Road Trip

As per some requests, as well as for our own benefit, I have decided to start a blog about our adventure this summer.  Kent just graduated from USU with a B.S. in Mechanical/Aerospace Engineering and he is going to be interning for two months at Kirtland Airforce Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico (a.k.a "The Land of Enchantment").

We decided to take our time driving down to New Mexico and see the sites along the way. We left on Tuesday, May 20^th (Happy 3^rd Anniversary to us!) and we arrived in Albuquerque on Saturday,  May 24^th.

Day 1 - Happy Anniversary!

We started our journey by driving down to Salt Lake and spending the night at the Anniversary Inn. Kent surprised me with a fancy-shmancy dinner at The Roof Restaurant.  It was delicious and the view was awesome.

After dinner, we found a bench outside the Temple and enjoyed the view for a little while before heading back to our Jungle Safari room.

Day 2 - Driving to Zion

We had a lovely breakfast-in-bed and then hit the road. 

Today was a travelling day. Along the way we happened upon a Costa Vida! Yes, we are lucky ducks! We got one last Costa meal to tide us over. No Costa Vida's in or near Albuquerque :( 

We got to our motel around 6 pm and spent the rest of the night wandering around Springdale, eating and hanging out in our room. (It was definitely not my favorite room of the journey, but it was a bed and it was less than a mile from the park entrance so we'll take it!)

Day 3 - Zion

On Thursday, we spent the day exploring in Zion. We hiked to the Emerald Pools, Weeping Rock, and The Narrows. 

Hiking to the Lower Emerald Pools

At the Upper Emerald Pools

Kent made some nice squirrely friends at the Upper Emerald Pools

The Narrows

 We left Zion at around 5 pm and headed to our Grand Canyon hotel. There ended up being a road closure along our way, and although we never really got lost, there was some major disagreement among our GPS and Google Maps which caused some nervousness within myself. The pitch black, empty roads mixed with talk of a serial killer with a chain-saw hand, made for a very unsettling drive. We saw a coyote, an elk, a frazzled little mouse, and a bunny on our drive. Poor, poor little bunny. He hopped right into our speeding tire...it was heart-breaking! We ended up having to drive through the east entrance of Grand Canyon National Park to get to our hotel (which was just outside the south entrance of the park). I do NOT recommend driving through the Grand Canyon at 11 o' clock at night. It was pretty creepy. We finally got to our hotel at about 11:30 and went straight to bed!

Day 4 - The Grand Canyon

We slept in and relaxed all morning. We ate a ridiculously expensive McDonald's lunch and then headed to see the Grand Canyon. Boy was it GRAND! Especially at sunset. It was a bit chillier than we were expecting, but so worth it. We headed back to Tusayan and ate at a delicious Mexican restaurant and called it a day.

Day 5 - The Last Leg

We drove to New Mexico, today! Woo! Along the way, we happened upon Meteor Crater and HAD to stop and see it. Kent was mega-nerd excited about it! It was a fun little side-journey and super impressive. 

Apollo Test Capsule - Astronauts trained for the Apollo Missions here.

Meteor Crater

Largest piece of the meteorite that has been recovered.

We hit the road again, and besides stopping for some food, we basically just pounded out the rest of our drive.

We made it to New Mexico!

 We checked in to our hotel, picked up a couple of groceries, and just relaxed in our room. We are already missing our home, but really excited for the next couple months.