‘inn’ The site of this hotel has been the location of various inns since […]
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Driving to Santa Fe
Today was just a driving day to get to Santa Fe in new Mexico where we have more things to see. We drive about 300 kms which took us about seven hours including our many stops. It had snowed overnight and everything was dusted with a light cover of snow. It was a bit thicker […]
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Mesa Verde National Park
Today, compared to our previous days, was just a relatively awesome day. We had far less stunning scenery, however, it was an exceedingly interesting day. We were on the road by 9.30 am and well into our usual travel plan. It seems that we spend the mornings getting to our next destination and arriving in […]
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A Day in Monument Valley
Today’s drive was to one off the most outstandingly scenic places in Western America – Monument Valley. It’s just a hop step and a jump across the border into Arizona and on Navajo tribal land. Most of our trip was across a large plateau with occasional small mesas and buttes rising from the landscape. We […]
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