Arizona Trip - Day 5 (Sedona & Flagstaff)

In the morning we visited Falling Rocks State Park and Red Stone National Park. We didn't hike a lot. We got nice views of the red rock canyons on the way. We went on a trail in Red Stone National park. My daughter was quite attached to the King Fisher bridge on that trail. She didn't want to come back. We had to forcefully bring her back.

We then visited Montezuma Well, Montezuma National Monument and Tuzigoot National Monument. These are some of the ancient ruins. Montezuma well was made out of limestone million years ago and it still gets water from the hot springs. All these monuments are somewhat closer to each other. You can see them all in about 4 hours. Do not expect to see 'exciting' stuff in these places. If you are a history lover, these places will definitely excite you.

Arizona Trip - Day 4 (RV Return, Papago Park, Desert Botanical Garden)

We cleaned and returned the RV, rented a mini-van from the airport and checked-in to Crowne Plaza Hotel. The whole process took until 2 pm. Phoenix car rental facility is the biggest that I've ever seen. You have to drive for about 2 miles from the airport to the car rental facility. The rental facility was bigger than a shopping complex :)

In the afternoon, We went to Papago park to see the Hole in Rock. The Hole in Rock was nice. You can climb upto the top. We then went to Desert Botanical Garden. The Desert Botanical Garden was not as impressive as I had originally anticipated. You can spend about an hour and a half there. We then came back to hotel.

Arizona Trip - Day 3 (Navajo Canyon Ferry, Wupatki National Monument, Sunset Crater)

We got up early and went to the ferry boarding point in Lake Powell. We boarded the ferry at about 9 am. The ferry took as to Antelope Canyon & Navajo Canyon. The walls of Navajo Canyon was 800 ft high. It was a 3 hours tour and you can get breath taking views of the Canyons. My wife & I enjoyed it very much. My daughter caught up with her sleep for 3 hours :)

We had our lunch and started driving towards Phoenix. On the way back, we went to Wupatki National Monument and Sunset Crater. The Highway 545 (which is off of Highway 89) drive was very scenic. There was Cococino forest on both the sides of the road and it was fully covered with snow. It looks like you have to take the Lava flow trail to see the Sunset Crater. My daughter was sleeping and we had to skip that.

We reached Phoenix at around 8.30 pm. We camped in Paradise RV Resort. Paradise RV resort is a good community and the stay was very pleasant.

Arizona Trip - Day 2 (Glen Canyon Dam Tour & Horse Shoe Bend)

After driving the RV for nearly 7 hours on the first day, I dropped the visit to "Zion National Park" from my plan.

We got up very late. We were amazed by the view of the Canyons surrounding Lake Powell, from the campground. I signed-up for the Navajo Canyon Ferry tour for the next day. Unfortunately, the tour to the Rainbow Bridge was not available. We went to Glen Canyon Dam for the dam tour. Glen Canyon dam tour was nice. The tour guide showed us the interiors and also the power plant. We had our lunch and then went to Antelope Canyon. We took a few snaps of the upper Antelope Canyon from the parking lot. We didn't hike there.

We then stopped over at Horse shoe bend. After a 3/4 mile hike, you get a spectacular view of the horse shoe bend. You can see the greenish Colorado river 1000 ft down. It was quite amazing. There was a sand storm and my daughter got frightened because of the cold weather and the sand storm. We took a few pictures there and returned to the campground at about 4 pm. We stayed in Page for that night also.

Arizona Trip - Day 1 (It started with a bummer)

I had planned to visit Phoenix with my friend's family. However, just one day before the trip, my friend's kid got rashes because of being allergic to a cold medicine. My friend dropped off from the trip. I started to think whether I should still rent the RV or should I just rent a minivan. I finally decided to rent the RV.

On 26th Dec, we got up early in the morning and got ready. We were waiting for the cab for our pick up. We waited until 5.10 am (our flight was at 6.25 am) and didn't see any signs of the cab coming for pickup. I called Yellow Cab and was surprised to hear that the cab will be delayed by 25 minutes. I canceled the cab and got help from my friend to drop us off in the airport. I did a curb side checkin and cleared the security checkpoint. The flight takeoff was delayed by an hour due to some fuel gauge issue.

The flight landed in Phoenix at around 9.35 am. We took Super shuttle and reached the RV rental lot. Eric (RV rental guy) gave me a 1/2 hour training+tour of the vehicle. I picked the vehicle at around 12 pm and went to Safeway. We did some shopping, had lunch and left Phoenix at around 2 pm. I didn't feel a lot of difference between driving an RV and a U-Haul truck.

It took about 6.5 hours to reach Page. On the way to Page, I was stopped by a cop for driving at 56 mph in a 50 mph zone. I didn't realize that I was driving above the speed limits. He warned me and let me go. This is the first time I was intercepted by a police. I was lucky enough, not to get a ticket :)

We reached Page at about 8.30 pm. It took about 30 minutes to figure out where the camp ground was. Finally, we called the support number to get directions. The camp ground was in Wahweap Marinas, facing Lake Powell. It was very cold in the night. I hooked up the connections to the outlets (water/sewage & electricity). We were very happy to get access to unlimited resources :) My wife prepared a delicious dinner. We had our dinner and went to sleep.

Arizona Trip - Preparations

Our office was shutdown for the holidays. My friend and I decided to go to places in and around Phoenix. We decided to rent an RV for the trip. That was the exciting part of the trip :)

We booked tickets on US Airways (through Hotwire). We booked a 29 ft motor home from Kachina RV Rental. We booked the camping ground in Wahweap Marinas, Page. We are all set to leave on the 26th Dec. We decided to go to Zion National Park, Glen Canyon and to a few places in and around Flagstaff/Sedona & Phoenix.

Sacramento Trip on Thanksgiving Weekend

25 November 2007

Are you in the bay area? Got a day to kill? Wondering what to do?

How about a trip to Sacramento? Your kids will love it too.

My friend and I decided to go to Sacramento during the Thanksgiving weekend. We rented a mini-van and started with our families at about 7 am. We reached Sacramento in 2 hours.

Our sight seeing trip started with the State Capitol building. The photos on the sidewalls capture the specialties of each county in California. The building had a few rooms with old office accessories like typewriters available for display. Someone from Arnold's office stopped by and gave us his business card. We took a few pictures in front of Arnold's office, of course, not with Arnold :(

There is a lot of memorials in the State Capital building campus including the Vietnam War Memorial and the Fire Fighters Memorial. There is also a colorful garden in front of the Vietnam War Memorial. You can spend about 2 hours in the State Capitol Building campus.

We then went to the California Rail Road museum. It is a good place for kids to spend time. There are a number of antique rail engines. They had miniature displays of passenger and goods engines running on the tracks. There is also a play area in the 2nd floor which my kid liked. There were a few wooden toy engines and tracks for kids to assemble and play.

We then went to the water intake facility in Jibboom park. It is located in a very calm location. You can see boats and cruise ships passing through the Sacramento River. There is also an unmanned bridge that opens and closes when cruise ships pass by. It was interesting to watch that. There is also a walking/biking trail close by.

Our next destination was Towe Auto museum. We went there with great hopes but were disappointed. The museum was located in a ware house. They had a nice collection of antique cars. This place may excite people who have interests in learning about antique cars. We spent about one hour there. We then left to Folsom lake.


We didn't know that Folsom lake will be empty during winter :) There was hardly any water left inside the lake. We took a few pictures of the evening sun set from the lake. From there, we headed back home.

Sacramento trip was enjoyable and was not very tiring. If you are going to Sacramento in summer, you can do a lot of water sports also.