We woke up feeling a little better than yesterday. We took
more medicine and headed out to brave the cold. It was about 40 degrees when we
left. We grabbed a fast food breakfast and headed up towards the Grand Canyon.
Around 10am we were reaching the top of a mountain and encountered a lot of
snow; it was actively snowing and sleeting for miles and miles.
It’s about 80 miles from Flagstaff to the Grand Canyon’s
south rim. We had initially planned to go to the north rim on the advice of
Uncle Mic & Carol, but with having a cold we decided to go to the south rim
and stay an extra night in Flagstaff. We eventually reached the south rim visitors
center and sat in the car for about 15 minutes to take a quick nap. We went
into the visitor’s center but it was not as interesting as we had hoped. We had
planned to take their shuttle bus around the rim area where cars aren’t allowed
but as we left the visitor’s center it began to rain and sleet pretty good. We
went back to the car and sat for another twenty minutes trying to figure out
what we wanted to do.
A good look at the map revealed that going east there were
several lookout points and an exit that would take us back down to Flagstaff.
The south rim is the most popular and is usually (as was the case today) pretty
packed with tourists. The busses that passed were pretty full. In addition, we
didn’t want to wait out in the cold & rain on busses all day only to fight
the crowds when we weren’t feeling so well. We are kind of a DIY people…we like
to do our own thing. So we took off east. We didn’t have high hopes for the day
because of the weather and the weather forecast. But we hit several great
lookout points and were only obscured one of them because of fog and rain. It
really is most spectacular in person:
We hit rain and snow all throughout our sightseeing. Can you
see the streaks of sleet?
We stopped and saw some Native American ruins too. They had
a little museum there that was pretty cool. Our very last stop was to the
Lookout Tower, a building designed to get a 360 degree view of the area. It was
intended and is still used as a gift shop and visitors center. Commissioned in
the 30s, the inside was painted by a Hopi artist in authentic Hopi symbols. It
was super cold when we left.
We exited out the east side and headed down to Flagstaff. We
were really pleased with what we saw. I’m sure we’ll be back someday to do
hiking and see the north rim. After getting back we walked to a diner behind
our hotel that was designed in the Route 66 50s theme. It sat on historic Route
66. Devin had a breakfast and I had fish and chips. It was okay. I ordered a
diet Dr. Pepper (my premier soda of choice, and one they usually never have at
restaurants) and I had to send it back twice because it wouldn’t hold any fizz.
It was really awful. When we got our bill he had charged us for it but the
hostess took it off. My dinner was on special and it had rung up the regular
price so then she had to correct that. We walked back to the hotel and watched
the end of the NASCAR race before deciding to go down to McD’s for mochas. I
ordered a small mocha, fat-free milk; he got the carmel mocha. We drove the
four blocks back to the hotel and I used the trip to cool my drink down. When I
took a first sip it tasted like old watered down, gas station coffee. Awful.
Super awful. I took another drink. Made Devin take a drink. Dumped half in the
sink to see if maybe it wasn’t stirred right. At this point I just want a good
drink for the night. We drove back to McD’s, went in, and they apologetically
made me a new one (a medium size too). The girl behind the counter said ‘this
doesn’t even look right, it’s not the right color at all.’ After going back to
the hotel with good drink in hand we watched the unbelievable end to the Cardinals
game before hitting the hay.
Today we traveled 217 miles across America for a total of
4,437.8 miles on leg 2 and a grand total of 14,962.5 miles across America.
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