Grand Canyon

Wow! One of the great wonders of the world. As with other National Parks, we could have stayed much longer. The views were majestic and spectacular. Timothy and Craig really got into hiking and maneuvering around and over the rocks. They challenged every boundary. The two boys and I hiked part of the Grandview trailhead. Dale wanted nothing to do with the steep slope with immediate drop offs to one side. She kept Luke safely with her. We also walked the much safer and easier path of the canyon rim. I think if and when we come back I will take the railroad to the Canyon next time. It was a 4 hour total round trip and we needed to make some headway East tonight. As it is, with the hour loss going eastward, having control of our travel is huge. There's not much else to say. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

The California Dessert

Due to our late departure, (Who? Us?) today will be a drive day as we head to the Grand Canyon by way of The California Dessert along route 40 East Bound, where it's gotten as hot as 111 degrees. Got water? Still, the view isn't that bad. However, it would be nice to see a gas station soon. There could be a story developing. Stay tuned...

So, our gas light just came on and we are 36 plus miles from next city. I checked my gps and there is a gas station 12 miles on Route 66. I told Dale, I bet they only accept cash. We get there and no debit at the pump. It's $4.99 a gallon. We put in $40 to make sure we could get to next city. I looked at the couple next to us I was like, "You know how you say I'll never get stuck in the middle of nowhere..." They replied, "...And here we are."

Another memory just created!

Update: We're eating at the Wagon Wheel Restaurant on Historic Route 66. Apparently it can get up to 130 degrees in Needles, Ca. No thank you.

Disneyland!! Yeah!

We made it! The kids can say yesterday that they have put their feet in both oceans, Pacific and Atlantic. Today they can say they have been to Disneyland and DisneyWorld.
It is amazing how thousands and thousands of people with such diverse backgrounds can coexist so happily, peaceful and in harmony. You would think we lived in a Utopia. Must be the magic of Disney. Too bad this isn't the realm outside the kingdom.
Anyway, we went on a number of rides and the consensus was the Indiana Jones ride was by far and away the best. Although, the Buzz Lightyear blaster was a lot of fun! We saw Chip and Dale and Cinderella along with a bunch of characters in the parade. We stayed for the fireworks and then after a final trip on Buzz, we got some Ice Cream and went back to Hotel de Chesley.
The kids have said that Walt Disney World wins. However, this might have changed had we gone to California Adventure Park too. Although, I will say I like the castle and Haunted Mansion at Walt Disney World better. Just the same it was a magical day and everyone left tuckered out and happy!

California Dreaming

I am not sure how the pictures will mesh with the post as I attempt to keep the blog alive via my phone thanks to the mobile app Blogger. However, I'll be damed to allow my initial intentions be thwarted.
As we wait for my credit card to show up, (Apparently, it was delayed a day for some reason) we will hang out an extra day in Burbank. Nothing wrong with this as our hosts have been great and it gives us another day with family. Again, Nothing wrong with that. We are just a little worried about making it home on time without doing a cannonball run type drive. So because it is Thursday and my check for work won't clear until tomorrow, Disney will have to wait a day.
So, we went to Zuma beach in Malibu, Ca. First thing I noticed: the surf is much rougher than on the East where I am from, hence the waves are higher which is really cool. Thank goodness for Dale's death grip on "No Fear" Lucas. The boys and I were successful in flying a kite. According to my son Timothy, it got vertical some 485 feet give or take a few. The view was beautiful and everyone had a great time. We even saw Dolphin swimming along the shore. Tim was super close as he was swimming a ways out. He thought it was a shark at first. Phew! The life guard was watching him just in case. Good suggestion Heather and thanks for lunch. So far it's been 20 days on the road when we made it to the beach and Dale and I haven't killed each other.
We ate dinner at Aunt Ruthie's. The first in home dinner we've had on our trip. It was nice. Tomorrow... Mickey Mouse?

Golden Gate Break-in

  We traveled to San Francisco on Tuesday, July 17th. The Alcatraz tours have all been long sold out. So, we decided to stop off at the Jelly Belly Factory tour in Fairfield, CA on our way to San Fran. The tour was quite interesting. The variety of flavors are astounding: Baby wipes, Barf, Booger, Dog Food,  as well as their three best sellers: Berry Cherry, Licorice and popcorn and everything in between. I didn't know Jelly Belly made candy corn but they indeed do and is quite yummy. The Jelly Belly store sucked us in with Dale and Luke getting Flip Flops and Timmy a very cool beanie helicopter hat. Instead of stopping for lunch, we went straight to San Francisco in hopes of beating rush hour traffic. We did. We stopped at the Golden Gate park on recommendation.
  The park is huge! It has a flower conservatory, a playground, the famous carousel, plenty of hiking trails among many other things to do. We roamed the flowers as evidence of pictures. We also took to the trails, where Luke was Tarzan. We missed out on the Carousel by 5 minutes, so we took Luke to the Koret Children's Quarter where he had a blast. It was time to get something to eat. I took out my trusty phone and opened up my gluten free restaurant finder and we ended up at the pacific catch. We walked there through the numerous trails I mentioned before. The food was good and definitely most different. We all had some type of fish except Luke who had his standby trustworthy chicken strips. My body went into shock (not really) as it couldn't remember the last time I had eaten this foreign substance.
  Time to head back to the car. We were one of a handful cars left, a stark contrast from the tens of cars when we parked 4 hours earlier. I looked down to see glass at my feet. When I looked up, it was from my passenger side window. We had been broken into. They took my laptop, which had 50% of our pictures as I had been dumping them from my phone and camera to save room. They took my wife's kindle, my son's i-Pod touch, our GPS navigation system, our bag of maps and tour books (I guess their planning their own trip) and most damaging, my wifes' purse. She had our checkbooks as well as all her credit cards, social security cards and what not. It wouldn't have been so bad had I not tried to be so smart. We share all the same credit cards but one. However, in attempt to be prepared, I wrote all my card numbers down on a piece of paper and put it in her bag in case I lost my wallet.
  So, I called the San Francisco Police department. They told me they couldn't take a statement over the phone until I had made sure their was no fraud on my credit cards. So, I began the long process of cancelling all of our cards. I canceled all our cards. All we had left for cash on us was $30. We were 6 hours from my family in Burbank and had half a tank.
  After filing a claim with my insurance company for the window, I went to the SPD to file a report. We then decided we would make the 6 hour drive to Burbank even though it was 10 at night.We really weren't feeling comfortable staying at a hotel with a busted window being so far from home. It was freezing on I-580. Yeah, 62 degrees isn't bad but the wind was still chilly. We stopped at a rest area and tied a blanket over the window to minimize the chill and put the heat on our feet. Now, we lost out navigation system as well as our maps. Thank goodness I had my phone. It successfully navigated us to our family at 4:30AM. So, once we got the kids settled in bed, we called our banks and stopped our checks and our debit card, pursued setting up the claim to have the window fixed, as well as start the process of getting all my wife's health/dental cards as well as social security and driver license replaced.
  I was able to take a 4 hour siesta as my wife finalized the arrangements for the guys to come to our family's house to change the window out.
  We were unable to cross the Golden Gate Bridge (that was on our agenda after dinner) but I did get a picture, My cousins were great as they loaned us the deductible for the window and then took the kids on a sight-seeing tour so Dale and I could get some sleep.
  We wait now for the window to be fixed, a CC over-nighted and pay day on Friday to have some cash. I can't thank everyone enough for all their generous donations, offers and kind words during this little inconvenience because in reality that's all it was. All my family was safe and unharmed. We had a place to stay and things are slowly getting put into order.
  We ended our night by going to the Counter for dinner. Thank you Aunt Ruthie for treating us and allowing Timothy to polish off a 1 pound Hamburger, Look at the size of this thing!!

 Some camp fire family time in the backyard made a rather unfortunate event much easier. I mean we could have been days away from family... so if it had to happen, this was probably one of the best scenario's.
  Oh, and one of the total upsides, is all our souvenir baseballs from our trip have been untouched.

  Update: Window is fixed. However, the card was sent out today instead of yesterday, so we'll have to wait until Friday to resume our adventure on the road. In the mean time, we will be taking to the beach for some much needed down time. Again, good to have family in this area!

 Also, there was some levity to all this. At the time of cancelling all my cards at the scene, Luke looks at me with his hands over his head, whimpering says, "Daddy, money all gone."
 "It will be okay," I replied. Then in the morning my cousin said, "The car looks uneven with one window punched out, so I punched the other one out too."

Detour along the Loneliest Road

We descended South West into Nevada, altering our route from the original path to Redwood National Park in California, as we really want to see family in Burbank, CA. There is a little disappointment in not making it to the Redwoods. However, Craig feels this would be a good destination in 5 years when he becomes a senior in high school. We are headed to San Francisco which has brought us down to I-80.
  It wouldn't be right not to stop somewhere in Nevada. Although, we went long stretches where there was nothing, not even a gas station, When I mean long stretches, I am talking an hour and half in the car with nothing to see but, well, nothing. We are too far north of Las Vegas and the reality of the situation is I don't think stopping at a casino is really appropriate with three kids, So, we ventured off to US 50, also known as the loneliest road in America. Well, it's because it's just you and road... and some tumble weeds.
  Why would you ask that we go such a route? Well, the answer is a historic landmark of course in the form of Fort Churchill which is in Silver springs Nevada. This was the first and largest military outpost in Nevada. It is also important that it was one of the stops along the Pony Express. The building pictured is where the mail was picked up. This site is so off the beaten path that you paid the entrance fee on honor by putting cash in an envelope and dropping it into a steel mail slot.
  We also saw Open ranges where horses roamed with no boundaries (fences). Unfortunately, we also saw someone's home go up in flames.

  Just as I took this, firetrucks were approaching the scene. We got back onto I-80 and headed for Reno. We stopped at Extreme Pizza which was mighty tasty. We continued to Sacromento, CA, before calling it a night. As we passed into California, they did an inspection of our car to make sure we were not bringing any insects, moths or anything else that might cause harm to the agricultural environment. This was something new to all of us.

Walking on the Moon in Idaho?

  We moved on from Wyoming finally. However, I am definitely NOT sad we stayed an extra day. I could see us spending a week gallivanting around Yellowstone and The Grand Teton's sometime in the future. We found ourselves in Acro, Idaho this afternoon at Craters of the Moon National Park. I have never seen anything like it. I am not sure how to describe it. Although the word weird keeps cropping up. Due to the fact I am at a loss to describe it, I have stolen the opening statement from the National Park Service.
  Craters of the Moon is a vast ocean of lava flows with scattered islands of cinder cones and sagebrush. We invite you to explore this "weird and scenic landscape."

   I read somewhere that I believe before the Apollo mission, the astronauts came here to learn basic volcanic principles.
   In it's history, it has had an eruption of some magnitude every two thousand years. The last one being just over 2100 years, so its due. Yeah, as cool as it would be to experience something like that live, I am okay that it didn't happen today. In addition to walking this Volcanic crusted matter, we explored a cave or two. No bats, just birds. Here are some pictures.

 

Apparently, this is NOT kryptonite. Superman is not having any difficulty.