We're home!  Finally!  We were away from home for 26 days and drove a total of 4,322 miles! 

Yesterday, we drove nearly 500 miles (8 hours!)  from Amarillo, TX to Joplin, MO.  Driving across Oklahoma wasn't bad, the highway is a toll road so there was less traffic and the highway was pretty smooth.... but cost $20 in tolls!  Don't know what it costs if you live there, but I can't imagine having to pay every time you need to get on the highway.  We spent last nite at a KOA in Joplin, right across the state line in MO.  The wifi connection was very bad.... don't know how they could even advertise having it!  It was so hot when we pulled in there, the thermometer in the camper said the outside temp was 112... I doubt it was that high, but it was HOT and took forever to cool down in there!

Today the drive went pretty quick, just about 300 miles and we were home by about 1pm.  The girls were very happy to be able to run in their yard again!  It's taken a few hours to get things unloaded from the camper... so much stuff!  Seems like we came home with twice what we took with us lol

Will spend the next few days getting laundry caught up, going through mail, and cleaning the camper.  It's going to be hot here, they're saying record breaking temps... possibly up to 108 tomorrow and Friday.  Will be nice to plop myself on the couch tonite and watch cable where I know what channels are what!

Will share some things we figured out/learned on this trip -

#1 - Take a cooler of ice water/drinks wherever you go.  There are actually places in this huge country where there are  no gas stations or McDonalds or Walmarts lol  Seriously, living in a city you just are used to being able to stop wherever you want and get whatever you want whenever you want, and if not just go a mile down the road to the next exit and it'll be there.  Not so everywhere.  There are miles and miles and miles of nothing but roadway.  No houses, no people....nothing.

#2 - Next time we'll take as much clothes as we can pack in.  It's easy to say "we can always do laundry".  Ha!  It's true you can always do laundry... but do you really want to after sight seeing all day??  And doing laundry at a campground isn't like walking into a laundrymat with 2 dozen machines.  You normally have 4 or 5 washers and dryers.... and a whole campground full of people trying to get in there first!  Didn't realize how expensive it is either.

#3 - Just because a campground advertises Wifi, or cable... and even when they assure you at check in that both are in working order.... that means nothing.  Just assume you won't get more than a few snowy stations on the tv, and that you won't be able to get an internet connection ... then when you DO get good results from either one you will be pleasantly surprised!  

#4 - As nice as it is to get away and see parts of the country you have never seen before, and as amazing as some of those things can be.... it's always nice to come home!  We saw some incredibly high mountains, deep gorges, beautiful waterfalls, desert, sand dunes, snow in June (!), ancient indian ruins, the Grand Canyon and so many other things.  But, it's nice to be home.  Was nice to drive through Missouri and see the rolling hills, the green grass and trees, and rivers and creeks with water in them!  I even missed the humidity lol Although my hair is already catching up on lost frizz time!

Already thinking about where we will be going on our next trip!  Would love to take the camper and camp out on the beach in Florida.  Or North Carolina maybe.  Or maybe even up through Niagra Falls and on to Maine.  Will have to get working on this soon :)  

Yesterday, we drove about 300 miles, from Williams Az to Albuquerque, NM.  While driving through Grant, NM we went through the El Mapais lava field.  We thought it looked like lava, but wasn't until we got internet tonite and were able to look it up that we knew for sure.

We stayed at a casino RV park last nite, the place was nice but we just happened to arrive on the day they lost one of their servers.... so no internet.  We did go to the casino and spend some free money, and stuffed ourselves at their buffet lol

Our view at the RV park - 

Today, it seemed like we drove forever!  We went 340 miles, spent about 6 hours on the road and finally made it to Amarillo, TX.  We're staying at Amarillo Ranch RV Park... it's pretty big, lots and lots of campers.  It's so hot here, don't know if this is normal or not but I don't think we could take this kind of heat on a daily basis!

We went to dinner at a place called Big Texan, right down the road from where we're staying.  It's a huge steak house that serves huge steaks lol  Ours weren't that big... but they have this special deal.  If you can eat their 72oz steak, baked potato, and salad in an hours time... it's free!  The steak is HUGE.  There were 3 men who tried while we were there, 2 didn't make it and 1 was still working on it when we left.  They set them at a special table with a timer and everyone can watch them chow down lol  If they don't finish in an hour their dinner costs them $72! 

We were stuffed with the small steaks we had, can't imagine what these guys were feeling trying eat all that.  They have "puke buckets" next to them just in case (gag). 

Tomorrow we're going to drive as far as we can.  We have about 800 miles to go... ugh!  Hopefully we can get close to Missouri before we stop and make it home on Wed. 

Today we went for a walk through the little town we're staying in, Williams, Arizona.  They have a main street (Route 66) with little shops and different restaurants.  It was a long walk, and the wind was blowing stronger today, and that combined with the sunshine and heat really wore us out.  We came back to the camper and rested for a few hours, before our last sight seeing trip.  There's a new animal park here called Bearizona.  They have a bird show, a small walk through zoo kinda thing with baby animals and a drive through wildlife park.  It was a little disappointing even though  the brochures sounded like it would be amazing.  The bird show was blah, but at least it didn't last long.  Walking through the baby animals was fun, they had all kinds of little bear cubs playing and climbing trees.  The drive through... well, the few animals there were all just laying around... until we got to the bears lol 

First, pictures of Williams, Az -

Elvis is alive and well

Bearizona is pretty new, they're still working on parts of it.  There weren't that many animals, and they were pretty much just laying around in the drive through part.

The entrance

Bear cub up in the tree

There were so many cubs, they were running and rolling around playing with each other

Some kind of cats... look at those feet!

Haha!

Don't think the wolves were a bit interested lol

White bison

The bears were the last area in the drive through.  There were quite a few, some were laying around and others were wandering.  A girl came through on an atv, throwing out corn and they all came running! 

Tomorrow we leave for home!  Will probably take us until Wednesday, driving about 300 miles a day.  We don't have any campsites reserved, we're just going to "wing it" lol.  Hopefully we won't have any trouble finding places along the way!

We spent the day at the Grand Canyon.  There really are no words to describe it.  It's just like the pictures you see, but to see it in person is something else.  Huge! It just is huge, and deep, and goes on forever. There are so many different things to look at, the colors, the rock formations, the way the ground rises in some places and falls in others, all the different colors.  When you're standing there at the edge, looking at it, it looks so unreal... almost just seems like a huge mural someone has painted. 

We wandered around the different viewing points they have on the south rim.  It surprised me they don't have a fence or barrier of some kind up around it.... the areas they have set up for viewing have barriers, but most of it is open.  I can't imagine taking a young one there, I'd be worried to death the whole time that they'd fall over the edge!  People were walking and climbing around on the rocks taking pictures, I wasn't that brave lol  I had to have something to hold onto to get near the edge.  I'm not the most graceful person (lol) so I didn't want to take any chances!

I took a ton of pictures, but they just don't do it justice! 

He was getting a little too close to the edge!

These people are nuts wandering around down there!

These ravens are huge

It looks like someone stacked those huge rocks, amazing how they just are formed like that.

Can see the Colorado River snaking through at the bottom.

We spent all day there, so much walking!  We came home exhausted,sore and sunburned.  Hopefully we can crawl out of bed tomorrow! 

Today we made it to Williams, Arizona.... about 3 1/2 hours, interstate all the way!  The Grand Canyon is about an hour north of here, we're going there tomorrow.  I was looking online for different tours that take you to the bottom of the canyon... and saw that mule rides have to be reserved 7-8 months in advance!  Not that I'd want to spend the day riding a mule lol, but I thought that was crazy having to make reservations that far in advance.  They also have jeep tours, but I think we're all jeeped out after our trip the other day ha!  So, we'll probably take the drive up there and just wander around ourselves. 

A few pictures of the drive here.  Not sure why there was so much haze... don't know if it's dust or fog or what.   There were signs posted to watch for blowing dust on the highway, so maybe that was it.

The campground we're staying at is nice.... again there's a lot of gravel.  But there's just not much grass around anywhere.  We still haven't seen rain in the 3 weeks we've been gone.  And I still have my bag of marshmallows because there have been fire bans the whole time we've been away.  I think we had one fire and that was one cool morning.  With everything so dry, and the way the wind blows it's just not a good idea.

There's a 2 hour time difference here... it's 8:30 and we're ready for bed!  lol  It's messing up Lucy's eating schedule too, her stomach clock says it's dinner time and it's only mid-afternoon. 

We'll be leaving for home on Sunday.  Can't believe we've been away from home for 3 weeks!  As much as we've enjoyed this vacation, I know we'll be ready to head home so we can get some rest and back into our "rut"! lol

Today we left Durango and ended up in Gallup, New Mexico.  It was about a 5 hour drive over mostly 2 lane roads with a lot of slow downs for road work.  The scenery changed yet again... no more mountain roads!  Instead, everything turned brown with these huge rocks just jutting out of the ground.  Dust was bad, in one picture you can see a fog along the bottom, that was dust blowing across the highway.  We saw another small dust tornado.... just so weird to see!

Our campground is just an overnight stay place, although it looks like a few people have set up home here.  It's gravel... lots and lots of gravel, but very neat and clean.  And so hot.... was 92 today.  Funny, 92 here seems hotter than 92 at home.... maybe because we have some moisture in the air and here everything is dry dry dry.  The news is filled with stories on the huge brush fires burning here.  I hadn't seen Judge Judy in 3 weeks, finally today find it on cable and they break in after 15 minutes with a new fire burning near Albuquerque.  We walked the dogs over in the dirt/dust/sand and poor Lucy was lifting 2 feet at a time because the ground was so hot.  I know they both miss their grassy back yard!

Tomorrow we'll be heading to Williams, Arizona for a few days where we'll go to the Grand Canyon.  Not sure what else is in Williams... I think a lot of train things from what I can find online. 

After the Grand Canyon, we'll be homeward bound! We'll probably take 3 or 4 days to get home, it will be a 1400 mile drive!  Hard to believe our trip is almost over!

Bailey wants to know "are we there yet"??  haha