Sedona with Rae

So this is Robert again and since we are very behind on the blog, I get to write a whole post.  My post is half as many days as Jenn's and far fewer pictures, but it will probably take me twice as long.

July 6: Desert View drive to Flagstaff  
Last night we took on the feat of cooking dried beans while camping and it was a complete failure. We ended up eating just the mashed potatoes that were meant to go with the beans. After I had passed out in the car, Jenn called it a failure and woke me up for dinner. We didn't want to really pack up properly so everything was just thrown into the back so we could actually go to bed. We woke up that morning with the truck a disaster, so a quick breakfast was pointless. We opted to set up the stove and cook instead of eat  cereal with nonfat powered milk. Nestle nido really is far superior to the nonfat powdered milk. I looked in the cooler to see what we had left to cook and found broccoli and mushrooms that were meant for the beans and the 4 left over eggs from pad Thai. Stir fried broccoli and mushrooms with two fried eggs was much better than it sounds or at least I thought it was. (Jen didn't exactly finish hers, but oh well.) I think one of the nonstick pans from storage in Seattle should magically appear in our kitchen box and maybe we could properly fry an egg.

Look-out on the Desert View drive

After breakfast we cleaned up from both last night and breakfast, organized our stuff (which is a daily activity), and loaded the truck. We headed back into Grand Canyon National Park to take the Desert View drive to the Watch Tower, which I thought was an actual watch tower used back in the day and was quite disappointed when we got there. Along the way we stopped at almost all of the look-out or view points along the way trying to soak up the last of this truly grand canyon. The watch tower was the last stop before we headed south to Flagstaff. Upon arriving at the tower I asked Jenn what they used the watch tower for and was told it was a gift shop. It turned out to be a pretty cool gift shop, but it was still just a gift shop. Mary Colter designed and painstakingly over saw the construction of this building in 1932. She also designed many other buildings in the park.

The Desert Watch Tower

The bottom floor was the gift shop, but the tower part had displays of native American artifacts and really cool cave paintings on the wall. You could climb up to the top of the tower and have a 360 deg view of the surroundings; it was worth the drive.  After walking down to the edge of the canyon one last time we got back in the truck and drove to Flagstaff.

Black mirrors (reflectoscopes) really make the colors look cool

The drive to Flagstaff was very nice desert scenery with many road side stops for "real native American jewelry". It was interesting, but we didn't stop so the hour and a half drive went by quickly. We met Rae, my cousin, and her boyfriend Brendan at Los Alteños for lunch. This was a really cool little Mexican place run by a Mexican family. The whole menu was in Spanish and most of the customers were Mexican. The food was very authentic, which means that Jenn has a hard time finding something that was sin carne. She decided on the chili rellenos and me, the Mex plate. Her rellenos were very flat and were battered in a very egg-rich batter, which I though was great but she preferred to eat the chili and cheese leaving the batter on the plate. Mine was a Mexican stir fry with beef, spicy peppers, and onions. Both dishes were served with tortillas and rice and beans. They also had a hot sauce bar which was very good, but they were very thin sauces so I can't really call them salsas. All in all it was way too much great food.

After lunch we headed over to Rae's place to hang out and take a much needed shower. We spent the afternoon chatting and hanging out before Rae had to go to work. We showered and Jenn napped while me and Brendan watch Ratatouille. Jen woke up towards the end of the movie hungry and since the whole movie is about food, I of course was hungry again so Brendan took us to the Pita Pit for a wrap. It was like Greek Subway, a nice lighter meal after the giant Mexican lunch we had. We picked up a six pack and headed back for a riveting board game of Settlers of Catan, which is really just a resource management game. After Rae got home from work she took us out to some of the hip spots in Flagstaff (The Lumberyard Brewery, Rendezvous and the Green Room), which turned out to be a really late night for us as we are in Mountain Standard Time and we stayed out til 2am. That's 4am for all you Central Daylight Time people and just really late for us.

July 7: Driving out to Sedona
We slept in this morning and for me that's 9am and as we have a mobile kitchen and pantry in the back of the truck, I went down to get some cereal and milk for breakfast. After a little organizing in the truck, I went back up to find Jen awake and wondering where I had gone. We had breakfast and cleaned up after ourselves and still no one else was stirring in the apartment. So I took a book off the self and started reading while Jen got caught up with news; evidently these guys stay up late and sleep in, just a little different than what we do. Brendan came out around 11:30am since he had to go to work and Rae at 12:30pm, but she was packed and ready to go. As Jen put it 0 to 60 in no time. We were off to the grocery store to provision for the next couple of days.

The drive out to Sedona is interesting as you drive off the rim and down into the canyon. Oak creek is really cool and very heavily traveled. Most campgrounds fill up in the morning, but we were lucky enough to find a campsite at the first place we stopped. It was the farthest campground from Sedona, which I think is why it still wasn't full, but by the end of the evening every site had a camper.

Jen and Rae walking up Oak Creek

We found a good rock to sit on.

We took a little hike around Oak Creek looking for the narrow-headed garter snake, which is supposed to be very rare except along this creek. Most of these snakes have radio transmitters on them, so with a receiver it would be pretty easy to find one, but we were unsuccessful in our attempts. We did find a pretty cool wash that during melt has a lot of water running through it, but was very dry while we were there. After our hike we went back to camp to start cooking dinner. We bought a 10lbs bag of sweet rice a while back in The Woodlands to make sticky rice with and made it only a couple times, so we decided to try and make it while camping. It actually turned out pretty good and everyone was very excited. The curry was our typical blend of coconut milk, curry paste, and as many veggies as we could fit in the pot. We ate as it was getting dark. Brendan arrived late that night after getting off work and shortly afterwards we all went to bed.

July 8: Creek Day

Our swimming hole

We had a very leisurely morning and since we left our stove setup from the night before, it was very easy to cook a hot breakfast of oatmeal and coffee. With enough sugar, butter buds, cinnamon and raisins, oatmeal is very tasty. We sat around and chatted for a while before I once again rearranged the truck so all four of us could ride together down to the creek. Rae knew a spot that was really nice on the south side of Sedona that young people went to instead of families. It was one of those places that you drive until it turns into a dirt road and then keep going until it dead ends and then take the trail until that dead ends into the river. It took about an hour to drive out there, but it was well worth it as it was the best swimming hole that we have had yet. The water was very clear and over 15ft deep in places with rocks to jump off of.

Rae enjoying the wonderful water

When we arrived we had it to ourselves for an hour or so before a super hippy guy and a kid arrived. Jen and I debated on the relationship of the two of them finally deciding on a Big Brother/Little Brother kind of thing. He was a professor teaching art and journalism and a veggie, but his use of words was the best. For example: "I'm hip to what your saying" and "I really dig this place," but it's hard for me to convey the supreme wonderfulness of his language. They had built a raft that he said held 8 people, but when we got there it was broken up into a tangle of twine and logs. They spent a good part of the afternoon moving the logs down to a small dam that already existed to increase the size saying "if we just move 10 rocks a day, we could save the world". They actually did a pretty good job of stacking the logs and rock even if no water was being dammed by their creation. It was a great afternoon of hanging out in the shade and taking dips in the water.

Jennnnn found a caterpillar

That evening we tried to salvage our beans from a couple of nights ago, but this time we were prepared with canned beans if they failed once again. Yes, once again they failed, but from my figuring and the improvement they made, I think an afternoon in the dutch oven over a fire will have them all fixed up so now we just need to find some place that doesn't have fire restrictions. The canned beans turned out great as we added equal parts beans and roasted green chilies. We served it over tortilla chips and cheese. Very tasty.

We had a pretty early evening as Rae worked the next day and we needed an early start. The next morning was a quick breakfast of leftover curry and packing up camp. We drove back into Flagstaff and dropped off Rae and said our goodbyes. It was very nice to see family that I haven't seen in a long time.