$2.079

Well, after a tense week of following Beck’s recovery — which hasn’t exactly been stellar! — the doc has cleared her to travel, as long as we take it very easy, and watch carefully for any signs of this thing coming back.

So, we’ve changed our plans to accomdate an easier schedule, and make this vacation more leisurely, and less active.

We will be leaving for Richmond VA tomorrow, which is where her brother, Morgan, lives. We’re planning two or three days to get there. Our thinking is that if she is feeling puny, we can hole up there for as long as we need, and not be paying HoJo sixty bucks a night!

Assuming all is well, toward the end of the week, we’ll head to the coast, and run south down the outer banks of North Carolina, watching sunrises and sunsets, birds and surf, and generally taking a leisurely pace.

And, if all remains well, we’ll head back toward St. Louis toward the end of the following week, with a possible stop at Grandma’s house on the way back.

Yeah, this isn’t nearly as dramatic a trip, but it’s a chance for both of us to get away from life, the universe and everything. Evidence from the last couple of big trips has shown me that that is as therapeutic as any medicine the doc could prescribe!

$2.139

Actually, just a bit less than that — nine work days. Last night, Becky and I worked out the details (after a long talk with Cousin Linda), and I think we have a rough itenerary. Here goes!

Still plenty of opportunity for lingering, or meandering or camping out somewhere. Aside from the push out there and the push back toward St. Louis, it should be a leisurely trip compared to the last big rove!

[Suck Creek Mountain]

Today, we took the new TrailBlazer out for a little four-wheeling atop the mountain at Prentice Cooper State Park. I decided I couldn’t stand it, and had to get it dirty. 🙂

Kevio went with us, just in case we needed spotting, and boy did we!

Our first stop was a rock formation called the Indian Rock House. Legend has it that Indians used rock formation as a natural shelter. It’s still used now by Cumberland Trail hikers, and there were small remnants of those campers left behind. It’s a beautiful formation, and worth the hike.

We decided we wanted to go to Lusk Point, and were fairly sure that the rough road we were on would take us there. We crawled the truck over some of the rocks and got to a small clearing that overlooked the Tennessee River. This was a wonderful view of the Tennessee River valley, sometimes called the Tennessee Grand Canyon. The clearing was there, and extended all the way down the mountain, because of a gas pipeline that runs through there. That was our gain, though, as we had a clear view all the way down the mountain to the river.

We pulled out and continued our trek to Lusk Point…. continued for about six feet, that is, until we saw the stairstep rocks that were next on the road. My poor little TrailBlazer didn’t have nearly the clearance necessary to pull that off, so we went back the way we came. I figured that since we came that way, it’d be easy to go back that way…. right?

Well, we got to the tough part of the road again, and had a horrible time getting through the rocks. Kevio finally convinced me to nudge it way over to the edge of the trail, and try it that way. He waved at me to stop, and I realized that only two wheels were touching the ground (left front and right rear). Poised in the air for a minute, the balance shifted enough that the other front wheel came down. Sio squealed, and Kevio asked if I had wheels in the air, and I told him “Yes!” I backed it up, leaned a little less toward the edge of the trail, and we scraped it right through.

It was thrilling to have the truck in that kind of position. The only downside was that we didn’t take any pictures of the thing being up on two wheels. A great, missed opportunity!

[Suck Creek Mountain]

Today, Sio and took the new TrailBlazer on its maiden voyage to visit Mom on The Mountain. I’m really impressed with how well it handled itself on the highway. A nice, smooth ride, and reasonable gas mileage, given that this is a truck — 18.5 mpg.

I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed having a sunroof until we got on the open road this morning and opened it up. There’s something exhilarating about having access to the sky while driving. That’s a part of driving that I’ve been without for almost ten years.

Becky was a little worried I might have some “buyer’s remorse” after not buying the EXT model, but truthfully, I think the advantages of the regular model really make my choice to go with it the right decision.

And, truthfully, the thing is just fun to drive. I don’t have to be quite so ginger in entering and exiting parking lots — in the Vald (the Impala), I drug the front air dam on those kinds of things daily. This week, I’ll get it a little dirty in Prentiss Cooper, and show Sio some of the finer points of four-wheeling, along with setting up a for a photo shoot or two from the bluffs.

We left Canðn City around 5.30 MT this morning, and headed toward St. Louis. 882 miles later, we’re home, unloaded, Papa John fed, and ready for bed.

The good news is that we don’t have to be back to work for another four days — yahoo!

I’m feeling very sleepy……

(BTW, I found out what was wrong with the site — it looks like the server went to sleep around the 12th. I have some kind of heat problem with the processor complex. It got hot, and it shut down. That’s bad behavior for a server! Hopefully, I can track down the issue, and it won’t happen again.)

Well, we thought we were going to head home, but decided instead to head toward the Canðn City CO, and the Royal Gorge.

The drive from Grand Junction was beautiful, but tiring. I-70 climbs to about 11,000feet before coming down the other side, and once again, I could feel the effect of the thinner air…. And all I was doing was driving! That’s the second time this trip, and the third time in the last year that I’ve noticed ill effects at those high altitudes. Probably a hint about my overall fitness!

We snuck through Golden, and hit I-25 – avoiding Denver – heading south toward Colorado Springs. Beck thought we could try visiting the Air Force Academy again. Last year, the Academy was closed to all visitors, and we were unable to visit. This year, however, we were able to drive right on to the grounds. We first visited the Visitor Center, and had a nice conversation with the desk personnel. We wandered around for a little bit, bought a bunch of things in the gift shop, and then continued to the Cadet Chapel.

The Cadet Chapel is one of the most amazing structures I’ve ever been around. Beautiful spires adorn the outside, and an incredible number of small stained glass windows fill the spaces between the spires. From the inside, this gives the chapel a beautiful blue cast to the chapel. Simply amazing. I’m sure there were many interesting things about the chapel, but the one that struck me the most was a single row, roped off, reserved in memory of those lost in the service of our country.

This was the first time I’ve been on an Air Force facility in many years, and it was interesting to feel all the old USAF information float to the top again.

We continued to Colorado Springs, where Beck found a vase from Van Briggle that she’d been looking for for a while – glad she got it!

Lastly, we cruised into Canðn City, and on to Royal Gorge. I had always thought that the bridge was an essential piece of the road, providing a transportation service that wasn’t provided any other way. What I discovered was that the entire area is basically a theme park region, with petting zoos, wild west shows, trams, and all manner of other tourist trap accouterments. However, the bridge was cool, fun to walk and drive across, and provided some beautiful images.

Tomorrow, we are headed to St. Louis. Looks like it’s just on the fringe of being able to do it in one day…. We’ll see!

This morning, we got up early, and took a drive to Sunrise Point to watch the sunrise. However, the weather didn’t cooperate, and we ended up with a marginal sunrise. It was fun to practice, though, despite the cold.

As we were leaving Sunrise Point, we ran across three mule deer scrounging breakfast. These animals were wonderful to watch, and had an impressive elegance about them. We watched them for thirty minutes or so, and let them go about their business.

We set our sights on Capitol Reef National Park, and started our drive. Little did we know how far that was from Bryce! I’d see some information indicating it was three hours, but I figured I’d beat that time easily. Not hardly. Even if there weren’t a ton of neat places to stop and look over the terrain, it was still a slow, tough drive, with lots of climbs up and down mountains. I think the highest we were on was over 9000 feet.

Once again, there was an abundance of birch trees, with the occasional pine after we crossed 8000 feet – very reminiscent of our drive to the Grand Canyon. This time though, the pines were the minority, with the birches owning the land for as far as you could see.

We finally arrived at Capitol Reef National Park, and started our drive through it. Again, it was full of unusual rock formations, along with intrusions from the Fremont River. My favorite stop was the petroglyphs. I’m finding that I am somehow drawn to this odd form of communication – almost as though the past is reaching out to me. The glyphs at Capitol Reef were similar to those I saw at the Grand Canyon – I can’t wait to compare them side by side. There were quite a few more here, along with some more modern scratchings – dated 1911 and 1945 – all of which lived pretty well together.

We decided to start heading toward St. Louis, and got our van pointed toward Colorado, with us spending the night in Grand Junction.

Grand Junction, BTW, is the first time we’ve seen a cell phone signal since we passed through Flagstaff Thursday evening. Obviously, cell phones don’t mean much to the desert folk!

We continued our trip this morning, after a nice breakfast at the Crazy Jug Restaurant. Today’s agenda was to cross into Utah, and see what we could see.

Shortly after getting into Utah, we saw snow again. This was the first snow we’d seen since we were in New Mexico, and it was, of course, beautiful. We’d had big storms through Fredonia last night, so I suppose some of the snow came from that storm system.

We had seen on the map the Coral Pink Dunes State Park, and decided it would be fun to stop and see what it was all about. First off, the sand – and it is sand – isn’t pink, it’s orange. Second, it is amazingly fine, so it’s very, very easy to sink up in. This whole park, in fact, is configured for both foot traffic, as well as ATVs. Beck and I walked around the dunes, and also exchanged some snowballs – probably the last snowballs of this winter for us.

Our next stop was Zion National Park. This place was gorgeous, and sported one of the longer tunnels I’ve been through (only 1.1 miles, cut through solid rock). The only drawback was the huge number of people there, and the overcast weather. Still, the park was pretty, and worth stopping through.

We decided to work our way toward Bryce Canyon National Park, and drove through the Dixie National Forest on the way. The Dixie National Forest was pretty amazing, with tall trees and some bright red rock outcroppings. I’m kinda surprised that part of this area was sucked into some national park – it was certainly pretty enough for that.

We landed at Bryce Canyon late in the day, and after getting a room at Ruby’s Inn, we decided to go exploring. The first thing we noticed was the elevation – the first point we stopped at was over 8200 feet, and we were sucking wind in no time. We stopped at a few points overlooking this very impressive place, and made our plans for tomorrow’s sunrise.

Words can’t really describe the beauty of Bryce, and I’m not sure my photos did much justice to it either. This is a place I would love to explore again, perhaps doing some hiking, too.

After a little pizza at the joint next door, we were off to sleep.

I had originally planned to get up early this morning, and shoot the sunrise and moonrise, but sleep was entirely too necessary! We packed, re-loaded the van, and caught a little breakfast at the lodge before hitting the road, with intentions of getting to Utah.

We first stopped at the watchtower at the end of Desert View Road. This was our original destination last night for the sunset, so we figured we’d take a look. The site was beautiful, and terrific to shoot. I’m glad we didn’t go there for the sunset, though – I think it would’ve been way crowded!

As we left the Grand Canyon NP, we stopped at many roadside vendors, looking at various Indian wares while still on the Navajo Reservation. We only picked up a few things, but were amazed at the variety, and the natural beauty of the canyon area outside the park.

Farther up the road, we stopped at the Navajo Bridge, which crosses the Colorado River in northern Arizona. When I was last through here – 10 years or so ago – the (now) pedestrian bridge was the only bridge, and car traffic on Highway 89A went right across it. Now there’s a separate bridge for the cars and the people, and you can now stand on the old bridge, and gaze lazily at the Colorado River far below.

We climbed through the mountains and hills of northern Arizona on Highway 89A, and finally made it to the top, at Jacob Lake AZ. I remembered this place from my last trip through here – it really started to freak me out! I started remembering little bits and pieces about the area, and it was almost like sharing memories from someone else’s head. Very strange.

The drive continued toward southern Utah, and the clouds got thicker and thicker. We decided to pull over in Fredonia AZ, and take our night’s rest at the Crazy Jug Inn. Nice, rustic place, with a great restaurant. They are really busy once the north rim of the Grand Canyon opens (about a month from now). Tonight, there was little business though, and it was almost as though we had the place to ourselves.

The weather got ugly though – 50+ mph winds that looked like a blast front moving through town. Fortunately, this happened at dinner, so we weren’t out in it!