You'll never be going back home

Au contraire, mon frère - I just got home after just under four hours of straight driving from Page.

When I set out on the trip I'd planned to stay away 1, 2 or 3 nights, depending on how I felt. I was having a great time and going strong with plans for fourth day when I suddenly hit the wall. After Antelope Canyon I went to Horseshoe Bend and what deserved to be a great experience (it truly is a magnificent sight) only felt like a pretty good one - my mind was simply saturated. Full with too many recent fantastic things to accept any more.

I went back to the car and plotted two routes: Bryce Canyon, Utah, and home. Bryce was closer, but still several hours away. And, in the opposite direction. So, I decided to leave Bryce Canyon for another trip, but before I headed home I checked out the Glen Canyon Dam and Lake Powell. Looks very similar to the Hoover Dam and Lake Mead.

In summary, a fantastic trip: 3 days, 3 states , 1,090 miles (1,750 km) and 594 songs roundtrip.

Light and Magic

I just returned from my visit to Antelope Canyon, just outside Page, AZ. Another great experience. I took a 1.5 hour guided tour and picked the 11:30 AM time because I'd learned that the lighting is best in the middle of the day when the sun is right above and can reach the bottom of the narrow slot canyon.

And, it it truly amazing - there are several places where thin beams of light - no larger than a dinner plate - come down, and create an even more pronounced effect when the guide throws a handful of sand in the air.

The canyon, which is about 400 yards long, has been created through erosion and gets flooded several times a year - usually during monsoon season in August. You can how see the rocks have been shaped by water rushing through the canyon.

Navajos, Nature and Nearly no bed for the night

First, I’m writing this Friday night in my motel room, but I won’t be able to post this until tomorrow – no Internet here. More about my lodging later.

Started out at the Best Western in Gallup and immediately hit the road with my eyes set on Navajo Nation. The Navajo reservation is the largest in the country and spans parts of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah. (About one fourth the size of Arizona and one seventh the size of Sweden.)

Three interesting tidbits about the Navajo:

- They don’t call themselves Navajo, they are Diné. Navajo is a word other tribes used to describe them.

- Only women own property

- They observe Daylight Saving Time, which causes confusion since the rest of Arizona does not. (To make matters worse, the Hopi reservation, which is fully contained inside the Navajo reservation, does not observe Daylight Saving Time.)

I quickly disposed of Window Rock (capital of Navajo Nation) and the Hubbell Trading Post – neither very interesting – and moved onto the first great experience of the day: Canyon de Chelly National Monument. Much smaller than the Grand Canyon, but in some ways a more interesting experience – at least from the rim. The Grand Canyon is so big, so wide and so deep, and the inner canyon is so far down and away that it’s hard to see much of what’s going on down there. Here, the canyon walls go straight down to the bottom of the canyon (about 1,000 feet / 300 m) where you can see the river, trees and Indian ruins.

My second major stop was Monument Valley, and what an incredible place that is! Impossible to describe and pictures don’t do it justice. All I can say is this: go, go, go, and do take the 2.5 hour guided tour.

It’s expensive ($70) but well worth the price. You get to sit in an open air 4WD vehicle (extended jeep or converted pickup truck) instead of driving your own car on a pretty miserable unpaved road (I started on my own, but found myself completely focused on the road instead of the scenery so I turned around and decided to splurge) and the Navajo guide takes you to a number of places you’re not allowed to go on your own (about 1 hour of the total tour). And, your guide may wear a T-shirt saying “How do you like your pussy?” I’m not kidding. It also had a lot of cats on it.

Also, I recommend visiting at the beginning or the end of the day when the light is best. By the time the tour was done, it was getting dark and I was pretty spent after much of the day out in the sun. I had originally planned to drive to Page, AZ, but was too tired for a 2.5 hour drive in the dark so I started looking for a motel. After having tried three different ones that were either pricier than I wanted (Holiday Inn $160…) or sold out, I started getting a bit desperate. My Navigation system said that there was one more motel ahead of me, and then nothing before Page, so I pretty much had to stay there as long as they had room. Well, let’s just say it was a $29-motel that charged $106 for a room. My room was in what they described as a “villa”, which turned out to be a something that looked like mobile home with paper-thin walls, a tiny room (the bed took up most of it) and a shower that could best be described as dripping, rather than flowing.

But, it had a functioning (albeit small) TV and I was able to watch the 4th quarter of the Celtics – Pistons game and see my Celtics advance to the NBA finals for the first time in 21 years. Life is good.

Get Your Kicks on Route 66

I believe today is shaping up to be Homage Day. I've been getting my kicks on Route 66 from Flagstaff Arizona (don't forget Winona) to Gallup New Mexico, and I've been standing on the corner in Winslow, Arizona. And, now I'm sitting in a coffee shop in downtown Gallup and it's a bit bizarre: me, the owner, his son, and a six-piece stringband that just busted into some Creedence:

Big wheel keep on turning,
Proud Mary keep on burning,
Rolling, rolling, rolling on the river

Six distinguished, older countryside gentlemen rocking their hearts out: four acoustic guitars (three finger-pickers and one slide guitar), one conga drum and one guy playing the "bass" on a homemade one-string instrument where one end of the string is tied to a large up-side-down brushed steel vat (for resonance) and the other end tied to a six-foot wooden pole, which he moves back and forth to control the pitch by adjusting the tension of the string. Just brilliant. I wish I hadn't left the camera in the car!

But, I'm getting ahead of myself. I took off from home a few minutes after seven this morning, and put on some Sufjan Stevens tunes for the departure. An iPod filled with goodies in a car filled with anticipation. Fought my way through the usual morning traffic on the 101 and headed north on the familiar 2-hour and 7,000-foot (~2,000 m) slow incline to Flagstaff. As I turned eastward on I-40 – with Flagstaff and the snow-covered San Francisco Peaks in my rearview mirror I realized I was covering new ground. Although, the flat, dry, yellow, high prairie, interspersed with protruding rust-colored earth and rocks felt familiar, as I’ve driven through the Painted Desert, closeby, before, on my way to the Grand Canyon.

Next stop: Metor Crater, maybe a half-hour east of Flag. Quite an impressive sight in the middle of the desert. The crater, created by a 150-foot (45 m) meteor impact some 50,000 years ago, is nothing but massive. 700 feet (~200 m) deep and 4,000 feet (1,200 m) across. You can't walk into the crater, but you can walk around the rim and look down into the center using several well-placed telescopes, one of them pointing to a life-size cutout figure of an astronaut(!) at the bottom, and it really helps you understand just how large the crater is.



Back into the car and on to Winslow. The old Route 66 was built in the 1920s and connected Chicago and LA, but has now been replaced by Interstate Highways. Officially, Route 66 is no more, but in several places, the old highway is now marked with signs for Historic Route 66. Well, Historic Route 66 goes right through Winslow, which is known to most people through the Eagles song Take It Easy:

Well, I'm a standin' on a corner in Winslow, Arizona,
and such a fine sight to see
It's a girl, my Lord, in a flatbed Ford,
slowin' down to take a look at me

And, here it is.



After Winslow, I drove to the Petrified Forest: a National Park 225 million years in the making. During the Triassic Era (apparently the one just before the Jurassic) this area was a rainforest (and all the continents still connected - Pangea) and trees that were washed away in a flood, were buried in sand gravel and sediment. Then, over millions of years, silica crept into the cellulose and crystallized and replace the wood cell by cell; forming rock, quartz, amethysts and other semi-precious stones. More recently (geologically speaking) erosion ate away from above and exposed the petrified trees so we can see them now. Unfortunately, over the last 100 years or so, people have been removing (stealing) much of the petrified wood. Even though the park is protected by park rangers, they estimate that visitors steal about 1 ton every month.

In addition to the petrified trees, the landscape in several areas of the park is very interesting: badland hills, mesas, crazy rock formations in layered colors. Impossible to describe, really, and unfortunately hard to capture in pictures. Here's one.

Then I drove to Gallup, NM, where I plan to spend the night before going into Navajo Nation tomorrow. Oh, I just noticed that the band has a new member - a woman on double-bass. And, one of the finger-pickers has switched from guitar to the banjo. Now I just need to figure out whether I'm having the time of my life or whether I need to prepare to squeal like a pig. Weeeeee! (If you're confused - don't worry. It just means you haven't seen the movie Deliverance. Consider yourself lucky.)

Here we go, I guess

Ok - I'm finally coming around to the fact that blogging may not only be for self-indulgent poseurs whose egos are desperately screaming "Look at me, ma! No hands!" Or, perhaps I've just succumbed to the fact we all have a bit of that inside of us. We'll see.

Anyway, I don't expect to update this too often - I mostly plan to use it as a way to share pictures from trips and other events. An online photoalbum with some commentary, if you will. I was inspired by my buddy Allen Snyder's account of his cross-country road trip a few weeks back: http://snydesapalooza.blogspot.com/. Thanks Allen - you've helped me turn into the a-hole I've tried so hard to avoid becoming!

Well, I'm planning to make a road trip - in my new ride, the Infiniti G35 Monster - up to the Northeastern part of Arizona: Navajo Nation and all that. I'm leaving tomorrow and plan to be away for 2-4 days depending on how much I enjoy it. Assuming I have online access I'll update the blog throughout the trip - otherwise it'll be when I get back.