After a good night’s sleep I decided there is no way I’m missing the Grand Canyon. I’ve never seen it, and this trip needs a grand finale.
Also, as we were driving, we noticed a sign for Meteor Crater, one of the best preserved meteor impact sites in the world. This was something new and exciting to see – and it’s only 6 miles off the main highway. We really enjoyed the hands-on museum. Kaelyn and Justin had fun simulating meteor crashes into various planets by varying the size, density, speed, and angle of impact, although it was quite disturbing to me that Justin enjoyed blowing up our planet. The crater was quite distinct, and it really got us thinking about what would happen if we discovered another big one headed our way. It’s nice to know that people are watching.
With that stop, it took us until afternoon to get to Flagstaff, and I was almost afraid we wouldn’t make it to the Grand Canyon before dusk. But we did and it was worth it. I don’t know what else to say about the Grand Canyon, because you’ve probably seen pictures of it, but the first time you see it live – it is pretty apparent why it’s one of the seven wonders of the world. My first glimpse of the canyon was stunning. I had to re-adjust my eyes and just take it in for awhile. On a clear day you can see the depth in a way that is hard to capture on postcards. I can see how people spend hours camping, hiking, and just enjoying the park for days, but it was actually quite easy to drive in, spend about 20 – 30 minutes looking at the south rim view, and drive back out again. I think this was easy for us because we arrived so late in the afternoon and most people had left for the day.
One thing we did NOT expect was the big fire we saw on the drive in. It looked like there was a fire in the Grand Canyon and maybe we wouldn’t be able to see it. Turns out, they do a lot of controlled burns in that area, and this was one of them. We got to drive by and see the little fires by the road and the firemen monitoring them. I tried to explain the concept of setting fires to prevent fires to the kids, and they seemed to get it because they began to play a game of “bad trees, good trees” as we drove through the park.
I still wanted to get home, so I decided to drive west for awhile. Of course the kids wanted to get to a hotel early enough to swim, but I told them it would be fun to see all the stars in the sky since we were in such a remote area, and I promised if we got to a hotel too late to swim I’d let them swim first thing in the morning. Unfortunately there was a big cloud cover over the sky that night and we couldn’t see any stars. The sunset was absolutely beautiful, but then it was pitch black out, and really hard to take advantage of the higher speed limits. I wanted to stop in a decent sized town, so we went as far as Kingman and found a really nice, clean, motel for our last night.
Also, as we were driving, we noticed a sign for Meteor Crater, one of the best preserved meteor impact sites in the world. This was something new and exciting to see – and it’s only 6 miles off the main highway. We really enjoyed the hands-on museum. Kaelyn and Justin had fun simulating meteor crashes into various planets by varying the size, density, speed, and angle of impact, although it was quite disturbing to me that Justin enjoyed blowing up our planet. The crater was quite distinct, and it really got us thinking about what would happen if we discovered another big one headed our way. It’s nice to know that people are watching.
With that stop, it took us until afternoon to get to Flagstaff, and I was almost afraid we wouldn’t make it to the Grand Canyon before dusk. But we did and it was worth it. I don’t know what else to say about the Grand Canyon, because you’ve probably seen pictures of it, but the first time you see it live – it is pretty apparent why it’s one of the seven wonders of the world. My first glimpse of the canyon was stunning. I had to re-adjust my eyes and just take it in for awhile. On a clear day you can see the depth in a way that is hard to capture on postcards. I can see how people spend hours camping, hiking, and just enjoying the park for days, but it was actually quite easy to drive in, spend about 20 – 30 minutes looking at the south rim view, and drive back out again. I think this was easy for us because we arrived so late in the afternoon and most people had left for the day.
One thing we did NOT expect was the big fire we saw on the drive in. It looked like there was a fire in the Grand Canyon and maybe we wouldn’t be able to see it. Turns out, they do a lot of controlled burns in that area, and this was one of them. We got to drive by and see the little fires by the road and the firemen monitoring them. I tried to explain the concept of setting fires to prevent fires to the kids, and they seemed to get it because they began to play a game of “bad trees, good trees” as we drove through the park.
I still wanted to get home, so I decided to drive west for awhile. Of course the kids wanted to get to a hotel early enough to swim, but I told them it would be fun to see all the stars in the sky since we were in such a remote area, and I promised if we got to a hotel too late to swim I’d let them swim first thing in the morning. Unfortunately there was a big cloud cover over the sky that night and we couldn’t see any stars. The sunset was absolutely beautiful, but then it was pitch black out, and really hard to take advantage of the higher speed limits. I wanted to stop in a decent sized town, so we went as far as Kingman and found a really nice, clean, motel for our last night.
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