When we arrived in Phoenix Arizona, we pulled up at the same time my mother had been retrieved from the airport. We plopped the camper in the drive way and began to enjoy the festivities of New Years Eve. The TV showed us the countdown for the regions around the world and we waited for our time to come. To have a little fun, we showed Dylan how to use sparklers and long exposures to make fun images.
The next morning, we drove over to the White Tank Recreational Area to do a little outdoor 'hiking'. The short trail up to the seasonal waterfall was just long enough of an outdoor adventure for some of our crew. We also took a moment to find Dylan's first ever Geocache. Since then, my brother has created an account so they can continue the hobby.
Another activity that we had a blast with was hitting up the local bowling alley. Of course Dylan had to be a show off and get the high score out of all of us.
We also took a trip to Encanto Park in the center of Phoenix to have a picnic in the sun. Pepe couldn't resist the getting us all into paddle boats to cruise the lake in the center of the park. Dylan expressed his dislike of being in Nanny and Pepe's boat instead of Chris and Liz's. Overall, it was a fun time and Liz's first time ever in a paddle boat.
As a Christmas present, we got Dylan some awesome camping swap including an emergency whistle/compass/thermometer combo (no fire starter just yet). We traveled out to the Buckeye Hills Regional Rec Area where we scored an awesome campsite and cooked up some delicious campfire grub and watched the stars pan the sky above the saguaros.
Some of the most fun though was spent at home on the trampoline of playing video games in the den.
When Dylan went back to school on the second week of the year, we planned some gnome time and went out to the Botanical Gardens in Phoenix which had a huge selection of cactus and native desert plants. It was beautiful.
We also were recommended to an awesome hike in the South Mountain Preserve called Hidden Valley which had a few rock scrambles and crawl-throughs to give some excitement.
On our last weekend in Arizona, we hopped in the car an drove out to Sedona for some beautiful outdoor adventures. Unfortunately, the weather was uncooperative and rain packed us in early in the day. We still grabbed a geocache and also picked up a salt lamp for Dylan's room. Overall, we had a great time in Phoenix with my brother and nephew and of course the parents. It was a great bonding time for Liz and we were able to spend some of our down time to rest but also start the lengthy planning process of the wedding coming in fall. Very Exciting!
Thanks for reading and sorry for the delay. Things are once again falling behind in life and the blog is the first to go the wayside. As we continue our journey back east and north, the blog will be pretty dormant for a few weeks until we are connected to internet source again.
No comments:
Post a Comment