Grand Canyon, Beaver, and Home

I. The Grand Canyon: We left our hotel in Holbrook, AZ at 7am and drove the almost 2.5 hours to the Grand Canyon South Rim, entering from the east on 64. We stopped at the Desert View visitor's center on the east side of the park and saw our first Grand Canyon panorama. It was breathtaking and big and beautiful! We were in awe. Thunderstorms were in the very near forecast, however, so we nixed our family bike ride plans and stopped at several canyon viewpoints as we drove west on 64 along the south rim. From the road, the canyon rim was mostly hidden by scrubby pine trees, so it wasn't a very scenic drive. Every time a brief canyon view opened up through the trees, we yelled "NATURE!" and pointed or tapped or smacked the window. It was silly, but our kids are so used to totally zoning out on car rides that they weren't even looking out the window much on their own before we started the nature shouting. We unplugged all screens and stories when we entered the park as well, to encourage nature appreciation.

Amber was disgruntled that there wasn't an actual playground in Grand Canyon National Park. She calls playgrounds "parks" and is always flummoxed at the lack of play structure whenever we go to a national park. At Grandview Point (or was it Grandview Viewpoint? Vista? I can't remember), we hiked a tenth of a mile on the Grandview Trail down below the rim. One tenth of a mile is not far, but it was so steep and rocky, we were all pretty winded by the time we had hiked that tenth of a mile back out again! Haha. Grand Canyon hiking is not for the fainthearted. I'm glad we got to dip our toes below the rim of the canyon, even if it was just barely.

When we arrived at the main South Rim visitor's center, a black thundercloud was blowing in from the south, and the place was crawling with people. We walked almost a mile along the paved flat rim path and admired the Mather viewpoint. Then we saw distant lightning in the looming dark cloud and decided to head outta there. After all of that extra driving, we only spent 2 hours in the Grand Canyon National Park!! 99% of visitors spend less than 4 hours in the park. I disliked being part of that statistic, but we did what we could with the time and energy we had. It was later in the day when we arrived and therefore too warm and also too potentially stormy for any real hikes below the rim. 

Jeff and I decided that the Black Canyon of the Gunnison was more our speed. Less crowded, more variety in the rim views, and just the right size for adventure without being too big to tackle. We prefer to experience the national parks, not just view them. I do want to go back to the Grand Canyon at some point, but probably not during summertime. Someday I also want to hike the Grand Canyon rim to rim, but maybe not with young kids in tow. Anyways, we saw the Grand Canyon! A little. How American of us.

GRAND CANYON PICTURES: 

There were several families at this viewpoint, but Amber had the best view because of her trusty pink boots!

A last view of the SLASH of the Grand Canyon.

II. Driving to Beaver: We left the Grand Canyon around 1pm, with a dark storm clouds at our tail. There is not much in the way of civilization north of the Grand Canyon. After consulting Google Maps, we decided to drive 5 hours 45 minutes to Beaver, Utah so that it would only be 12.5 hours to home on our final day of driving. That 5.75 hour drive from the Grand Canyon to Beaver was brutal and beautiful--brutal because it always feels brutal to begin a long drive in the afternoon, beautiful because of the red rocks! The rugged red rocks of the southwest were so foreign and different and big and everywhere! This was my first time in that part of the country, and I looked and looked out our van windows. Jeff got tired after about 2.5 hours of driving, so I took over and drove us the rest of the way in to Beaver, on scenic byway 89, which had views.

We changed our clock back to mountain standard time when we got to Utah, and that made it an hour later when we finally pulled up to the dark, somewhat dank Butch Cassidy Best Western Motel in Beaver: nearly 8pm MST. (Apparently Butch Cassidy was born in Beaver, Utah.) 

At the motel, I immediately changed and went for a run, even though it was after 8pm. My body was begging for some actual activity! I ran 4 miles through Beaver and met Jeff and the kids at Denny's for a late 9pm dinner. I got spaghetti and it felt so weird not to get breakfast at Denny's, especially since the rest of my family minus Amber did order breakfast! (Amber got a hamburger). The joys of America's Diner. After we ordered our food, I went to the bathroom and stretched because I felt so tight after driving and running. It was a weird place to stretch, but it felt necessary.

Everyone was pretty wiped out when we got back to the hotel, so bedtime was smooth and sleepy for the kids. Sweet Jay volunteered to sleep on the floor again. Bless him. We have got to remember a camp pad next time the five of us stay in a single hotel! 

Pictures from the drive from the Grand Canyon to Beaver, Utah:

Tiny Beaver, Utah has a big B on a hill overlooking town.

Blurry post-run picture at Denny's, with our fully loaded van in the background.

Denny's Diner dinner! Once we had eaten a late night meal at a diner, our American road trip felt truly complete. We nailed the triple crown of American road tripping: expensive car repair, briefly glance at a wonder of the natural world, and eat a late night diner dinner. Go us! Falling into clichés right and left! 

Bedtime in Beaver.

III. Friday, July 30th: DRIVING HOME. We were all worn out and SO over car time, but we still had nearly 13 hours to go, so we put our sore compressed gluteus-es back into the van and kept driving. The closer we got to home, the more I reflected on our trip as a whole. We were gone for 17 days including travel time, and it was a doozy! But we saw SO MUCH during that time! Jeff and I went to four national parks, two of them with our kids. We spent a week with family and saw old friends. It was a fulfilling, gorgeously scenic trip! As tired as we were on the last day, somehow we made it through the rest of Utah, then through Idaho and Oregon all the way home. 

Only one scenic moment of the whole day: the cloud-shrouded mountains in Utah. Southern Idaho and Eastern Oregon are either totally not scenic or too familiar to feel scenic. Or both.

Five Guys near Boise: late lunch/early dinner. We accidentally drove 20 or 30 minutes out of our way trying to find this place. We were so done with road trip food! Our snack stash in the car was old, fast food was old, food in general was blah. Road trips seem to always include an element of desperation. We definitely felt it on our final day of driving!

Utah and Idaho had some super weird, sometimes funny billboards and signs. I only took a picture of one of them. This one in Idaho was advertising vasectomies. "Vasapalooza! It's a Vasectathon! Shoot Blanks!" SERIOUSLY. 

We arrived home wearily and gratefully at 9:30pm.