Tucson, day 2

For as long as I can remember, Jamie has had this straw bale book on our bookshelf. He has read it from cover to cover, been inspired to take a straw bale course, picked a few more books up along the way on the topic of alternative buildings and dreamed about the day that he would be able to build his OWN strawbale house.

So, when he was searching around for things to do in Arizona, you would not believe how excited he was to discover that his idols, Bill and Athena Steen, were set up very close to Tucson! And after much harassing from moi, he finally emailed them to see if he could tour their property and imagine his pleasant surprise when they said YES!!!! Unfortunately the Steens were not going to be there (running a course in California) but they had a houseguest (Emily) who would be happy to take time out of her day to show us around.

And you know, it worked out perfectly - some of the Steen boys were there (unschooling, lego-obsessed, dress up and creative-playing, brownie baking boys - our kids were in HEAVEN!!!!!) and willing to entertain our kids for hours, Emily had been in Japan for many years and was learning Japanese techniqes in plastering (Japanese culture tends to be another obsession of Jamie's), and she was happy to spend about 5 hours taking us through the property, showing us photos of workshops and answering Jamie's many questions!!!! Wow, what a tour, and what an amazing place!!!!!! A couple of things that I especially loved about it was that the kids were able to get just as involved in the building as it is with such a natural product, it's really easy to expand on a need-basis, and so as the boys got older and wanted their own space, they could just help build an out building for their room, within easy reach of the main home! What a great way to approach the teenage years :-)

Oh, and check out some of the detail work in the buildings as well - built in benches and niches, raised art work on the actual walls - the buildings are so beautiful AND functional!

Quick greetings from the Denver airport.......we had booked cheap flights through Alaska Airlines for today, and totally surprised the girls on the way in. They were SOOOOOOOOOOOO excited to find out, it was well worth keeping the secret for the past week! Plus, this way they didn't drive us nuts counting down to the exciting trip!!!!!!

Originally we were supposed to transfer in Portland and arrive after 10pm. Which was fine for super cheap, but not our first choice. Then upon arrival, we're informed that the flight is overbooked, and would we mind changing our travel plans a bit - they provided us with $1000 in travel vouchers, gave us a cheque and transferred us over to United. For a direct flight. That arrives a couple of hours earlier. Um, sure, twist our arms! So now we're all well fed, the kids are flinging elastics back and forth slingshot style and Jamie and I are taking advantage of the free wi-fi in the airport to catch up a little!

More updates from our travels once we arrive in Vancouver - as I try to catch the blog up, I've begun to realize just HOW MUCH stuff we've been doing, and no wonder we're all wanting a bit of down time for a while!!!!!! I've even been skipping things, like the great week we spent in Mojave before Vegas, but still there are pages and pages of photos and stories to update you on. I guess we'll just have to meet in person sometime to fill in around the blog entries.

Tucson

The funny thing about driving down to Tucson is the Barth would not shut off. Because it's always got to be SOMETHING, you know - gotta keep us on our toes! So when we drove to Bell Rock, it seemed to work to turn the key a bit more on (ie grinding the starter a bit) and then it would turn off. However, by the time we got to Tuzigoot it wouldn't turn off at all. We were kind of scratching our heads as to what to do, but then Jamie came up with the brilliant idea of running around and shutting off all the propane tanks, thus stalling the engine. (we were amazed how long it actually took to run out of gas!!!) Then we drove all the way almost to Tucson before we had to fill up again, pulled into a propane station, stalled Bartha again, restarted and made it to the RV park where we stalled it again. No problem!

And this is where we realize just how lucky we've really been so far. See, in the morning we called the RV MD (he even had a t-shirt with that logo on it!) that will come to your site to work on your RV, and now not only would Bartha not turn off, she wouldn't start - in fact, wouldn't even turn over at all. The mechanic took one look at all of the wires, and exclaimed that we really must have someone looking over us as the wires were basically resting on a piece of insulation, barely touching at all - he was shocked we made it all the way down from Sedona!!! He then spent a few hours fixing up our wires and changing our ignition, while we took our rented car and explored the area around Tucson - barely noticed that Bartha was out of commission! Very blessed indeed, though if one more thing goes wrong with this RV I doubt we'll be feeling so blessed!!!!!

We didn't actually spend a lot of time in Tucson itself, only because there were so many things just outside of the city that we wanted to explore. However, we did want to make sure we at least made it in once, so after we got the mechanic set up with Bartha, we drove into old Tucson to wander around a bit and grab some dinner.








We weren't sure where we were going to eat, but once we neared the old town square, we started to hear rifle shots and cannons, and thought it was intriguing enough to check out! Turns out that the historical society was having a fundraiser, so a bunch of people were dressed up in costumes, there was a mariachi band, homemade Mexican food, and the old fort was open to tour with desserts and people set up at stations to tell us about the money, the playing cards, the food, the herbs, the trading systems, the weapons, etc of the fort in the early days of Tucson. FASCINATING way to learn a lot of the history of Tucson, and all for less than the price of a meal for 5 out!!!!!

From Bell Rock, we drove just south of Sedona to Tuzigoot in order to see the ruins of an ancient village site. The museum was really interesting, describing the building techniques and also how they thought the natives lived inside and around the buildings. Then after reading all about it, we were able to walk through the rooms, seeing exactly how SMALL each room was, and were able to climb down a ladder into one room as the inhabitants used to. At the end of our walking tour, the girls found an example of a mesa and metate (basically a mortar and pestle), so they had a lot of fun playing with that. What I love about adventures like this one is how easily the girls are able to let their imaginations go, and all of a sudden they have an elaborate game of history and culture going! And, of course, I was able to pick up a book or two in the gift shop to further their knowledge and keep their imaginations going!

Sedona 2

The thing with Sedona is, it is full of energies (hence, I'm sure, the attraction of the aliens. And, as we very affectionately call them, the flakey bunch), and there a few different vortexes widely advertised in all the tourist shops (I'm sure the locals know of more) so we could not leave the area without checking out at least one of them.

We chose to go for a morning hike up to see Bell Rock, partially because it was close and easy to drive to with Bartha, but also because it promised to realign both our masculine AND feminine energies. The write-up mentioned that those who are sensitive will notice the energy from the moment they get out of the car - I guess we're not very sensitive. However, as cynical as we can be about this stuff we figured that it couldn't hurt us to spend a bit of time there, so opted to check out the plants, do our morning stretches and marvel at the amazing geology! And, realign our energies, of course!

Sedona

After frolicking in the water, we decided to continue on into Sedona. We weren't sure where the rv parks were, so we opted to pull into a tourist information centre - and lucky that we did, as when I was returning from getting directions, I noticed that the tire under Jamie was really flat. I knew he shouldn't have had the extra cookie, ha ha! By this point in the trip, we were feeling really thankful for our BCAA membership, as it has now paid for itself and more! We called up, and within an hour they'd changed our tire and we were ready to go! And luckily, the alien museum was right next door so we were easily able to amuse ourselves!!!!




Then, with a new tire on and our interest in local alien hotspots piqued, we drove another 5 minutes down the road into our rv spot. Sedona is a really neat town, I could have happily spent many more days exploring around it, and heading further north to see beautiful red canyons and caves. Another trip for sure! I'll leave you with a couple of photos of Sedona - which was very much exactly as we'd pictured Arizona to be!!!!!

Into Arizona.....

So, from the Grand Canyon we drove for a few hours to get as far as Sedona. We stopped for a bit in Flagstaff, which actually looked like a really cool town, and then stopped again at Slide Rock in order to eat and explore. Slide rock was really neat - beautiful red rocks, and a great river flowing down over smooth rocks which had formed to make natural waterslides. I imagine in the summer this place is HOPPING on a sunny day, but today none of us were quite brave enough to do more than dip our toes in and watch the odd fool crazy enough to get soaking wet on this winters' day!!!!!!

We have a new niece!!! Elsie Bengle-Stanley was born at home on March 31st at 12:45 - and she weighed a whopping 9lbs 4oz! Huge congratulations to Chloe, Sean, Maya and Lucas - we can't wait to meet her!!!!!!!!

LOVING the spin!!!!
Originally uploaded by the five mckays

So, we arrived in Denver Colorado today - and I was determined to do a bunch of catching up on the blog tonight but have come to realize that it is 11:30 and I have barely touched on Arizona, not to mention New Mexico, so I think I will leave the rest for tomorrow. However, I wanted to give a brief update on our plans as of right now, for those who have not been updated, as we're ALWAYS changing them (isn't flexibility the key to life?!!!)......

My mom is coming back to Vancouver for a visit (from her work in Cambodia) and we really wanted to make it there in time to see her. However, when we thought about hustling our butts in the Barth, over snowy passes and the Rocky Mountains, only to turn around and drive BACK over the Rockies on our way east, we were less than enthusiastic. Then our friend suggested looking into the cheap flights from Denver, and we thought that sounded like a FABULOUS idea! So, for $30 we're storing Bartha in Denver for a month, flying up to BC to have a good visit with everyone (in a rental car that takes very little gas and is able to drive quickly! We'll be spoiled!) and then flying back to Denver in order to make our way east.

We've decided that for this year, we're not going to do a lot of traveling in Canada. I imagine we'll be traveling here there and everywhere in Bartha for years to come, but right now we're feeling the need to create a home base for us to always return to. We want to buy our land, design our house, build up our new community, and be around for all the new nieces/nephews making an appearance. We love a good adventure here and there, but it turns out we are not full-blooded gypsies!!!!!

So, our dates for Vancouver are April 6th to May 4th.....send us an email if you have time to see us!!! xo

So, from Vegas we drove over the Hoover Dam, stopping to take some photos and walk over it, and then onto the Grand Canyon. I have to admit that we were a bit nervous about seeing the Grand Canyon, as we'd heard so much about it, had seen many photos of it, and wondered if it would really be as grand. But from the moment I peered over the edge, I have to say, I was amazed - what an impressive valley, it seems to go on forever and there are so many rich colours in the rocks. I could have just stood and stared for hours, if it wasn't quite so cold!!!!!!!!!

It was kind of funny, it felt like we had to drive forever to get there, and all through really boring, flat landscape with no indication at all of the incredible vista we were approaching. We finally arrived at the gates, where we had to pay $25 to get in. Jamie kind of balked at that, but there was no way we were turning around at that point so we paid and kept driving. It was getting late and everyone was hungry, so we opted to find a campsite and set up. Then it was too far to walk, and rather cold, so we made the decision to wait until the morning to go see it. That night, for whatever reason, Tiegan ended up throwing up all night long - keeping us all awake and also covering our bedsheets with puke. Lovely. Luckily the campground had a laundry attached to it, so once we got going in the morning, we gathered up all of the bedding that had been thrown outside and headed over there. Bartha took a bit of coaxing to get going, which was odd, but not shocking so we didn't think much more of it. However, after the laundry was done (and we were all showered!), we couldn't get her to start at all. Uh oh, this WAS a bit worrisome. Luckily there is a garage near the campground as well, so we made our way there - and spent a good hour trying to coordinate with BCAA to get them to check the Barth. Turns out it was just a wire that came loose, and took 2 seconds to fix, but Jamie had to go back to the Barth to wait for someone to come check it out, and by this point it was 3:00 in the afternoon and I was seriously wondering if we were EVER going to get a chance to see the Grand Canyon!!!!!!! It would seem a little ridiculous to have made all the effort to get this far and NOT see it, so I insisted that Kea, Ryland and I trek over to see it!

WOW!

If you have never been, you must make it out there at least once in your life. Just wow. Or as Kea exclaimed, "Oh, it makes me feel so small"!

I came back to the Barth exclaiming over how awesome it was, and so Jamie wanted to go as well - we bundled poor Tiegan up, and made it out for sunset, a full moon guided walk with a ranger and then the next morning we dragged everyone out of bed to watch the sunrise - amazing!

Death Valley

Our plan had been to drive Bartha into Death Valley and camp there for a couple of nights. But since she had been rolled into the transmission shop for a few days of R&R, we had to come up with plan B. Which, evidently, did not include skipping out on Death Valley. So we loaded up our tired kids and set out to drive. And drive and drive and drive through the middle of nowhere. Now here's the thing with my kids. When they're tired, they whine. And when that doesn't get them anywhere, they proceed to slowly torture each other as a form of eventually torturing us. And with three car seats stuffed into the back of a car, this torture is VERY easy to complete. A little eye poke here, a book grab there, escalating into full hair pulling and ripping out of the scalp. Screaming, shouting, threatening and eventually pulling the car over onto the side of the road ensues. None of which is a pretty sight, and I'm sure all of us can agree that at this point we are very glad that we were in the middle of nowhere so no one can see us!!!!!! After a few of us sit on the side of the road for a while, calming down and talking things through, we're ready to move the seats around once more and head off - hopefully getting a decent amount of distance in before we repeat it all again!!

Really, we should have just turned around, but no - troopers that we are, we. must. go. on.! No matter what our frame of mind is while we are there, we must see Death Valley!

We arrive, we're hot and tired and ready to commit murder. We pull up to the first hotel, and are told it is $175 a night. Some of us don't care, some think it's unthinkable. We drive on. The next place is $350. Ha ha ha. Oh wait, there's another place 45 minutes down the road in another town. We drive there. It. is. full. WE are not at all amused at this point, and kindly share that we HAD mentioned in the first place that we should have stayed at the first place. This kind of sentiment is not received well. Lots of storming and back turning. Which gets us nowhere. Oh, and the restaurant also closed an hour before. So, most of us go into the store to find frozen burritos to nuke while Jamie calls the first place to reserve a room for way too much but at least it's a room. Phew. (we won't mention that the rv park had lots of room, and was only $15 a night)

We are determined to turn things around, so now that we have a bed and somewhat full bellies, we stop on the way back to climb on sand dunes. Very cool, so immense and desert like. Jamie and I enjoy taking numerous photos and exploring all of the neat desert plants, despite the fact that the kidlets are DETERMINED to ruin the peace by bickering. This bickering escalates into screaming and heart-wrenching crying because one has found dirt clumps and she wants to bury them, but the other really doesn't want her to bury them and will not compromise on any front, so we have to heave her over our shoulders and head back to the car. We're seriously wondering what the heck we are doing, bribe them all with chocolate and hope that it'll keep them quiet all the way back.

Almost works.

We must stop at the salt flats, which is below sea level - we had seen some really neat photos of it, and wanted to copy them. However, by the time we arrive, the sun is setting so the light is really bad, and we don't see the shot at all. Very disappointing.

We arrive at our hotel with shattered nerves, ready to collapse into bed or to guzzle a glass of wine. We eat an overpriced, mediocre meal in the restaurant, then lay in bed only to be kept awake by partying, card-playing young male Japanese tourists that have arrived by the bus load.

In the morning, we wander through the museum quickly, then hurry on back to Vegas because of course we have made lunch plans that day.

And that, my friends, was Death Valley.