Holy shmoley, it's February. I've got a lot to say about a lot of trip.... but sitting here in a Starbucks drinking a nice cup of tea, while Jen cooks a nice Halibut diner (most likely on our Weber Q100 totally awesome portable grill), I was astonished to see the date of my first blog entry. It says "The Littles are making a change".... Oh, can you guess where I am? probably not and I don't want to skip forward, but I'll give you a hint... I caught a fish yesterday, with my hands. Anyway, it's February and that is the month I posted my first blog entry, which means that was the first time we told everyone our little secret, which also was the day we realized we'd really do it.... because we told everyone, and certainly weren't going to back out then. Wow, one year ago, that is amazing and is another example of how fast time moves and how we can do big things in just a year.
We are in our sixth month, probably our fourth month of really hitting our stride with the lifestyle and just visited our 29th state. The experiences and time together as a family is getting better and better, we took a long guided food and eating tour of this city we are in, it was so stupendous. We ate cheese, crab cakes, clam chowder, donuts, fruit, the best chocolate covered cherries in the world and got a full history on this place we are staying... I didn't know half of the history.
After the tour we were hanging out with a couple in a little park, taking pictures of the city, the mountains, and just chatting. They commented on how amazing our kids were, they walked the entire tour, tried 100% of the food, asked questions to the guide and had a good time... I didn't really think about it, but I guess They are now used to it, we've dragged our kids to at least 15 parks, 17 cities, 20 hikes, 5 tours, on boats, bikes, planes, mountains and more... they now don't know any different, brain washed I guess. That makes me happy. But speaking of this couple, turns out when they graduated from college, moved to Paris the day after and opened their first bike tour company. Fast forward to today and they own 20 tour companies in Europe and the US, if you've ever done a Segway or biking tour, it's most likely from their company. They have two kids and travel to Europe like five times a year, that is really cool... great couple.
Before we visited the Arizona desert everyone goes on and on about how, amazing, mystical, beautiful, and breath-taking it can be... it's really annoying when people exaggerate so much, clearly they have an agenda, but then you go and understand. It's all true, the desert can be the dessert of a long trip around the country.
The desert, which by the way is spelled with one "s", most people want more of that sweet stuff we eat after diner, which is why it's spelled with more or two s's, or called dessert. The sunsets alone are worth visiting Arizona, we stayed a week in Tucson and a week in Mesa, aaamazing. In both places we camped next to a mountain range in local parks, every night this happened! It was breath taking, meaning it literally took said breath out of your lungs and made you gasp.
One of my great high school friends Michelle and her bo Brendon (and soon a title more "elevated") visited for a night, so fun catching up.
Partying new years night, we played games, had fancy drinks, and did magic.... we even got a semi-live feed of the ball dropping festivities later that night on my iPad. If you've never played Farkle, get to it, it's the best family game ever.
This is a pretty funny picture but not quite as funny, when we first arrive the kids ran outside to check things out. We quickly heard Campbell screaming, but he kept screaming. Turns out he had run through a cactus mine field, and literally had five or six one inch spines sticking completely through his Crocs. Sure in hind sight wearing Crocs wasn't the smartest idea, but lesson learned.
Jump to Phoenix or more specifically the town of Mesa. This picture was taken from the roof of 0ur RV, and is where we stayed for a week. 70 degrees and sunny every day, it was awesome.
This may look fake, but this was 8 feet from our RV, I love these cacti... it's like having sculptures all around you.
There is Arizona, then there is Sedona Arizona. That is where all the magic and mystery happens. At every turn I was convinced Clint Eastwood would ride over the rock and say "Howdy". We took a renowned jeep tour called Pink Jeeps, it was two ours of rock 4-wheeling and sight seeing. A must, if you ever visit.
We were blessed and fortunate to have our family friend, and our kids first baby sitter, Britt, visit for 4 days. We enjoyed her company, conversation, and enthusiasm during our adventures. Of course being totally deprived of time alone with my wife, we went on a date night during the visit... thanks Britt!
We visited Jennifer's Aunt Brenda in Phoenix and were lucky to also see her grand kids Destiny and Tyler. We had diner at her house (which I brought laundry to do) and thoroughly enjoyed the time and catching up.
One of the highlights of stay in Mesa was a hike up a 3,000 foot mountain, our plan was to climb up to the top, then watch the sun set. Then we were told by the park ranger the hike was too difficult and treacherous for small kids. We thanked him for the advice and headed up the hill. It was really cool but got a little scary and turned into an adventure.
We summited about 15 minutes before sunset and hung out on this rock, you can just see Jen's head over the edge waiting for the sun to go down.
We tried to time the hike down so we wouldn't have to climb with too much darkness. We took this picture on our way down balancing the camera on a rock.
Probably the best sun set picture taken on the trip.
We made it down, but you know that because I'm typing this blog. But the kids must of fell on the rocks 20 times, it's was pretty hairy coming down in the dark. This was taken at the end of the trail.
