Back To The Lone Star State

I hope you don’t mind, I have put the whole trip together before releasing it to the blog. It seems to be more cohesive this way, hence why I’m so tardy with its delivery.

9/9 After a summer spent welcoming our new granddaughter into this world and enjoying family in the wilds of Watsonville, CA we departed for Texas with a few stops along the road which I will now regale you with. Our trip here was 2,412 miles of meandering and of course our return trip will be more of the same but a bit shorter, only 2,245 miles.

We pushed through the Mohave desert where we stopped overnight and then through the city of sin, Las Vegas until we hit Hurricane, UT. Our thinking was, how can you name a town Hurricane when they could never possibly have one, this far from the coast. Well some Mormon farmer had his wagon blown off the side of a hill by a strong wind while overlooking the valley below where he had settled, hence the name.  Anyway, the motorhome was not blown over, we just parked it in the valley and used this place to kick off our exploration of Zion and Bryce Canyon.

Zion, Looking for Peace

9/12 I know this has taken me while to put this together, but there are so many photos and I want to pick the ones that came out giving the best impression of what we saw. We started our tour of Zion by taking a bus tour into the canyon (no private vehicles allowed). This tour included a 20 minute film with a discussion of the founding of the park and some geological facts. I highly recommend viewing this.

The first impressive formation was the Court of the Patriarchs as seen below.




Court of the Patriarchs - Zion National Park



There are many bus stops through the canyon and you can get on or off as many times as you like. The longest wait seems to be about 9 minutes between buses. Each of the stops feature a hiking trail off to somewhere. Sure wish we had the capability to do some of those hikes. We settled for taking some snaps from the nearby vista points.

The end of the bus trail is at the Temple of Sinawava where the Virgin River comes out of the canyon and of course there is a hiking trail up along the river. We just took this picture looking up the canyon along the trail. What you cannot see is that the Virgin River is flowing along to our left.



We then drove around to Kolob Canyon which is a 50 mile drive out and around onto the I15 where the views were just as spectacular. This part of the trip was done in our truck, no buses in this part of the park.

 I will include a photo that we took on our way through Zion on our way to Bryce Canyon a couple of days later, but it was in Zion so here is Checker Board Mesa.

Checkerboard Mesa - Zion National Park

A Golf Day

9/13 I took some time to play golf at Sky Mountain Golf Course in Hurricane. Although the course was challenging, the views sure played havoc with my concentration.



Sky Mountain Golf Course - Hurricane, UT



Bryce Canyon

9/14 We are up bright and early eager to start our next leg to explore Bryce Canyon. Our route will again take us through Zion National Park and through the one mile tunnel that was cut through the mountain during the depression as part of the WPA. Past Checkerboard Mesa and on into Bryce Canyon.

Here there is much more of the red rocks prevalent and it sure shows up in the photos.

Again as in Zion, there is a shuttle bus, however it is not compulsory so we bypassed and took the truck on our own tour. We started with Sunrise Point where they had a good sized lodge. Normally we try and visit these lodges, but opted to bypass and just enjoy the views.



Sunrise Point - Bryce National Park



We had to walk up a bit of a hill an all of a sudden this appeared through the trees, it was breathtaking. We did wander around and took many more photos, but knew we had more ground to cover and off we went with our next stop at Bryce Point.



Bryce Point

This was even more breathtaking and I really can’t tell you how many photos we took here, but it was quite a few. As many as we took there just isn’t enough to do the view justice. Again we could have stood there for hours just soaking it in. We stopped at almost every view point there was along the roadway and I’m not going to overwhelm you with a photo from each, however I will give you a few more that we really enjoyed, like the natural bridge.



Natural Bridge - Bryce National Park

The last photo I’ll leave you with from Bryce is Rainbow Point which is the end of the road at an elevation of 9,115 ft.

 

Rainbow Point - Bryce National Park

Back on the Road

9/15 Our intention was to stop at Jacob Lake and go down and view the Grand Canyon from the north rim but with recent heavy rains and possibility of snow in the higher elevations, we decided to backtrack and go back through Las Vegas and down through Kingman where we would pickup I40 and head for Albuquerque our next destination. Along the way, we spotted signs for the Grand Canyon Skywalk, so you can guess where we next stopped. 

Grand Canyon Skywalk

9/16 I will tell you that the Grand Canyon Skywalk is very expensive and I’ve read many comments that it is not worth the price but that said “it’s a once in a lifetime type of thing.” Once you have been there you would not want to go back. After getting off highway 93 at Dolan Springs, there is another 50 miles to drive to the Canyon of which 9 miles are unpaved. If you do plan on going there it might be paved, they were working on it. Anyway you have to take a bus to the two view points and a ranch (no private vehicles) and you have to pay for the bus. If you want to go out on the walk, you have to pay for that also and if you buy the full package, it includes lunch as well as a drive down into the canyon (we went as far as the lunch). You can’t carry anything out on the skywalk (no cameras, phones, etc.) so of course if you want a photo you have to buy one of theirs.

Hangin' out over the Grand Canyon

This one only cost us a mere $30. Notice the booties we had to wear. And yes, that is the Colorado River behind us. You can see that there is an opaque border but the center is clear glass.

Grand Canyon West Skywalk

It is an interesting structure and after watching a special on TV on the construction, I was staggered by the cost and amazed that they were able to get the materials out to the location over that dirt road.

Colorado River Grand Canyon West

This is located on a side canyon but it is still quite stunning. Yes, It was worth the stop and no, we will probably bypass the next time through.

Painted Desert / Petrified Desert

9/17 We got an early start the on our way so when we stopped at Root 66 RV Park which is touted as the closest park to the Petrified Forrest, we decided it was worth a return trip to this wonderful park for some more pictures. We had stopped here back in 2001 and had really enjoyed it. Our last go through was with the RV, so we knew it could be done as an easy drive.

Painted Desert - Petrified National Forrest Arizona

I guess after Bryce Canyon it seems a little subdued, but we still think it to be beautiful. This is the top half of the park while the lower half contain the Petrified Forrest, it too has some beauty.

And of course we can’t leave out a chunk of wood, can we?

This would wreck a chain saw for sure!

9/18 And we are on the way into Albuquerque for a few days with our good friends Bill & Pat and of course some golf. We are chuggin’ along and

Who said Granny don't drive?

Our arrival in Albuquerque was more for visiting friends than sightseeing but we did get to do a bit of that . Our first surprise was in our choice of campgrounds. We stayed at the Enchanted Trails RV park and Trading Post. Have you ever heard of it? Well it was featured on a TV show about unusual RV’s in that they had a section of the park where they had several restored RV’s that they rent out for you to stay in like renting a cabin. We did not realize it until we pulled into the park and drove past the section and I remarked “that looks awfully familiar.”

9/21 We had to take a trip up to Santa Fe and how can you go from Albuquerque without taking the Turquoise Trail (Hwy 14) with a stop in Madrid to see the latest in jewelry etc. Our friends who returned to Albuquerque to settle had never gone this route to Santa Fe and really enjoyed it.

And yes, a cup of coffee is always welcome along the trail.

9/22 -25 we continued on our way through Clovis, NM into the panhandle of Texas and headed towards Bandera where we connected with Alan. Our plans were to play some golf and visit with old friends Charlie & Loretta, as well as Ken & Willie that had settled over by Lake Medina.

Al and I took some time and drove out to see the lake. The powers that be had taken advantage of the drought to do some repair work on the dam and had drained the lake in 2011. Well the work was completed but the drought continued and as you can see by the picture I took of Al standing in front of the lake…..

Directly behind Al is the boat ramp down into the lake and the road you see off in the distance is completely under water? I guess it will be a few years (they hope) before the lake returns.

9/28  After some wonderful golf and dinners with our friends we (Al included) headed off to Johnson City to visit with some more friends, Dave and Nan. Here, we did not stop at a campground, we just pulled into their Ranch and parked near their house for a couple of days. We thought it would be nice to bring them a nice little bit of rain since they had been suffering from the drought also. I sure hope they appreciated it.

Sure was nice to sit atop a hill and look out and enjoy the view with the old goats. Oops, sorry, Dave I wasn’t talkin’ about you. They do have a herd of goats that are guarded by a donkey?

 

Who keeps those coyotes and other pesky critters away.

Pat was fascinated by the enormous live oak trees, of which there were several and they were majestic to say the least.

10/1 We said goodbye to the goats and a thank you to Dave and Nan. Alan headed off to visit his son and would return to his home near us in the Pharr and we turned south to return to our home park in Edcouch. It was a long summer and we had a wonderful time but here is the best of the best.

Our Granddaughter Anouk is 4 months old, we have been gone a month and miss her terribly already.

So that is our travel blog and we hope that you have enjoyed it.

Pat & Tom

A Bike Tour

8/19 Yes, a bike tour! We have not been on a bike ride in years so, you can imagine that even a short four and a half mile ride is a major triumph for us.

We parked the truck along business route 1 across from the Naval Postgraduate School and started peddling towards Cannery row. Along the way we passed a parking lot that was loaded with old time cars that had been through an auction presented by Russo and Steele. Any of you car nuts have seen this on TV with collector automobiles going for very high prices.

After admiring the hundreds of cars, we continued on our way along the bay towards Canary Row only to come another spot we had to stop and take some more pictures.

Here we found some naked sunbathers out on the rocks enjoying the beautiful day. Many were frolicking in the water while others just lay about on the rocks and in the background were some wonderful buildings built up on the docks.

So many distractions, it’s amazing that we did make it all the way to the end of Cannery Row. We had some pizza down by the aquarium and took some snaps looking up along Cannery Row to prove that we had been there, also because we liked the view.

Did you notice that bit of brown building on the left? Well that’s where Doc lived and worked.

Don’t know Doc? Guess you are going to have to read some of Steinbeck’s work. Doc was his best friend and appears in the novels “Cannery Row” and “Sweet Thursday.”

That was mile 2.25 and the return trip was much the same as we saw on the way out so I’m closing with saying that we got home and realized it’s been years since we did that much biking and we knew it. Also, before I close I have to tell you about the camera we used for the photos. It’s our new phones. We just got the Galaxy S4 and they come with a 13megapixel camera. For general pictures, they sure fit the bill.

Now part of it is an Aquarium

6/23 You’ve heard about Cannery Row, well that has been turned into a tourist attraction which contains a lot of restaurants and gift shops and at the end of it all there is one of the finest aquariums that we have ever visited. It cost a pretty penny to get in, so instead of paying the entry fee, we joined and now we can visit anytime. After all, it’s only about 25 miles from us. They do change the exhibits occasionally and the current big attraction are “Exotic Jellies” which are Jelly Fish from all over the world.

 



Watching these Jelly Fish swim through the water is mesmerizing and we could just stand there all day watching the dance. These were just a few of the many species throughout the exhibit. This was just the start of an amazing day.

Another of the favorite spots for folks to sit and watch were the otters. It seems they never run out of time to play. Do you think it’s because they know they have an audience? To be honest, I’ve seen them out in the bay far enough away that I’m sure they don’t know they have people watching and they seem to do the same antics as they do in the tank at the aquarium. I wonder if they ever grow up.

We continued on through the Aquarium and enjoyed many more of the exhibits including Kelp Beds, Penguins, many schools of fish of which I would love to show some pictures, but alas I put the camera in my pocket and just enjoyed the views so I have none to show you. It looks like we have to go back, now that we are members, and take some more pictures to share. Oh yes, before I put the camera away I did capture some species that had escaped and were running loose. They happened to be trapped on one of the outside balconies and I did capture these photos. I believe they are referred to  as Homo Sapiens Aged.

 

A "Grand" Father's Day

6/14 It has been 3 weeks and a few days since the arrival of our granddaughter Anouk Grace Cooper, born May 22. She came into this world at a whopping 8 lbs. 2ozs. and continues to grow. She and mother  were treated for an infection with antibiotics keeping them in the hospital for an extended period after birth, so it was a bit of a traumatic experience to say the least. They are home and things are going along well and of course she is the most beautiful baby ever born, just ask me. Grandma is having a blast and is doing all the grandma stuff. Me, I’m just sitting back taking it all in and yes, enjoying this wonderful bundle of joy.

Anouk Grace Cooper

We had the family over to the campground for Father’s Day and had a nice quite dinner and of course Anouk did demand her bit of feast, which her mother was able to supply. Afterwards, we stepped outside for some family photos.

The Proud New Parents Jim & Cory

We plan on being here for a few more weeks but we're not looking forward to leaving, I know grandma sure isn’t going to want to leave. Of course you know grandpa can leave anytime (yeah, right).



"Yeah kid, that's your grandpa!"

Ok, I’m going to explain her name just because I get asked a lot. Anouk is a French and Dutch diminutive of the female given name Anna. It is fairly popular in the Netherlands, used but not as popular in Belgium and France.

Yes, I had a GRAND Father’s Day!

A Visit From the Past

6/13 We had a visit from some remaining members of the Ohlone Native Tribe to our little campground here at Pinto Lake in Watsonville. I’ll bet most of you have never heard of them and for good reason. They have not been recognized by our government as a native tribe, however, they are recognized by many and even have their own website http://ohlonecostanoanesselennation.org/ which is kind of cool. Of course their decline is blamed on the Spanish Missions, which destroyed their way of life. Anyway, we had a visit from some of their tribal folks who demonstrated the construction of one of their canoes. I guess it’s one of those boats you just sit atop and paddle.

Guess Where We Had Lunch?

6/12 Here we sit in the front parlor of the boyhood home of John Steinbeck waiting for our lunch to arrive. While we are waiting, we look around and see many items that would have adorned the old home including portraits of his parents. The home has been restored to its former glory (assuming that it did have a former glory) and I have to say it was very well done. As you can see.

This restaurant and gift shop are run by volunteers with only 3 paid positions (Manager, Chef & dishwasher). All of the dishes are made from locally grown produce. The house is just a few blocks from the National Steinbeck Center located in the center of Historic Salinas. As for the lunch, it was delicious and the ambiance made the price seem “worth it.”

The Center was very well laid out and we thoroughly  enjoyed it. Basically, the exhibits were laid out in the time line of Mr. Steinbeck’s life. He was quite the literary giant, and his writing drew from his life in and around the Salinas Valley. I’m throwing in the photo of the Model T because it reminds of a story often told by my father who was but a year older than John Steinbeck.

My father’s story tells of his trip in a similar car from Michigan to California, but I’ll save that for another time. As you walk through the exhibits, you get a feel for what Mr. Steinbeck experienced and what brought about the stories that he wrote. You could feel the grit in those tales and understand how the local folks could actually go out and burn copies of the “Grapes of Wrath” when it was released. There is an exhibit for each of his literary works, with bits playing from a screen play or just someone reading from a story. A visit to that center certainly opened my eyes to more insight into the man, John Steinbeck than any discussion in any of my English classes back in my school days. I do remember that I disliked reading his works in school, perhaps because they were so gritty or not whimsical. I’m not sure if I now want to go back and re-read some of his books or just try to bring my writing up to his level (nice to have a dream).

Side Trip to China

5/17 Not quite all the way to china, just as far as San Francisco. We visited the Asian Art Museum where they were displaying some of the terracotta warriors that were unearthed in China  in 1974. These warriors stood guard near the tomb mound of the great Emperor Qin. It is said that the more than 6000 figures each have individual features. It is said that they used eight face molds but each one had additional clay added to change the features to each face. (I used a lot of “it is said” which translates to this is what is written on the displays) The display had only a few figures to represent the army that was uncovered, but among the display was a General, another high ranking officer as well as some

Calvary, foot soldiers, an archer and horses. This young emperor assumed the throne at age 13 and unified all of china by the age of 49 when he died. We are not saying that he was not ruthless in his approach, but he brought about a standard currency and weights and measures. Not bad for such a short lifespan. There were also some artifacts that came from the tomb of the emperor that would be for his enjoyment in the afterlife, one would imagine. Care for some tea with the emperor?

The display was coming to an end and we were glad we got to see the warriors before they were packed up and shipped to Houston, their only other destination in the US.

We continued our tour of the museum by going to the third floor to see other parts of Asia such as India and Japan. We think back to history and the knights of old with their armor and then we look at those terracotta warriors with their armor, now look at this Japanese warrior and his armor.



While interesting, it certainly brings home that we human beings do seem to like this thing called war. This is one of the finest museums we have ever visited and you can certainly spend a lot of time here. It depends on how much time you want to devote to any particular subject, but we were tired and did not make it to the second floor, we were just too pooped out.