Four Corners, 18 days, 3000+ miles
Jun 21st, 2008, 07:29 PM
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Four Corners, 18 days, 3000+ miles
This is a quick outline of our trip this Spring. It was MARVELOUS!
Diane & Steve’s Wild Wild West Adventure -- April 28-May 16, 2008
We flew into Phoenix and drove to Sedona for our first night, where we stayed at the Sky Ranch -- super quiet location, simple room, beautiful grounds and views. After breakfast and a shopping trip to stock up on bottled water and picnic stuff, we drove to the Grand Canyon, entering at the Eastern end and taking “Desert View Drive” stopping for gorgeous views. We spent one night at Thunderbird (contemporary motel-like accomodations on the rim) and one night at El Tovar - which was WAY better for only $10 more! We did our hiking along the rim trail and enjoyed looking down on the zigzag Bright Angel Trail.
There is a touristy gift shop at Cameron, outside of the Grand Canyon, but there is also a fabulous gallerey the folks on the tour buses seemed to be missing out on. This is where we fell in love with $15K Navaho rugs. (No, not a realistic souvenir!)
It was an easy drive to Zion National Park. We stayed in Mt Carmel at the Best Western East Zion Thunderbird Lodge. Huge, clean comfy rooms, fun people, and an exquisite drive into Zion, past grazing buffalo, through the 1.1 mile tunnel and unbelievable geological changes. Visiting Zion is like signing up for Geology 101. We took several hikes over the next two days, and marveled at the rock climbers on the sheer cliff faces. One of my favorite trails was to visit the Weeping Rock. Many of the “waterfalls” are actually water seeping out of the rocks. The Virgin River that winds through the park is lovely. I’d go back again for sure! We stayed 3 nights at the Best Western, as who could resist both a 9-hole golf course (hey, the owner had to build it to keep her water rights, or something like that) and the attached Thunderbird Restaurant which proclaims itself the “Home of Ho-Made Pies!” (The pie was good, but the BEST meals were the breakfasts)
It also was convenient to Bryce Canyon. We packed a lunch from a Subway on the way to Bryce. Sights from the viewpoints are great, but the hike down into the canyon was amazing. Perfect places to picnic. The next morning we stopped at the “Mossy Cave” in the Red Rock state park bordering Bryce.
We next stayed in Boulder UT -- the drive there was beautiful, and it's another place we’d go back to spend more time riding and exploring and would stay again at Boulder Mountain Lodge. We were there one night and just kind of chilled away the afternoon around the hot tub. The reason we chose it was to eat at Hell's Backbone Grill and both dinner and breakfast were delicious. We would have stayed a second night, but at this point, we were no longer working with reservations that had been made before we left--being off season, we were able to find places "on the fly" rather easily.
From there we drove through such varied scenery and types of geography, particularly in Capitol Reef National Park and Fruita, UT, on down through the Moki Dugway - a long gravel switchback taking us eventually to Bluff, Ut. The next morning was an amazing drive through Monument Valley. What had started out as a sunny morning clouded up and I wondered about my photos -- but now that we're back, wow. The stormy clouds gave that place even more drama. That afternoon, after checking into a cheap motel in Cortez, CO, it was off to Mesa Verde, where we lucked into a free ranger tour group of only six people!
The next morning we drove up the “Million Dollar Skyway” through Ouray, Colorado and Silverton, two fading mining towns. This is an extraordinary drive. We spent the night at Silverton’s Grand Imperial Hotel. Off-season, I think we met everyone in town. There were only two places open for dinner. Perhaps we should have eaten at the other. But the Grand Imperial Hotel was fun, clean and tidy and we slept like babies. It snowed over night! The views of the mountains are dramatic. It was a gorgeous drive to Durango. I must note that the condition of this "million dollar highway" is somewhat less than perfect. Gives you pause when politicians start talking about cutting gas taxes (which actually pay to keep these highways in shape!) It was every bit as exciting as a drive along the Amalfi Coast.
Next we hit Taos, NM for 2 nights where we stayed at the historic Taos Inn right downtown, visited the Pueblo and Millicent Rogers’ museum as well as a Spanish colonial complex. We found a lovely restaurant, Graham's Grille, across the street from the Taos Inn, where we liked our dinner the first night so much we ate there again the next. Really lovely menu and good wine. Be warned: people eat early around here. The kitchen closed at 9PM!
From Taos, after talking to people who said it wasn’t a bad drive, we went to Chaco Canyon. Again, those free Ranger programs are terrific. I’d love to come back and camp here for a night or two. It must be incredible.
Having spent the night in Jemez Springs (which is an interesting little place with hot springs spas). Our room was mostly just OK and quite cheap, so it compensated for a few splurges along the way. The drive out of town takes you past a soda cave over a waterfall which was really neat.
We stopped at Bandelier on our way to Sante Fe. We totally enjoyed Bandelier, with the knowledge we’d gained visiting Mesa Verde and Chaco. Climbing into those cave portions of their settlement was cool. Lots of petroglyphs here.
You may have noticed that we're visiting tons of National Parks -- a couple years ago when DH turned 60, we got a Golden Eagle pass that gets us into all the National Parks for free. It was WELL used on this trip!
We more-or-less finished up our trip with 3 nights in Santa Fe and it is a wonderful town. We lucked into a wonderful deal at the Old Santa Fe Inn. Perfect location, beautiful comfortable room, and delicious "burrito bar" at breakfast!
While there are supposed to be great museums, we spent nearly a day and a half just on Canyon Road, visiting galleries. Terrific! We ate one night at El Faro, which was featured in some paintings we liked. At Nedra Matteucci Gallery we found our souvenir -- a beautiful Mata Ortez black-on-black vase. Shipped it home as I couldn't trust carrying it on a flight home. We also took half a day and visited Los Alamos. The little historic museum, housed in the old boys’ school was WAY more interesting than the Bradbury Science Museum - which seems dated. Overall, though, Santa Fe is another place to which I’d return.
I talked Steve into checking out the Painted Desert & Petrified Forest on the way to Flagstaff (OK, it was one more night). We found the desert portion quite beautiful. I’d never seen a petrified forest before. Now I have.
Our last night was in Flagstaff, where I used some miles for a "free" room.
Diane & Steve’s Wild Wild West Adventure -- April 28-May 16, 2008
We flew into Phoenix and drove to Sedona for our first night, where we stayed at the Sky Ranch -- super quiet location, simple room, beautiful grounds and views. After breakfast and a shopping trip to stock up on bottled water and picnic stuff, we drove to the Grand Canyon, entering at the Eastern end and taking “Desert View Drive” stopping for gorgeous views. We spent one night at Thunderbird (contemporary motel-like accomodations on the rim) and one night at El Tovar - which was WAY better for only $10 more! We did our hiking along the rim trail and enjoyed looking down on the zigzag Bright Angel Trail.
There is a touristy gift shop at Cameron, outside of the Grand Canyon, but there is also a fabulous gallerey the folks on the tour buses seemed to be missing out on. This is where we fell in love with $15K Navaho rugs. (No, not a realistic souvenir!)
It was an easy drive to Zion National Park. We stayed in Mt Carmel at the Best Western East Zion Thunderbird Lodge. Huge, clean comfy rooms, fun people, and an exquisite drive into Zion, past grazing buffalo, through the 1.1 mile tunnel and unbelievable geological changes. Visiting Zion is like signing up for Geology 101. We took several hikes over the next two days, and marveled at the rock climbers on the sheer cliff faces. One of my favorite trails was to visit the Weeping Rock. Many of the “waterfalls” are actually water seeping out of the rocks. The Virgin River that winds through the park is lovely. I’d go back again for sure! We stayed 3 nights at the Best Western, as who could resist both a 9-hole golf course (hey, the owner had to build it to keep her water rights, or something like that) and the attached Thunderbird Restaurant which proclaims itself the “Home of Ho-Made Pies!” (The pie was good, but the BEST meals were the breakfasts)
It also was convenient to Bryce Canyon. We packed a lunch from a Subway on the way to Bryce. Sights from the viewpoints are great, but the hike down into the canyon was amazing. Perfect places to picnic. The next morning we stopped at the “Mossy Cave” in the Red Rock state park bordering Bryce.
We next stayed in Boulder UT -- the drive there was beautiful, and it's another place we’d go back to spend more time riding and exploring and would stay again at Boulder Mountain Lodge. We were there one night and just kind of chilled away the afternoon around the hot tub. The reason we chose it was to eat at Hell's Backbone Grill and both dinner and breakfast were delicious. We would have stayed a second night, but at this point, we were no longer working with reservations that had been made before we left--being off season, we were able to find places "on the fly" rather easily.
From there we drove through such varied scenery and types of geography, particularly in Capitol Reef National Park and Fruita, UT, on down through the Moki Dugway - a long gravel switchback taking us eventually to Bluff, Ut. The next morning was an amazing drive through Monument Valley. What had started out as a sunny morning clouded up and I wondered about my photos -- but now that we're back, wow. The stormy clouds gave that place even more drama. That afternoon, after checking into a cheap motel in Cortez, CO, it was off to Mesa Verde, where we lucked into a free ranger tour group of only six people!
The next morning we drove up the “Million Dollar Skyway” through Ouray, Colorado and Silverton, two fading mining towns. This is an extraordinary drive. We spent the night at Silverton’s Grand Imperial Hotel. Off-season, I think we met everyone in town. There were only two places open for dinner. Perhaps we should have eaten at the other. But the Grand Imperial Hotel was fun, clean and tidy and we slept like babies. It snowed over night! The views of the mountains are dramatic. It was a gorgeous drive to Durango. I must note that the condition of this "million dollar highway" is somewhat less than perfect. Gives you pause when politicians start talking about cutting gas taxes (which actually pay to keep these highways in shape!) It was every bit as exciting as a drive along the Amalfi Coast.
Next we hit Taos, NM for 2 nights where we stayed at the historic Taos Inn right downtown, visited the Pueblo and Millicent Rogers’ museum as well as a Spanish colonial complex. We found a lovely restaurant, Graham's Grille, across the street from the Taos Inn, where we liked our dinner the first night so much we ate there again the next. Really lovely menu and good wine. Be warned: people eat early around here. The kitchen closed at 9PM!
From Taos, after talking to people who said it wasn’t a bad drive, we went to Chaco Canyon. Again, those free Ranger programs are terrific. I’d love to come back and camp here for a night or two. It must be incredible.
Having spent the night in Jemez Springs (which is an interesting little place with hot springs spas). Our room was mostly just OK and quite cheap, so it compensated for a few splurges along the way. The drive out of town takes you past a soda cave over a waterfall which was really neat.
We stopped at Bandelier on our way to Sante Fe. We totally enjoyed Bandelier, with the knowledge we’d gained visiting Mesa Verde and Chaco. Climbing into those cave portions of their settlement was cool. Lots of petroglyphs here.
You may have noticed that we're visiting tons of National Parks -- a couple years ago when DH turned 60, we got a Golden Eagle pass that gets us into all the National Parks for free. It was WELL used on this trip!
We more-or-less finished up our trip with 3 nights in Santa Fe and it is a wonderful town. We lucked into a wonderful deal at the Old Santa Fe Inn. Perfect location, beautiful comfortable room, and delicious "burrito bar" at breakfast!
While there are supposed to be great museums, we spent nearly a day and a half just on Canyon Road, visiting galleries. Terrific! We ate one night at El Faro, which was featured in some paintings we liked. At Nedra Matteucci Gallery we found our souvenir -- a beautiful Mata Ortez black-on-black vase. Shipped it home as I couldn't trust carrying it on a flight home. We also took half a day and visited Los Alamos. The little historic museum, housed in the old boys’ school was WAY more interesting than the Bradbury Science Museum - which seems dated. Overall, though, Santa Fe is another place to which I’d return.
I talked Steve into checking out the Painted Desert & Petrified Forest on the way to Flagstaff (OK, it was one more night). We found the desert portion quite beautiful. I’d never seen a petrified forest before. Now I have.
Our last night was in Flagstaff, where I used some miles for a "free" room.
Jun 22nd, 2008, 11:03 AM
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Here is the link to photos -- There are 5 "albums." Don't worry about trying to put them in order, you can look at any one of them "on its own."
http://www.kodakgallery.com/ladyoleisure/travel
The albums are titled The Best of the West Chapters 1, 2 and 3 (easy to do those in order) Bryce through Mossy Cave, and Boulder Capitol Reef & Monument Valley.
We decided in looking at the photos when we got back that Bryce is sort of the Venice of the National Parks. No, there's not canals -- but when you get back and look at your photos, it wows you even more than when you were there!
http://www.kodakgallery.com/ladyoleisure/travel
The albums are titled The Best of the West Chapters 1, 2 and 3 (easy to do those in order) Bryce through Mossy Cave, and Boulder Capitol Reef & Monument Valley.
We decided in looking at the photos when we got back that Bryce is sort of the Venice of the National Parks. No, there's not canals -- but when you get back and look at your photos, it wows you even more than when you were there!
Jun 22nd, 2008, 05:44 PM
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Sort of -- we headed for Abiquiu on 96 and went West thru Galina, and South to 550 where you shoot West to Nageezi. We had checked the website for Chaco as there is only one really "good" road in and out for people driving regular cars. It wasn't as bad a drive as we'd heard it to be. When we went on to Santa Fe, we took 550 back then took 4 North to Jemez Springs -- which was a nice little side trip. If we'd planned ahead better, we could have stayed at the Laughing Lizard, where we had a fine dinner. The Salt Dam on the Jemez river was interesting. There is also a lovely state park with beautiful trails and picnic spots. We stayed on 4, stopping at Bandelier on the way to Santa Fe. It was a beautiful drive.
