Chapter One September 30th and we are on the road...

Hello again. 

Another year, another journey.  We ended last year's blog abruptly, with the tragic loss of Karen and wee Ayden at Christmas time.  Once we returned to Mexico, we just weren't able to continue.  Needless to say, we had a quiet winter.  Thank you to all of you for all the love and support and kind words we received from each of you.  You really do learn who your friends are in the terrible times.

Departure date this year was September 30th. Have you noticed the departure dates are getting earlier each year? As always, we leave with mixed emotions. Saying goodbye to our many close friends and tiny family is always difficult and the goodbye dinners and farewell breakfasts have us lonesome before we even leave.  On the other hand, as the open road beckons, the excitement of new adventures has our adrenalin pumping. We finally finished our errands and left town around 3 PM and drove out Hwy 33 onto the Crows-nest #3 as far as Grand Forks, BC.

As the route this year will be similar to that of last year, at least as far as Utah, I promise to keep the historic rhetoric to a minimum.  

The following day we were on the road early and crossed the border at Christina Lake into Washington. This drive follows along the meandering Kettle River and is quite delightful.

We skipped through Idaho with a slight delay at the Outlet Stores, and then on into Montana where we stopped for the night in Butte. The next morning we were on the road early again. It was below zero and still dark when we headed out. Highway 15 here is lightly travelled and is a great 4 lane highway with a speed limit of 75 miles per hour. It is a very scenic but easy drive as you run south along the Continental Divide.

Here we saw the antelope grazing in the open range beside the roadway. Bob was the great sport he always is and put up with my rendition of "home, home on the range" at 6:30 in the morning.

There's snow in them thar' hills

Yes, you have seen him in last year's blog.  He lives just ouside of Dillon, MT

We fought a lot of high winds as we re-entered Idaho and passed on into Utah. We managed to miss most of the traffic in Salt Lake by taking the Leisure Parkway onto Hwy 215 east of town and finally pulled in for the night at Cedar City. The night was clear and cold and we were treated to a lovely full moon over the rust coloured mountains.

We decided to alter our route this year and opted to run Hwy 89 through Lake Powell and then down into Flagstaff. We hopped off the I-15 at Hurricane and ran the #9 south of Zion National Park. Now if you get the chance, make sure you visit Zion as it is absolutely beautiful. We toured it a few years ago, so decided to skirt around it as the roads are very windy and it is slow going. We hooked back up with #89 just east of the Park and enjoyed a beautiful scenic trip on good roads. The Lake Powell area is beautiful and is one of the largest areas for dinosaur fossil findings.  These are in the Glen Park area.

Lake Powell is a reservoir on the Colorado River straddling the border between Utah and Arizona (most of it, along with Rainbow Bridge is in Utah). It is the second largest man-made reservoir in the United States behind Lake Mead storing 24,322,000 acre feet (30 km³) of water when full.


Lake Powell was created by the flooding of Glen Canyon by the controversial Glen Canyon Dam which also led to the creation of Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, a popular summer destination. The reservoir is named for explorer John Wesley Powell, a one-armed American Civil War veteran who explored the river via three wooden boats in 1869. In 1972, Glen Canyon National Recreation Area was established. It is public land managed by the National Park Service, and available to the public for recreational purposes.

Lake Powell is a storage facility for the Upper Basin states of the Colorado River Compact (Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, and New Mexico). The Compact specifies that the Upper Basin states are to provide a minimum annual flow of 8.23 million acre feet (10 km³) to the Lower Basin states (Arizona, Nevada, and California).

 Lake Powell Utah & AZ

We took our time exploring the Lake Powell area and then drove down through Cameron where we stopped at this quaint trading post and bought ourselves some new moccasins.

 

We stopped for the night in Flagstaff at the Holiday Inn Express on Lucky Lane.  We walked up street to the Outback restaurant and had a great dinner.  When we came out the winds were so high and cold that Bob went back to the hotel and got the car to rescue me.

Flagstaff initially got its name from a Ponderosa Pine tree that was stripped down and used as a flagstaff for a 4th of July celebration, by an exploration party, back in 1876.  The flagstaff, visible from afar, served as a landmark for wagon trains bound for California.  Transients knew they had found a good place to camp when they spotted the flagstaff.  The town was officially named "Flagstaff" in 1881.

 We decided to continue with our scenic route and opted to run down the 17 into the Sedona area. We have always loved the way the dense trees give way to the shimmering red rocks.  It was a bit rainy when we started out, but turned nice soon after.

Sedona is said to one of the rare places on earth that is home to several vortexes, special fields that emit energy upward from the earth.  A vortex emanates three types of energy, electrical (masculine), magnetic (feminine) and electromagnetic (neutral).  Needless to say, there are countless stores specializing in new age medicines.

Sedona got its name in 1902 from Carl Schnebly who was one of the first settlers in the area.  When he wanted to establish a post office the two names he submitted to the Postmaster General, (Schnebly Station and Oak Creek Crossing) were deemed too long for the cancellation stamp.  His brother suggested he submit his wife's name and it stuck.

Bell Rock, said to be home to one of the Vortexes

Upon Leaving Sedona we fought gale force winds all down through Phoenix and encounter white-outs in the blowing sand at  Picacho Point outside of Tucson. 

When we stopped for a break I was delighted to see the cactus

This beautiful prickly pear is in full bloom.

 We pulled into a nice Holiday Inn North of the Airport on Palo Verde.  Here they had little casitas around the pool where we  stayed.  The following day we got our Mexican Insurance, made our mandatory visit to Trader Joe's and then headed to Green Valley where we stopped at another Holiday Inn and planned for our early morning border crossing into Mexico.

Next stop, Sonora Mx.

Adios, for now.