Adventures in our Adventurer: More Surprises and Spectacular Sights

Early Fall 2018. We leave Durango, CO and head west via Northwest New Mexico. During our sojourn, we decide to take an Indian Road (that's the official designation when on a reservation) that will provide the most direct route to our destination of Gallup, NM. After making the turn onto the road, we crested a rise in the road and were treated to a scene out of an old Western movie. We stared for a long time looking for smoke signals, a wagon train or a group of riders on horseback. Of course, we saw none but were still carried back to the images we have been fed via the movies many times in the past. It was a very surreal moment to say the least.

What a sight to see - roughly in the middle of nowhere

After reaching Gallup and our RV Park destination, we enjoyed a BBQ dinner at the park under an Indian Summer night sky. The setting and food was perfect after a day’s worth of driving. From this spot on I-40 we continued our westward trek through Flagstaff and on to Williams, AZ where we intend to stop for about a week.

We arrived in Williams and took our spot at the Grand Canyon Railroad RV Park. Williams is located south of the Grand Canyon and is part of the old Route 66. There are a lot of historic and tourist type establishments in downtown Williams which is within walking distance from our RV pad. Bibi and I took a stroll one morning just to get a feel for the place and to see what we could see. Afterwards we booked our train excursion to the Grand Canyon.

It is interesting to me that I traveled on only one train as a child and it was the only trip I took via train my entire life until I retired. Of course, I did grow up in the era of the car, particularly muscle cars, when trains had diminished to almost entirely freight hauling. Since retirement, I have been on multiple trains to various locations and thoroughly enjoyed the relatively slower pace of travel.

All Aboard

Hey Bibi - They said All Aboard!

The trip to the canyon on the train was very entertaining primarily due to our ‘conductor’ who provided almost non-stop commentary during the trip. He writes books about animals he studies and had come to Arizona to study certain animals and write a book about them. He was quite knowledgeable and entertained us enough to make the long trip seem much shorter.

Upon arrival at the Canyon, we had a certain amount of time to eat and do some sightseeing before boarding the train again for the return trip to Williams. We determined we would come back in our car to fully explore some of the areas of the Canyon we did not have time to look at on this trip. We learned from our ‘conductor’ that a group of California Condors had been relocated to the Canyon to try and save the species from extinction. According to him, it appears to be working because the original group has grown in number. So this became one of our goals to locate and see the condors.

That is a three story building in between the fingers!

Boy howdy! That is a loooonnngggg way down.

Just don't lean too far back - please.

Having not been successful on our short visit via train to locate the birds, we continued our search a couple of days later when we returned to the Canyon via car. We spent the entire day exploring the views and sights at many of the stops available via the park service shuttles that operate continuously. One of our major disappointments is the fact that the three dimensional images seared into our brains cannot be viewed adequately by looking at a two dimensional picture. There is no way to accurately reproduce the ‘grandness’ or the beauty of what we saw using pictures.

We did have success in locating some condors on this trip. Here are a couple resting on the ledge of an outcropping. They are nowhere close to us and this picture was taken with a very strong telephoto type lens by our intrepid photographer pal, David. So mission accomplished with thanks and a hat tip to David for providing our proof.

That's too close to the edge Bibi and don't pull on me so hard.

Definitely prettier when flying but here's the proof we saw them.

During our stay in Williams I had a super nice surprise. I was staying inside the RV while Bibi and our traveling companions made a trip to a Flea Market adjacent to our RV park. While at the flea market, a vendor asked the group where they were from and they told them Longview, TX then they proceeded on their way to other vendors. A short while later; another couple came by the same vendor who asked them where they were from with the same answer; Longview, TX that led to the next question, ‘do you know those folks from Longview?'

Long story, short, I get a knock on the RV door and standing in front of me is a former schoolmate from high school I had not seen in 50 years. We had a great time catching up with each other’s lives, friends and events during the intervening 50 years. What a nice surprise and time we had and it was all owed to a vendor at a flea market three states away from Texas. Of course, our Texas accents probably had a lot to do with his initial question. Jus’ sayin’.

What a super nice surprise and a reunion from 50 years ago

We made one additional trip to the Canyon late one afternoon just to catch the sunset as it played its last light of the day on the facing rock walls. We read and were told the best time to take photographs to try and catch the colors, definition and translate the 3D to a 2D image was at sunset. So we decided to give ourselves a shot at doing just that. We had a great time and enjoyed a different perspective than previously experienced during our daytime visits.