Crinkly's Good Ole American Family Road Trip Day 26: Revisiting the grand hole in the ground (Grand Canyon) (9/22/15)

Woke up and had breakfast at the hotel and then headed out towards the grand canyon so that I can be humbled at the sheer size of nature for yet another day of this trip. Get into the canyon grounds and there are storm clouds all around the canyon (north rim is being poured on) so we decide not to do the hike down into the canyon and stay along the rim checking out the nice views.

Beautiful sunrise starting off the day but clouds definitely are everywhere. 

Health lodge at the Grand Canyon. Didnt see this part last time I was here.

These are the trains you can take to get into the park from nearby. 

The OG GC train.

Those storms, they are a brewing. Let the stunning views begin.

Yes beautiful indeed.

Found a lodge one can stay at when visiting the park. Looks good.

You can use this scenic locator to view the canyon.

Or you just look out and take it all in.

Found this guy as we were walking on the path.

Scary lil dude.

Looks like the formation in the middle is being back lit. Even on such a stormy day, the canyon is amazing.

Found a mammalian friend to hang out with as we walked around.

Another site I think I missed last time I was in the park. Not this time :)

Think I can make it to that landing? Yeah me either.

"Small" plateaus in the canyon.

A nice panoramic shot of the canyon.

I think its kinda cool you can see the different levels of the canyon (river gorge, plateaus, and north rim)

I know all these pictures are probably pretty redundant to the untrained eye, but the canyon is truly spectacular in person.

Clouds giving us some cool coloring on the rocks.

Getting a better look down into the valley.

Clouds starting to clear up a little bit.

Great example of the size. That wee man out there is my dad.

Just some siblings enjoying the view. They may have been scheming on the other accidentally falling into the canyon. Sibling love :)

Crinkly wanted to get a glimpse of this magnificent landmark.

Clouds are coming back in with a vengeance.

Another little panoramic shot of the canyon. Wish I had a better camera for this place.

This. This is the reason a picture of this place is the background on my phone.

Some more wee people over yonder. 

Found another critter to hang with.

Crinkly taking advantage of this beautiful day.

Not sure I like the horde of birds just chilling in a nearby dead tree.

Crinkly is starting to show his age.

Got us a glimpse of the mighty Colorado.

Moon starting to come out.

Crinkly doing his best imitation of the tower.

Sunset over the canyon is starting. Gotta finish seeing our sights before no light left.

Ahhhh more views of the Colorado and the Eastern most area of the canyon.

Crinkly was thinking that was a volcano. Dont think thats a thing in the canyon.

Yeah this will be a gorgeous sunset me thinks.

Panoramic view as we set up for the sunset viewing.

Trying to get a few last pics in during dusk.

Crinkly is loving sunsets... almost as much as me.

Crinkly and his tower.

We found us a pretty good spot I think.

BEAUTIFUL!

The moon is ready for his time to shine.

Now for a series of sunset pics as you can never have too many to enjoy :)

El Fin!

Grab lunch from the canyon cafe in the Market plaza. They have ordering kiosks which are cool in theory but when putting in an order for multiple people, it would take much less time just telling someone the old fashioned way. Oh well, get our food which is cafeteria food; nothing too good or bad. I had a porter from historic brewing company that I thought tasted close to a young's dbl chocolate stout, which I liked but was a little too sweet/chocolatey for me; turns out it is a cherry vanilla porter. We left there, took the tram to yaki point which was another gorgeous view of the canyon (don't know that there is such thing as a bad view of the grandest of canyons) before heading back to the car to begin the exit via the eastern (Desert View) entrance. Get to the tower at the desert view stop after the stairs are closed at 530pm so we just explore the grounds and wait for the sunset (plenty of clouds in the sky which I believe makes sunsets/rises infinitely better with the right amount of clouds) before heading out towards Flagstaff. Get into town and go to eat first, but Oregano's has a 45 min wait so we put our name down and head to hotel (Budget inn) to check in and get unloaded before walking over to the restaurant to be seated. Eventually get  to our table and I ordered the kiltlifter first (4 peaks – Scottish ale) before getting the santan pale ale. I ordered the grandma G's chicken potato pizza (or something like that) which had some garlic chicken with sauteed onions, gorgonzola, potato slices (little thicker than potato chips), and some other stuff. Was great but I was lied to when I asked if their small was for 1 person (12” pizza is not for one person – I could have gorged to finish the last 25% but didn't). Was a great place (well priced and very good food with a waitress that was quick witted and cool to interact with) and would recommend it for people going through town. After dinner, we head back to the room to book some rooms for the remainder of trip before heading to bed.

Crinkly's Good Ole American Family Road Trip Day 25: Those some huge trees! (9/21/15)

Woke up relatively early and had a quick breakfast before heading out through the park and down towards sequoia national park. Drove through where the fire brigades were stationed to fight one of the nearby fires (we were near one of the big fires entering the San Francisco part of this trip and now driving near the other big one). Get into the park and there is a smoky haze filling the valleys which is both cool (creates a really interesting view of the mountains which is pretty) and smelly (the smell of smoke permeates everywhere). We finally get into the sequoia area and it is impressive; we had a small taste of the sequoias in Yosemite but this is just flat out impressive.

Crinkly is glad to be back around these gentle giants. There were way more here than in Yosemite.

This isnt even the biggest one but look how massive it is compared to the other trees/people all around it.

Crinkly admiring the awesome wonder of nature.

Crinkly and more of his giant tree friends.

Crinkly and another tree. I know they all look the same but they are so spectacular had to keep taking pictures (these werent all of them btw).

Crinkly looking at the base cross section of a fallen sequoia.

What happens when a giant sequoia falls across a road? you cut through it and make a cool little tunnel.

Root system of a fallen sequoia. Pretty impressive looking.

Fascinating colors in the sunset tonight. Love it!

As we get deeper into the park, the frequency of these giant beauties increases with groves full of them popping up here and there. Some of the trees here date back to BC times; to me that is a complete mind-explosion that this living thing has survived longer than many (probably most) civilizations. Not only is their age/resiliency impressive, so is their size/beauty. This is one of those places you just need to visit to entirely appreciate and understand; I for one plan on coming back in the future and spending a few days hiking around the trails and really submersing myself around those giant specimens. After seeing the largest (not tallest) tree in the world (General Sherman), we head out the south entrance; before we get out, we have to traverse the switchbacks from hell which have way too many hairpins to count with some pretty awesome views of the canyon before you. We get out and make our way to Kingman, AZ where we grab a room in the Best Western Kings Inn after a long day of driving. The Best Western hotels we have stayed in have all been pretty great and I think everyone is pretty impressed with the quality of the rooms/hotels when we have stayed in the BW hotels.

Crinkly's Good Ole American Family Road Trip Day 24: Last day in Yosemite (9/20/15)

Woke up and had a quick breakfast in the room before heading into the park for our final day of hanging around. We go to the Yosemite village area and walk around a bit, then go to the village store to do some shopping before heading to the visitor center. The visitor centers at all these national parks are pretty cool; there are history and science explanations of how the parks were formed, the types of animals in these parks, etc. So we spend some time reading those facts and then watch some history videos in the theater before going to the deli nearby for a sandwich for lunch. We were able to grab beers for 1.50 (bottles of Sierra Nevada), which surprised us but we weren't going to let that opportunity pass. After finishing our meal, we went back to the room to chill for a little bit before having dinner at the lodge restaurant. We enjoyed our meals and then headed back to the room to hang out before heading to bed as we have a long day tomorrow.