The road trip story continues!  We’ve been home two weeks now, but the blog posts keep coming.  As I mentioned last time, we were celebrating our second wedding anniversary, and Sedona is as romantic as it comes in the Desert Southwest.  As such, we planned our perfect day, which starts with a good brekky.  And this one was exceptional!  All the fruit was actually ripe (that never happens), and my french toast came with a caramelized banana sauce that was so good it almost left me short of breath, but wanting more.

We’d been dreaming about a Sedona hike for weeks, and the concierge recommended Brins Mesa Trail in Coconino National Forest for some of the best views in the area.  The first half of the hike (on the way up) is so gradual that you don’t even notice you’re gaining any elevation.  Of course, I like a good climb, too, which the back half of the trail provides.

Tequila plant!

I have so many of these pictures, it’s really hard to narrow them down.   But here’s a couple looking out across Mormon Canyon to Wilson Mountain.

Besides the breathtaking scenery, we also came across this stunning Eastern Collared Lizard.  He was surprisingly cooperative, which allowed me to take a few pictures.

The “tree” on the left of this photo is from an agave (tequila) plant.  They live for decades, and just before they die, grow a mast full of flowers.  Looks like we just missed this one.

The summit was not at all what we expected.  We were expecting a ridge line, or a cliff.  Instead, it levels out for about a quarter of a mile, covered in brush, before it starts to descend back down the other side.  This was our turnaround point.

It’s pretty, but you just never know what kind of desert critters are lurking about.  In this series:  1. Stop and pose.  2. What was that noise in the bushes?  3. I’m outta here!

Now, if you get this picture as a Christmas Card, you’ll know where it came from!

I really had full intentions of posting this whole day, but it was so full, I’ve just gotta break it up.  Teaser – it has my new favorite photo!

Cheers!

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Day three take us from Amarillo, TX to Sedona, AZ by way of New Mexico!

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Our day started around 8AM, I think…  To be honest, we were really turned-around on the time considering that at some point we crossed into a new time zone, and then we crossed a state line that doesn’t observe daylight savings time.  Which made it really hard to judge our progress.  But whatever; the sky was blue and the only thing we ultimately needed to know was that we were headed west.

I think we ended up getting on the road about 2 hours earlier than we needed to, but somewhere in the middle we knew we had to eat lunch.  We had a hankering for BBQ, and Lea found an awesome spot in Albuquerque on Yelp -  Rudy’s “Country Store” and Bar-B-Q!  This place really was the real deal.  Complete with red checkered tablecloths, sweet tea, sauce by the gallon and paper towel dispensers at the end of each family-style picnic table.

The way it works is you order your meat by the lb (I think that’s French for pound), which they slice to order, and then they give you bread to make it into a sandwich.  By 11:30AM, local time, they were already sold out of the pulled pork!  They’re other best sellers are the brisket and turkey.

They have scales right at the register to weigh your lunch.  Oh, and feel free to ask for free samples!

We brought one of these pups home with us.

Back on the road, we were absofruitly stuffed, and looking forward to some more of this beautiful, open landscape.

The terrain started to change a bit as we crossed over into Arizona.

Follow the signs to Flagstaff!

I had heard that there was skiing in Flagstaff, but I never pictured all the pine trees!  My only experience in AZ had been in Phoenix and Yuma, which aren’t particularly well-known for their greenery.  More like brownery.

The landscape in these parts changes so dramatically, so rapidly, the famous red rocks of Sedona are just 23 miles south of Flagstaff, and when they do appear, they seem to jump out of the earth from nowhere.

Oh!  And here’s some proof that Lea actually logged a few miles on this trip.

Ah yes, our first glimpse of the red rocks.

We rolled into Sedona with enough time to beautify ourselves and drive up to a lookout to watch the sunset before dinner.

Lea actually had the top half of her body out the sunroof for this one.  Not to worry, though.  I kept it under 50…

I haven’t mentioned it, but we worked in a little extra time to spend in Sedona to celebrate our second wedding anniversary!  As such, we had a table reserved at Dahl & Di Luca, Sedona’s most romantic restaurant. 

Lea ordered the Linguine Paradiso - Homemade linguine pasta with a portabello mushroom ragu and a dollop of Chevre.  Totally, completely, utterly delectable.

I had to take a picture of these “golden arches.”  Sedona has a strict policy on “light pollution” due to the local observatory.  It makes for some fantastic skies, bursting with stars.  Unfortunately, I don’t know how to take pictures of stars.  It’s weird.  But at least I got this!

 

That’s it for tonight.  Gotta get some z’s for tomorrow morning’s hike.

 

Cheers!

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Please excuse my absence – I just got back from a three day “communications workshop” for school, which got in the way of more important things…like telling you about my fun with Tyler and Katelyn!  For those of you who don’t know, Oklahoma in August is like the inside of a dog’s mouth.  No offense…  So, what do you do?  Slip ‘n Slide!  Yup, that’s right.  They still make ‘em.  They’re not to the anatomical scale my size now requires, but for the little ones, they work just great.

Just ’cause it’s not big enough for me doesn’t mean I’m not gonna play too.  And Tyler’s crazy if thinks he can stand in my way.

Tyler’s also well-known for hamming it up for the camera.

And what does this picture remind you of?

That’s it!    (Just kidding!)

See, she’s no Saskwatch. She’s a cutie.

Oof, she’s so shy and so cute, I just want to eat her up!  She pulls her little ringlet of bangs over her face for security.  It’s so sweet.  Although, sometimes her fingers are sticky and she gets those curls in such a knot that there’s no other way to untangle it than to just cut it out.  (Which is exactly what Aunt Lea had to do while we were there.)  I have no idea what that’s like, but given what I know so far after being married for two years, her husband is going to learn a lot about conditioner…

In order to keep our trip on track, we had to vamoose that night around 7:00 to make it to Amarillo.  For the last time Lea, not Armadillo!

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Cheers!

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