Thompson visit -- April 2015

Lee and Karen came down to visit during their spring break!

They arrived the day before Easter, so it was nice to have family around for the celebration. We went to church in the morning and then to a friend's house for brunch, complete with a bit of swimming. It is Arizona, you know!

The Thompson men!

Cute!

Grammy, Rolin, Justin, Lee and Emmett. Only Rolin and Emmett's outfits were planned, the rest just happen to match beautifully!

Thanks to cousin Maggie, the boys had cute matching Easter shirts this year :)

Emmett and me after church. Love those teeth!

Please get your sunglasses ready for this next picture....my skin...it reflects light. 

I was the designated swimming adult...that's about all the further Rolin and I got in the water...it was chilly in the pool! 

Daddy and his boys. And a garbage can. 

Back at home, grammy and Rolin played egg hunt over and over and over. 

Rolly, me and Emmett. And a garbage can. 

We generally go on a little adventure when parents are in town; this time we returned to the Tonto Natural Bridge, about a two-hour drive north of us. Justin, Rolin, Emmett and I had been in October...Rolin may only be two, but he has an impressive memory and talks about the "cave" all the time, so we knew we had to go back. We also knew it was a place the Thompsons would like to explore!

Looking through the hole, you can see light on the other side -- it's not a cave, but a bridge. You can walk right over the top of the arch/hole, and we did!

It's a long, tricky hike to the bottom, but we all made it. Lee was a champ/hero and carried Emmett in the hiker pack all the way down and up, then down and up again on the other side. I worked with Rolin, who was also a champ, even though his little legs turned into cooked spaghetti noodles near the bottom.

Hiking down side 1.

Down near the water at the bottom. 

Rolin and I were hiking partners. 

Karen and I helping Rolin down a large boulder. 

Taking a breather at the bottom.

Underneath one side of the bridge at the bottom. The water is very clear!

Heading up side 2.

The rest of the week was filled with house hunting (yes, we're looking to buy a house!!!) and playing outside in the warm weather (before it gets too hot).

We also toured the Thompsons around Sun City in the hopes of encouraging them to buy a retirement home in sunny AZ with the rest of the snowbirds. To help with the luring, we stopped at my parents' new place for lunch and a tour of their rec center.

Hanging out at the Casa de Emerson II in Sun City. 

A special thanks to Grammy and Grandpa for watching the kiddos when Justin and I went out to visit houses. We also had a date night! We hope you can make it back down again soon. 

Grand Canyoning

The day after the Tuzigoot and Montezuma business, we drove into the Grand Canyon National Park. Planning a trip of your own? It should be noted that it's best to do a bit of research on food options before going to the park without a picnic lunch. 

While we thankfully ate a large breakfast, our arrival was poorly timed, specifically in regard to walking certain distances between available food sources, times we would like to be eating and when these food sources were open (things close in the afternoon, folks). 

However, as I said, thankfully we all ate a large breakfast, so everyone was in good shape. That, and I had packed snacks for Rolin, which also doubled as adult snacks toward the end of the day. 

Details, details.

Lee and Rolin walking to the park from the parking lot. 

Justin with his sweatshirt on. 

Justin with his sweatshirt off.

It was a nice day for a visit -- clear, temps in the low 70s, a weekday so we weren't trampled by weekenders.

Because this is my blog, so I can say what I want to say, while grand, I was expecting more grandeur. I mean, it is a fantastically huge, colorful, mystifying work of art in the surface of the earth, but I think my eyes had been spoiled ahead of arrival by photographers' edited pictures.

I think another reason for my (I don't want to say disappointment, it wasn't that) lack of awe was because I was on edge and slightly terrified of Rolin escaping and slipping and falling, whether it be on his own or while he was on someone's back in the carrier. I mean, just a week or two before we arrived, someone tragically slipped and fell near where we were walking! I can't say I really stopped much to absorb the majesty of the Grand Canyon.

Don't get me wrong, it is pretty awesome. A few times I imagined being a pioneer, riding along on my horse, wishing someone would invent mosquito repellent already, and randomly coming across a completely impassable, colorful, enormous hole in the ground that no one had ever seen. But, after a while, everything started looking the same. And we had a long way to walk before we got to the (closed) restaurant, which would have cost us about $65 per plate, and 9 p.m. would have been the earliest we could get a reservation.

Plus, eventually Rolin didn't want to be in the carrier anymore. He wanted to run free. He wanted to show other visitors at the Grand Canyon that, yes, it is possible to walk the trail and cry for about 45 minutes straight.

Walking the trail, pushing Grammy and Mama forward with his screaming. Is he a future drill sergeant? 

Can you see the veins popping out in my hand? Death grip, peeps. Death grip. 

Justin, me and B2T2. 

Grammy making friends with another squirrel. 

Lee and Karen.

The view from the Desert View Watch Tower, nearing sunset.

We'll definitely go again sometime. Maybe when our kids have babies of their own (like, have to be strapped-in-a-stroller, can't-yet-walk babies), so I'm not responsible for fearless teenagers who think they can jump between rocks or scamper out to teeter on a cliff edge. Their spouses, not their overprotective mother, will then be in charge of threatening them with bodily harm if they're being ridiculous daredevils. If my kids are parents of their own by the time we go again, maybe I'll take some time to sit and stare at the world wonder.

Grand Canyon in 2042, anyone?

Tuzigoot, Montezuma Castle & Montezuma Well

Justin's parents came to stay with us in April, during their spring break. Justin had been wanting to see the Grand Canyon since we arrived in Arizona, and we figured the Thompsons would like to see it too, so JT planned out a trip up north. 

Thanks to a day-trip recommendation from Sunset magazine, we stopped in Cottonwood for some pizza at a joint the that came highly recommended. Unfortunately, the joint wasn't open for lunch, but thankfully we had landed on a cute strip of old Cottonwood, where the streets are lined with cute cafes and shops.  

Turns out there is a lot more than a closed-for-lunch pizza place near Cottonwood. It's also where you'll find the Tuzigoot National Monument, an ancient condominium-like village of 110 rooms built by the Sinagua people around 1000 A.D. 

Sinagua is a term given to this group of people with uncertain origins. It's not a Native American tribe, bit rather more of a mystery. Sinagua is a term coined by a scientist in the 1900s around the time they discovered some of the dwellings in the area, such as Tuzigoot. I believe Sinagua is of Spanish origin, meaning without water(?).

Tuzigoot from the bottom 

Tuzigoot from the side (plus the in-laws and my kiddo)

Tuzigoot from the top

A nest with eggs near Tuzigoot

Rolin was given a Junior Ranger badge while visiting Tuzigoot. I think qualification is based purely on cuteness.

"Hi, Lizard!'

Always trying to escape. 

PS -- the hillside town of Jerome is in the background. We stopped there with my parents two months earlier, not knowing this cool historical site was nearby.

After Tuzigoot, we went to see the famous rock dwelling called Montezuma Castle. As you can see in the pic below, it's a housing structure built completely into the side of a rock cliff. It is much more than what you see on the outside; there are many rooms and hallways that go deeper into the rock. Now, looking again, please note that we're standing at the base of the cliff...there are no stairs up to the dwelling, just a rock wall between the ground and dwelling base, about 150 ft. up. The historians and signs on site suggested the inhabitants used many ladders to climb.

This was again a dwelling place of the Sinagua people, utilized from around 1100 to 1425, when it was completely deserted.

We also stopped at a place called Montezuma Well (the coolest of all three places!) The funny thing about Montezuma Well is that the other two sites are packed with tourists, require a fee, have gift shops and rangers and the works. Montezuma Well has none of that, and it's free for everyone! (Note: We were able to get everywhere for free because Lee used his national parks perk card you get as a senior, but still...)

Lee was a champ and carted Rolin around most of the day. 

The well is about 11 miles from the castle. It's basically a giant sinkhole that's filled with fresh water, but no one, still to this day, knows where exactly the water comes from (obviously under ground, but one of the signs noted that many divers with equipment and cameras have tried to put cameras down a supposed source, but the cameras are shoved back out before they make much progress).

The Sinagua people built a few small dwellings in the rock wall around the hole, but nothing as grand as Tuzigoot or the castle.

Here's the well. The two arrows are pointing to two doorways into cliff-side dwellings.

Better shot of the doorways.

This dwelling was built near the water level of the well, down a couple sets of stairways. We weren't allowed inside, but you can see on the right of the pic that the dwelling area goes deep inside the wall (where is is much cooler). 

The heat was getting to me by late afternoon.

The neat thing about the well is that the water escapes through a natural tunnel in the side of the rock (limestone?) and out through a small opening in the back of a hill, which the Sinagua people discovered and made use of for irrigation by routing the water through a series of man-made canals. This is otherwise a desert, folks. There is not a lot of water around, so the well was very sacred, for drinking and irrigating.

This is the point where the water exits the well and heads outside the hill where it was then (and now) routed through canals for irrigation.

The canals have been reinforced as of late, but follow the original route the Sinagua made. This is at the bottom of the backside of the well (it sits on a hill). 

Making my way down one of the stairways to the water. If anyone is looking for a pregnant lady to jump in front of a nice scenery shot, I'm for hire until mid-July.