Vacation Report
Posted by in TravelHello everyone. I’m back after 13 days, 2000+ miles, 4 states and lots and lots of fun. I’ll be posting about the food on the trip separately. We flew to Vegas and drove to the Grand Canyon, Sedona, Santa Fe, Colorado Springs and flew home from Denver. Along the way we:
Saw a comedy/magic show in Vegas (Mac King – highly recommended)
Saw the Titanic exhibit in Vegas
Went to the Fremont Street Experience
Went to the Pawn Stars store (it was closed)
Enjoyed tigers, lions and dolphins (including a baby dolphin!) in Vegas
Took a gondola ride at the Venetian
Saw the fountains at the Bellagio and the volcano at the Mirage
Gambled exactly $1 and lost
Enjoyed the lazy river at the MGM Grande
Stopped at the Hoover Dam
Grand Canyon
Saw the Grand Canyon
Red Rocks Jeep Ride
Drove a Jeep through the Red Rocks in Sedona
Visited the town of Jerome at the top of a mountain
Noodled around Oak Creek in Sedona
Saw two cliff dwelling sites
Saw petroglyphs
Visited a meteor crater
Drove through the Painted Desert and Petrified Forest
Visited two pueblos, including one that has been continuously occupied for over 1000 years
Petroglyph
Took the high road to Taos
Saw the Rio Grande
Visited Rancho de las Golondrias, a living history musueum
Saw a prairie dog village
Saw wild horses on the road
Rode a cog railway to the top of Pike’s Peak
Meteor crater
Saw the Continental Divide
Saw a buffalo herd
Went to a Ghost Town Museum
Rode horses through the Garden of the Gods
Sampled different mineral springs waters fresh from the spring at different fountains throughout Manitou Springs
Happened upon a fine arts show
Visited Seven Falls
Went to a wolf refuge
Painted Desert
Went to the Denver Mint (where unfortunately they were cleaning the machines and we did not actually get to see coins being minted – very disappointing)
Visited a gold mine and panned for gold
Went to Dinosaur Ridge and got to stand in actual dinosaur footprints
My kids never want to get in a car with us again after this. The photos are kind of mishmashed in this post, but you’ll get the idea!
wolf refuge
wolf refuge
cliff dwellings
View from Pike's Peak
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What a fantastic trip! I’m so glad you got to see my “neighborhood.”
Wow! You did so much. Reminds me of a trip with my kids when they were teenagers. Would have liked to have seen the wild horses. Glad to hear you had so much fun and will look forward to more posts on food impressions along the way.
Yes, it could be our last family road trip since Teen Martha is 19, so we decided to go for it. I personally just love a good road trip and hope to do more once we are retired and can just go along without a tight schedule. You can see so much and do so much. It was in stark contrast to our Alaskan cruise last summer where you have literally a few hours in each city.
I enjoyed it.
What a great vacation! I’ve yet to see the grand canyon. It’s really a sad situation. I also haven’t been to Vegas before. There’s a part of me that wants to see it and a part of me that doesn’t. I understand Vegas sucks all of the water out of Nevada, leaving a lot of family farmers dry. It wastes water on golf course grass and fountains while farms aren’t allowed to irrigate. Seems wrong.
I was ambivalent too. I wanted to see it just once though. It was fun to see the things we did and know what it was like. The worst part was the smoke. We spent a day and a half and two nights there and by the time we left, everyone had a sore throat and red eyes from the cigarette smoke, even though we spent no time directly in the casinos. It just permeates all of the buildings. I saw on billboard arguing to make the city smokefree, but doubt that will ever happen.
Are the red rocks not one of the most amazing sites? And the Grand Canyon? And the cave drawings? All the natural beauty of the west, it seems you got to explore and enjoy!
Yes, there was just so much to see and all of it spectacular and so different from our landscape at home in Buffalo.
Wow, I would call that a power vacation!
It certainly sounds action packed! What a great photo of the Grand Canyon. I was sorry to read that the food was mainly disappointing – I can’t believe a nutella patty with a donut as the bun – only in America!
Only in Vegas, really!
We tend to get through things rather quickly. I was reading a description of a small museum out loud and it said to allow 30 minutes. My son said, “well that means it will take us 10 minutes.”
What a fun trip! Man, you really packed in lots of cool stuff. Love that you went to the Pawn Stars store, but bummer it was closed.