Today we traveled 445 miles and spent the entire day in Colorado traveling from Cortez, CO to Colorado Springs, CO.  Along the way we made two quite interesting stops.

The first stop was at the Mesa Verde National Park.  This is the only National Park dedicated to preserving the “works of man” rather than something in nature.  These are incredible ancestral homes of the Pueblo people from over 700 years ago.  It is amazing at how well they are preserved and the architectural details and structures used back then.

The second stop was at the newest national park, the Great Sand Dunes National Park.  These sand dunes were created by winds picking up sand from glaciers and depositing it all at one stop along the Rocky Mountains.  Just like the Grand Canyon, it is hard to describe and capture the size and expanse of these sand dunes.   I took a video trying to capture the dunes better.  You can see it at http://youtu.be/KW51M5xI8Co . You can see some people as small dots to give you some idea as to the size of the dunes.  The dunes cover 30 square miles.  We all enjoyed this stop and would have liked to stay longer.

Today we woke up to explore the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.  Before breakfast we walked out to Angel Point, a spot that reaches out into the canyon for some amazing views.  The vastness and beauty of the Grand Canyon is incredible and impossible to capture in a picture.

After breakfast, we again “encouraged” the girls to join us on a hike along the rim of the Grand Canyon.  The girls have now caught on that our “short walks” usually end up being hikes around 1.5 to 2.0 miles long, which should not be a problem.  After returning from our hike we checked out of our cabin (we again enjoyed another cabin in the National Park System) and went for a drive along the canyon.  The girls refused to get out for any more “walks” with the exception of seeing Angels Window, which is part of the canyon creating a natural bridge/window in a protrusion from the rim.

As we approached mid-day we headed out of the Grand Canyon National Park.  As we did we encountered an amazing storm.  It had a lot of rain and the temperature dropped to around 42 degrees (approximately 40 degrees cooler than when we left).  At one point we actually saw some snow or sleet on the edge of the road.

For the rest of the afternoon we made a mad dash across Arizona into Colorado.  The drive had a number of beautiful sights.  As we have seen in some of our previous drives in the West, it is amazing as to how far you can see.  The girls learned about how you can look across the landscape and can see rain coming down miles away.  Throughout our drive we encountered some heavy rains and witness the results of flash flooding on some roads.  Thank goodness for Rain-x!

In traveling through Arizona we managed catch a glimpse of part of the Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park.  These stone formations look amazing, especially as we approached sundown and even from a distance as we drove by.

Despite our quick progress, we unfortunately missed our opportunity to stand at the Four Corners National Monument, where four states come together.  Access to the monument closes at 8:00 p.m. and we did not reach it until 8:50 p.m.  We did stop to take a picture with the sign and then completed our 382 miles for the day in Cortez, CO.

One additional sight we were blessed with during the last part of our drive was watching the moon rise.  At first, because of its size, the girls refused to believe that it was the moon.  However, as we continued to drive it rose in the sky and grew brighter since it was almost a full moon.

Due to our late arrival in Cortez the girls were treated to their first late-night trip to Denny’s.  Both girls enjoyed a Value Slam breakfast for dinner

Today we packed in a tremendous amount of traveling (262 miles) and national park visits.  From our Cedar City, UT starting spot we travelled up to the Cedar Breaks National Park canyon, which is very similar to Bryce Canyon National Park, but not as well-known by visitors.  We enjoyed the view of the rim of the canyon at Point Supreme which is 10,350 feet above sea level.  The picture of Karen below taken by reaching up over my head to get the canyon behind her is one of my favorites from our trip so far.  We went on a short hike along the ridge of the canyon, which to our surprise was a much wooded area.  Although the girls were not thrilled to start our day with another hike, Karen and I really enjoyed the walk through the rim-side forest.  Karen continued to be our tour guide providing lots of information along the way.  We completed our hike just as a thunder storm rolled in.

From there we retraced our route back down and around to Cedar City due to road closures (one from a rock slide in the fall and another from mudslides in recent flash flooding).  Our next stop was part of the Zion National Park.  We once again “strongly encouraged” the girls to join us for a hike.  By this time the sun was out, the temperature was warmer, and the scenery was gorgeous.

Our last stop would be for the night.  We spent the rest of the afternoon driving to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.  We were very fortunate to be able to secure a cabin in the national park just a week prior to our visit after a few calls to check on availability.  This ended up being a real benefit since it takes about 45 minutes to an hour to travel into the park.  We reached the park in late afternoon, which was a great time to travel in the park.  We stopped three times on the way in for deer to cross our path.

Our stay in the Grand Canyon National Park was in a nice little cabin.  As we quickly unpacked and headed off to our dinner reservation in the lodge we learned that Arizona does not follow daylight savings time.  Thus the hour we thought we had lost travelling today we gained back by showing up an hour early for our dinner reservation.  Fortunately we were able to get a table and have dinner as we watched the sunset over the canyon.

As we explored the North Rim area a little after dinner to get a feel for the area we were blessed with a clear evening with a full moon.  It was amazing to see the bright moon shining over the canyon, quite a beautiful way to end our day.

After seeing a number of places and enjoying our trip out to the west coast we now have to start the rapid trip back across the country.  Today we traveled 551 miles from Santa Barbara, CA to Cedar City, UT.  The entire day was spent driving with a brief stop in Las Vegas, NV.  We wanted to show the girls the strip and give them an abbreviated taste of Las Vegas.  We spent an hour walking through the lobbies and casinos in Paris and the Bellagio.  This also gave us the opportunity to see the famous Bellagio fountain show before resuming our trip east.  Reaching Cedar City, UT prepared us for our national park visits tomorrow.

This is the Chihuly glass ceiling in the lobby of the Bellagio.

Ahhh.. today was the first day I did not drive at all.  We spent a relaxing day in Santa Barbara, CA with Karen’s Aunt Sue as our host.  Our day included a visit to the Santa Barbara Mission, a walk through downtown Santa Barbara to the wharf and a walk on the beach to put our feet in the Pacific Ocean.  It was a nice, slow-paced day and is the first time we spent the night in the same place for two nights in a row.

This morning Karen and I took a short walk on the Cambria, CA boardwalk along the Pacific Ocean.  It is beautiful but was largely hidden by the morning fog.  As a family we then headed down Route 1 to take a tour of Hearst Castle, the former home of William Randolph Hearst.  It is an amazing residence and story of its construction with all of the ceilings, fireplaces and artwork purchased and moved over from Europe.  And to think it was never finished to his vision!

After our tour, a walk around the grounds, and a quick lunch along the shore we traveled the remaining 141 miles down the coast to Santa Barbara, CA to visit Karen’s Aunt Sue.  This will be our turn around point after travelling 4,702 miles.  In evening we enjoyed a home cooked meal and a relaxing evening watching the Olympics.