Arizona Vacation

I've fallen way behind on our blogging, so it is time to catch up. Danica, Anneliese, Alexa and I took a road trip vacation to Arizona in early March. We left Denver after work on a Friday, and drove down to Santa Fe, NM where we spent the night. The next morning we quickly left and hit the road for the long drive to Phoenix. We encountered a variety of weather, and even some snow outside Flagstaff. However, we arrived in Sunny, warm Scottsdale that evening. The nice weather didn't last, and it was rainy and cool for the next few days.

We visited Danica's father, Vern. Vern took us to a nice park that had lots of birds to feed, and the girls decided the birds would be quite happy with a loaf of their gluten free bread. :-)

The next day we went to McCormick-Stillman Railroad Park, which is a very nice park in Scottsdale that has a miniature train and a carousel.



It was still chilly, and you can see everyone bundled up. We still had fun riding the train.



Shortly after this, I received a call from my best friend Neal Thompson. I have known Neal since I was 11, and he is like a brother to me. He had bad news, and told me that his father had unexpectedly passed away in his sleep. I was majorly bummed, and my heart really hurt for Neal and his family. It was hard being in Arizona and not able to come help. Neal's dad lived in Texas, and Neal headed down there to take care of his dad's affairs. They will be having a memorial in Denver for him next week in Denver. God Bless you Mr. Thompson.

Later that night we headed over to Vern's for Dinner. Anneliese and Alexa love to have Grandpa Vern draw for them. He is pretty good at drawing cats, dogs, pigs and cows.


After a few days we said Goodbye to Grandpa Vern, and headed to Sierra Vista, home of my Aunt Denise and Uncle Terry. Sierra Vista is an hour southeast of Tuscon, and not far from the Mexico border. Here is Alexa and Denise. We had a nice time visiting and the weather started to warm up.



Denise took us to Bisbee, which is an old mining town in the southern Arizona mountains. Danica's grandfather immigrated from the Isle of Man and worked in the Bisbee mines for several years. It was neat for Danica to see a little bit of her family history.



Not far from Bisbee is Tombstone, famous for its turn of the century gunfights, and the gunfight at the O.K. Corral. We watched a comedy gun fight around the corner from the O.K. Corral.



The girls also learned what happens when you get into trouble in an old western town. :-)



After visiting Aunt Denise and Uncle Terry for a few days, we headed back to Denver, via Albuquerque. I spent some of my early childhood in Albuquerque, so we drove by my old house and elementary school. It was nostalgic for me, and it was neat to show the girls.

We drove over 2000 miles on our road trip. What was really amazing is how well Alexa and Anneliese tolerated all the time in the car. We brought lots of toys for them, and when they needed something very distracting, we let them watch cartoons on our iPhones. We had an excellent first family road trip. I'm sure we will have many more in the future. I'd like to take road trips to see Yellowstone, Mount Rushmore and the Grand Canyon.