More pictures of Winter Wonderland!!

the wind started blowing!!

keeping the Beer cold!!

Winter Wonderland!! It snowed Friday night 11/4 in Flagstaff, AZ

Well they predicted snow on Friday night in Flagstaff so Saturday was a day to drive 89A and see the scenery. It was a spectacular drive and the snow on the mountains and trees made it like a Winter Wonderland!! We had a great time seeing the snow and it was one of our best days on the road!!  Pictures don't do it justice!!  But I will try!!

Took 2 hikes in the Sedona Red Rock Country

We haven't been taking our hikes like we wanted and decided to take two nice hikes. The first one was Fay Canyon, a little over 2 mile round trip to see some beautiful scenery.  We saw several other hikers enjoying the beautiful red rocks. What makes this different than Moab is the trees and other greenery.

Our second hike was a little over one and a half round trip, with an elevation gain of over 400 ft. It was a moderate climb giving you beautiful scenes of the red rock country, once you completed the hike. The hikes allowed us to splurge to a fish fry dinner at the casino, burn those calories!! and yes, I even lost money again at the casino.

Overall a great day!!

almost stepped on the snake

Visiting Sedona and Jerome, AZ

Decided to take a drive and visit Sedona and Jerome. Sedona is a town with a little over 10,000 people, but many more are part time due to the beautiful scenery and nice climate. We found Sedona a place that we would like to visit again and maybe even spend several months. The scenery is fabulous and the hiking trails are unlimited. This is one great place and a must to see if you ever come to Arizona.

Jerome was a copper mining camp, growing from a settlement of tents to a roaring mining community. Four disastrous fires destroyed large sections of the town during its early history, resulting in the incorporation of the City of Jerome in 1899.  Jerome is now a bustling tourist magnet and artistic community with a population of about 450. It includes a modicum of artists, craft people, musicians, writers, hermits, bed and breakfast owners, museum caretakers, gift shop proprietors and fallen-down-building landlords.

Snoopy!!

Moving up the road to Sedona, AZ on 11/2/2011

We were excited to move to Sedona and see some of the beautiful Red Rock country. We are camping at Distant Drums RV Resort in Camp Verde, AZ. The campground was recommended to us by some campers in Buckeye and are we glad they did. This is a great place to camp and is within 20 miles of Sedona and just across the interstate is a casino. I tried to win Christmas money but again went home empty handed:(((
Since we got to the campground around lunch we decided to visit Montezuma Castle and Montezuma Well.
Montezuma Castle is a neat looking cliff dwelling which reminded us of our visit to the dwellings in Mesa Verde. It is always fun to see these dwellings on the side of mountains. You just wish you could see how everyone got around.
Montezuma Well is a  naturally occuring spring in the desert which produces a million and a half gallons of water a day. Empty cliff houses, caves and ruins of stone pueblos are all that remain of this 14th century farming community.

Visiting White Tank Mountain Regional Park on 10/29/2011

Decided we need to take a hike so we headed to White Tank Mountain Regional Park. It is about a 20 minute drive from our campground and very little traffic. The mountians have an elevation of 4,000 feet and the floodwaters have scoured out a series of depressions, or "tanks," in the white granite rock, thus the name of the mountains. We stopped at the nature center and got to see the live display of rattle snakes and a stuffed owl. I don't like snakes or owls so we got out of there rather quickly. We decided to take the Waterfall Trail hike because seeing waterfalls is one of my favorite things to do. Well the hike is about one mile out to the "waterfall." There is no waterfall:(( why would there be in the middle of the desert? Well the hike and the scenery were very nice and there were other tourists looking for this waterfall.
On the way back we saw a rose farm with thousands of roses. It was very cool to see all the different colored roses.
We are enjoying our stay in Buckeye, but it is time to move on to Sedona on wednesday. It is going to be cooler as the elevation is different, let's just hope we don't get any snow:))

the waterfall

In Buckeye, Arizona

We have been in Buckeye, Arizona since 10/2/2011. The temperature has been almost 100 everyday and hopefully will cool off next week. It has been an active month with the wedding, but other than that we haven't been doing much. We have been on the road 233 days as of 10/22/2011. The down time was needed and we have enjoyed doing nothing. My birthday was Friday, 10/21 and I turned 61. I am looking forward to next year when I can start collecting Social Security:)

Suzanne and I are doing great and looking forward to the remainder of our trip. We have been planning it and are going to Sedona on 11/2 and then on to Carlsbad, San Antonio, Corpus Christi and Galveston. We are planning to stay in a lot of state parks as Texas has some great ones. Then on to  Birmingham, Alabama for Christmas, after that it looks like Florida unless we make a decision to travel on. I guess you never know what life will give you, so we may just keep going.

The only pictures I have taken other than the wedding is of our campground, Leaf Verde RV Resort. It is a nice place, no shade as Arizona doesn't have trees in this area:)) and you can't beat the price. The dogs have enjoyed the dog run and Oreo has taken to chasing the ball and returning it. She is so cute:))
Both Sandy and Oreo had to be boarded when we went to the wedding and were perfect guests of the pet resort. They both got A's on their report cards!!

Suzanne's favorite