Northern Arizona Road Trip, Part 1

Jo and I so enjoyed last summer’s road trip that we planned another tour of local National Parks, this time in Northern Arizona. We started last Wednesday and Northeast to Navajo National Monument just outside Kayenta, Arizona in the Navajo Nation. It is here we ran into Arizona’s kooky time issues. In a nutshell, the state of Arizona and the Hopi Nation do not recognize (celebrate? Conform to?) Daylight Savings Time but the Navajo Nation does. Ergo, on the Navajo Nation, during the summer, it is Mountain Standard Time; but everywhere else it is Pacific Standard Time.

Anyway, we spent the first evening hiking the two trails around the rim of the canyon and looking over Betatakin, the Anasazi – or Ancient Pueblo People if you prefer – ruins. The second day we broke camp and met a ranger at the visitors’ center to take the 5 mile, round trip, guided tour to Betatakin. It was, by far, the highlight of the entire road trip. We were able to walk gingerly around the ruins and our guide was extremely knowledgeable.

From Navajo National Monument we headed to Canyon De Chelly National Monument. Now, Canyon De Chelly is pretty in its own right but we had a few issues with the park. First, it sits on the very near outskirts of Chinle, AZ and the proximity of the Navajo town seems to affect the park. The canyon consists of two rim drives each with their own overlooks. The overlooks are nice and they give decent views of the canyons and the Anasazi ruins. The campground feels more like a state park grounds and there is a strange instance of the locals simply parking at open sites and...well... hanging out. This most likely goes hand in hand with the signs at the Visitors' Center that warned about a rash of robberies.

Our biggest issue was, as I stated above, the effects of Chinle. First, there are numerous merchants at every overlook selling Navajo tourist trinkets. That in itself is not bad, but they are a bit pushy about it and all the trinkets are the same. It distracts from the canyon. Second, and more irritating, is the fact that the only way to go in to the canyon for a majority of the year is by hiring a guide from town. Again, not a big deal, in fact we like the idea of the Navajo Nation working in tandem with the Parks Service, but the majority of those tours are done via 4 wheel drive. As you all know, we dislike the destroying of nature via wheels.

We did stumble upon a Ranger hike into the canyon, a rarity in the park. It was a good hike but we were still a far distance away from any ruins. We planned on taking another guided hike the day we left the park, but decided against it due to fatigue and disillusionment. From the canyon we headed to our final destination, Holbrook, AZ on our way we would visit Hubble Trading Post National Historic Site and would spend the next few days in the Flagstaff area as well as Petrified Forest National Park.

Stay tuned for the rest of the trip!

-Cory

Editor's note: If you don't have anything nice to say, 1) don't say it at all, or 2) be courageous enough to put your name to it. Anonymous comments will no longer be accepted. Have a great day!

The Itty Bitty Kitty Committee take two: The Gentlemen of the Shire

On Saturday we returned the second of the Itty Bitty Kitty Committee to the Homeward Bound gang. This time we had four little boys with us:

Frodo(the striped one):

Gandalf:

Smeagol:

And Pippin:

They were a bit more of a challenge than Tara and Scarlett. The boys had only lived in a large crate and were basically in shock when we let them out the first night. It was a bit of a…. well… shitty mess. With a little guidance from Homeward Bound we decided to have them stay in the extra bathroom. Keeping them in a smaller room reduced the stress, both on them and us. After about a week they began to warm up and embrace their full kittenness (what… it’s a word).

As each week passed they became much more loving and playful. They would often spend hours in the front room pouncing on one another and playing with the numerous cat toys we have.

Frodo and Smeagol became great friends and were often found together (funny, no?). Gandalf, true to his name, was often the most curious and the first to explore. He was also very independent and would wander away from the group to find his own place to play or sleep. Pippen was very reserved and quite shy.

We’ll be taking a break from kittens for a few months as our travels will keep us out of the house for most of the rest of July and August.

In a quiet house once again,

Cory

The Itty Bitty Kitty Committee take one

You remember the pictures I posted on Facebook of the Bare Naked Ladies concert?... you don’t? go check them out…

You with me now?

Well, that was an event called Pet-A-Palooza. It is a fundraiser for the local SPCA and other animal groups here in Las Vegas. Jo and I have avoided it for the past few years because we feared our lack of willpower when it comes to adopting new critters. Jo stumbled upon the possibility of fostering kittens and…lo! There are kittens!

We got the two little scamps eight weeks ago when they were four weeks old. They didn’t even have names; we spent the first few days calling them “the orange one” and “the white an orange one.” We worked hard on finding them a pair of literary names and finally settled on Scarlett and Tara (really? You don’t get the allusion?... try Wikipedia).

Scarlett came to us with a runny nose and a bit of an eye infection. We got the eye cleared up fairly quickly but she still has the sneezles.

Tara grows exponentially each day, both in girth and in fur. Scarlett remains hyper and wiry.

Tara purrs the minute you touch her; Scarlett likes to sleep in JoAnna’s hood.

They both sleep…. A lot. When they are not sleeping, they are attacking each other, JoAnna’s desk, Toby… but not Abby, never Abby.

On Sunday we take them back to the woman who runs the program… and pick up more.

In Love and Fur,

Cory

New Orleans Photo Essay

Ok... we know... it has been way to long. Instead of taking forever to write a long post on New Orleans, we figure a photo essay might be better.

The Union Station in Los Angeles

Lamp lights in the French Quarter

The Corn Fence House

Cafe Du Monde

And again

Street cars- we took one to the Garden District

Katrina damage to Louis Armstrong Park

The cemeteries are one of the coolest parts of the city... all sorts of photo opportunities

So there you have it. New Orleans in a very small nutshell. That brings us up to the beginning of April! Crap...

Peas!

Cory

I'm on a train!

Greetings Dear Readers:

The next few posts are going to revolve around a theme: that of our Spring Break trip to New Orleans. The first step in our epic Big Easy adventure was taking the train from Los Angeles to New Orleans.

Now, both Jo and I have been on trains in foreign countries (Kenya, Scandinavia, Korea etc…) but never here in the states. The trip takes 48 hours and we decided to skip the extravagance of a sleeper car and ride coach the whole way. The seats were huge and there was plenty of leg room but it was a tad uncomfortable to sleep two nights in a row in a semi-reclined position. We’ll definitely spring for a sleeper car next time.

A majority of our time was spent in the observation car simply watching the countryside roll by and pretending to read our books. We played cards and bananagrams, drank coffee, ate bagels and peanut butter, and took a lot of pictures.

Our day on the train began in El Paso, Texas. It was interesting because we could see the big brown fence that marks the border between El Paso and Juarez. The rest of the day was spent crawling across the vast expanse of Texas. We had a nice dinner in the diner car with a retired Air Force Chaplain and his wife. It was a decent meal and a lot of fun to meet a new people.

I think the most interesting thing about taking Amtrak is the obvious level of unhappiness amongst the employees. They were never outright rude to the passengers, but they were obviously surly and often told the passengers that “they don’t listen to us, so please complain.”

We would definitely take the train again and we got in to New Orleans right on time and got to see a lot of the lower half of the United States.

More to come!

New color!

Hey!

Welcome back!

We painted the living room...well the two of the walls. Observe!

It took a week to decide on colors. We had about a dozen different and very similar shades of green and red. We're still on the hunt for a matching set of curtains but overall we're very happy with the change.

Hope all is well.

-Cory

A Caribbean Sail to Ring in 2010

Once again, I'm late in posting about my latest trip, but it is what it is.

My sister, Rebecca, and I sailed on Holland America's ship, the ms Eurodam, the second full week in January. We rarely get to spend time together, so it was nice to just chill away from everything else for awhile. For the most part, we were unplugged for the duration of our trip, though we couldn't help but ring up the hubbies while we sat in the hot tub on the shore of Puerto Rico (technically U.S. land and therefore no international roaming charges). I was on the cruise for the International Food, Wine and Travel Writers Association 2010 conference, but for most of the time, we got to do what we wanted to do.


Some of the highlights:

• Holland America paid for me to get a spa treatment. I got a seaweed wrap, which sort of made me feel like a baked potato. It was very relaxing, though, and, for a first-time spa experience, I give it two thumbs up. I will be writing about the experience on Kaleidoscopic Wandering within the next couple months.

• The dessert extravaganza, which was held by the chefs one night, was by far more of an art show than a culinary marvel. Carved fruit and ice sculptures, beautifully designed bread art, a chocolate fountain, tiers of candied apples, dipped strawberries, mousse in every flavor ... truly stunning in every sense of the word.

• Relaxing in the hot tub. I know, I know, not all that exciting from the sound of it, but it was so nice to be able to soak in the hot water with no where else to go or anything else to do. I really did enjoy the night we were sitting in the hot tub while we were in port in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The lights were colorful and the weather was warm.

• There was a piano bar on board, and the piano man could plan hundreds of songs - everything from 1920s hits to modern gangsta rap. We spent a couple evenings in the piano bar and had a lot of fun.

• The Exploration Lounge was actually a huge library with computers and a cafe. It was on the very top floor of the boat, overlooking the ocean. Very chill. A nice place to relax.
• Rebecca and I were smart enough to pack a deck of cards (I never seem to have them when I want them), and we whipped through some serious games of War, including the shortest game ever. It lasted two rounds through the deck.

In the week we were at sea, we stopped at four ports: Grand Turk (Turks and Caicos Islands), Puerto Rico, St. Thomas (U.S. Virgin Islands) and Little San Salvador (Bahamas). Seeing as how our first cruising experience was pretty much a bust, I was definitely happy with our on-shore stops. Here's what we did:

• It was raining when we left Ft. Lauderdale, and it poured rain the whole first day at sea. It also poured rain on Grand Turk, the largest of the Turk Islands, which are part of the Turks and Caicos Islands. Luckily, Grand Turk is a pretty small, fairly undeveloped island, and there really wasn't all that much to do. We stayed with the conference group the day we went ashore to Grand Turk, and that was fine with me. We had a car tour of the island (at 7 miles across, there's not much to see). The island is still trying to rebuild itself after a devastating hurricane that swept through in 2008, and there were a lot of buildings in shambles. I was most surprised by the garbage dump, which was literally a huge pile of garbage next to the side of the road - and next to a school and cemetery. We ate some variations of conch, which is a delicacy in the Caribbean, and which I fell in love with in Honduras. Overall, a pretty chill day - cold, rainy, but at least we got to get off the ship for a bit.

• Our second port was San Juan, Puerto Rico. We started the day off with part of our conference group. We had a really knowledgeable guide who gave us a tour of Old San Juan. I loved the public art and fountains in the public spaces. The streets were narrow and paved with cobblestones or old blue bricks. The sun was hot, and Rebecca and I each got a bit of sun (Yay! Mission accomplished!). Once we reached El Morro, the famous fort in San Juan, we broke off from the crowd and decided to tour it. I was a fan because the view was superb, and there were aspects of this fort - like a triangular staircase - that I've never seen anywhere else.

• Our cruise ship next docked at St. Thomas, one of the U.S. Virgin Islands, but Rebecca had found out that it's quite touristy and known for shopping. Not so much our style. So we hopped off the boat and caught a ferry to St. John, another of the U.S. Virgin Islands, but much more preserved for nature. Over half the island is part of the U.S. Virgin Islands National Park. The NPS office is right off the ferry dock, so we picked up a map and headed up the trail for a day of hiking. We only met a few other people on the trail. It was another warm day and sort of humid. I was sweating like mad, but it felt good to burn off some of those cruise ship meals. There were a couple places where we could look out over the island, and it was so green and beautiful. The sea was vivid blue, and there were itty bitty islands in every direction. Little white sailboats were floating around. Absolutely beautiful. Part of the trail went along Honeymoon Beach, which had very few people on it. It was a soft white sand, and little waves lapped on the shore. One of the stranger things on our hike was our discovery of hermit crabs, which, we learned after our hike, actually climb up into the hills of the park every year to live, then climb all the way back down to the beach and sea to mate.

• Our final cruise port was on Little San Salvador, an island in the Bahamas that is rented by Holland America for use as a cruise port. There were two Holland America ships in port that day, so the beach was packed (and the water was freezing cold!!), but we claimed our spot on the sand and did our best to soak up some sun on our last day on the cruise. In the afternoon, we went sea kayaking in a lagoon on the island. I've never kayaked before, and even though it was a hefty upper body workout, it was a lot of fun. I'd definitely do it again.

Overall ... a lovely week at sea. Here's hoping my sis and I get to vacation together every year!

Port and Starboard ~
JoAnna