Monster Bus Tours

Traveling the magnificent Icefields Parkway in the Canadian Rockies one of the prime attractions is the opportunity to actually ride a bus across a glacier.  Now I've ridden a lot of buses in my day through such weird places as Jersey City and Hoboken, but even in the occasional winter storm none of them ever took me across a glacier.

Needless to say, these are not your ordinary bus.  They are sort of a cross between a bus and a monster truck with eight-wheel drive.

Here's a picture:

A number of these vehicles - known as Brewster Ice Explorers- were built in Canada for use on glacier tours but one is actually in service in Antarctica.

Here's a close-up of one of the tires:

Talk about a wide tread...

The tour actually takes you out onto a portion of Canada's Columbia Icefield known as the Athabasca glacier.  It starts with a ride down a thirty-degree slope over a glacial moraine (basically a huge pile of gravel created by the glacier's motion)  which is a little scary even when one is informed that the vehicle has four forward gears: low, lower, even lower and lowest.  Nevertheless, one is deposited safely in the middle of the glacier for a short romp around the ice.

Michelle - romping on the ice

As you can see from this panorama of our view from where we stood on the glacier, it's just a magnificent spot set amid ice fields and mountains and I would recommend a trip up the Icefields Parkway and a stop at the Athabasca glacier to anyone.

Welcome to the USA - Watch Out for the Cows

So as part of our recent vacation to the Canadian Rockies, we wanted to include a visit to Glacier National Park just over the border in Montana.  This necessitated a drive down a two-lane country road in Alberta Canada which led us to a tiny border crossing in the middle of nowhere.  The Immigration/Customs guy examined our passports and waved us through, cheerfully saying: "Welcome to the US and watch out for the cows."

Watch out for the cows?  Had some bovine coup taken place during our short absence from the homeland? Well, no, he meant it literally.  Apparently the ranchers in Northern Montana are not particularly diligent about maintaining their livestock fences.  For the next several miles of two-lane country road we shared the right-of-way with numerous steers of various breeds who wandered aimlessly across the pavement and along the shoulders of the road.

Yup...Watch out for the cows

Eventually we reached a more traveled road where the fences were kept up and the wandering beef menace was no more. 

N'awlins

This past week we returned to the Big Easy for the first time since Katrina. We spent three nights in the French Quarter in a hotel called the "Bourbon Orleans" just two blocks from Jackson Square and half a block from Bourbon Street. Jackson Square is named for Andrew Jackson, who foiled a British invasion of the city in the War of 1812 and fronts on St. Louis Cathedral, the heart of the French Quarter. Bourbon Street is, of course, noted for booze, music, and young ladies exposing their mammary glands for cheap plastic beads.

We drank a little, listened to some kick-ass Cajun and Zydeco and generally had a good time. However, Michelle would not let me throw any beads at young ladies on Bourbon Street.

The main thing we enjoyed was the amazing food to be had in the area. Unfortunately, some of our favorite restaurants from days past were gone - victims of Katrina. Although the French Quarter did not flood since it is the oldest part of New Orleans and was originally chosen as the highest ground in the area, the severe impact of the disaster on business and tourism was enough to doom some eateries.

But we found some new ones that had opened. Among these was a place called "Stanley" - yes it's named for that Stanley: the character in "A Streetcar Named Desire". We had one of the best breakfasts there I have ever eaten - Eggs Benedict topped with six delicately fried oysters - OMG! Interestingly enough, "Stanley" has a counterpart restaurant called "Stella" which is a fancy dinner place.

I should also mention we ate at a place called "G W Fins" -obviously a seafood place- where we enjoyed an excellent seafood dinner.

All in all, it was a pleasant few days, made even pleasanter by the fact that we totally missed the last snowstorm of the season in New Jersey LOL.

St. Louis Cathedral and Jackson Square New Orleans

Vortexes and Pink Jeeps

From the Grand Canyon, we drove south, past Flagstaff AZ and on to the lovely town of Sedona. Sedona is known for a number of things, but most famously as a center for "New Age" studies and "enlightenment". Chief among its attractions for the enlightenment seeker are a number of spots in the desert and around town which are locally known as "Vortexes". I know - I know, the proper plural of the Latin loan-word "vortex" is "vortices" but the folks in Sedona prefer "vortexes". These vortexes are supposed to be areas where one can be put in touch with spiritual forces from other dimensions for purposes of healing, enlightenment and other ethereal stuff. I also think that UFOs may figure in there somewhere. Whatever.

We didn't make it to any vortexes, but we saw and did a lot of other neat stuff during our three-day stay in Sedona. Among these was a jeep tour in the desert and a side trip to the old mining town of Jerome AZ.

Our trip into Sedona was highlighted by a long and rather spectacular drive on AZ Rt. 89A which took us down a long canyon in a verdantly forested area. At length, we arrived in Sedona.

The town is surrounded by desert and red rock mesas which make for spectacular views even from downtown.

This was the view from a parking lot in downtown Sedona

Some red rock mesas outside of town. Note that the desert here is much more verdant than the desert terrain in some of the previous places we visited

Another mesa outside of town

We wandered around town, had lunch, and made reservations for a jeep tour to some Native American ruins out in the desert for two days hence. We planned to spend three nights in Sedona as a way to sort of recover from the mad dash around the canyon lands and Colorado.

Our motel was the La Quinta Inn in the Village of Oak Creek, located a few minutes drive from downtown Sedona.

This was the view from our motel room in the La Quinta

One of the highlights of our stay in Sedona was a tour through the desert to some Indian cliff dwellings. We booked the tour through an outfit called "Pink Jeep Tours". Yes, the jeeps are painted a shocking pink. However, be that as it may, we really liked their tour and I would recommend them to any visitor to Sedona. The guide who drove us and led us on the short (horizontal thankfully this time) hike to the Indian ruins was very knowledgeable both about the history of the local native peoples and the desert plants and ecology he led us through.

The sign at the entrance to the ruins - our tour company helps support their restoration

The ruins - they were not as well preserved as the ones in Mesa Verde

On another day that we were in Sedona, we took a ride to an old mountain mining town called "Jerome" AZ. It was about an hour west of Sedona. It had a bunch of interesting shops and we ate lunch there, but the highlight was a "ghost town" built around an old abandoned gold mine.

The place was an enormous jumble of all sorts of things: mainly old cars, trucks, and earthmoving equipment from the 30's, 40's, and 50's. Michelle and I got a big kick out of seeing all the vehicles we remembered as kids in the 50's such as old gasoline tankers, ambulances etc.

Some of the jumble of interesting junk

Back in Sedona, we also visited a chapel designed by a disciple of Frank Lloyd Wright. It was quite striking.

The story behind the chapel in the architect's own words

The "Chapel of The Rock" as seen from the road

The chapel interior

Anyway, after three days in Sedona, it was time to head back to Vegas. On the way, we strayed off the Interstate to spend a little time on old U.S. 66. It's not really an official road anymore, but parts of it are maintained and labeled for the tourist trade.

The world-renowned "Roadkill Cafe" on old Rt. 66

We ate lunch here in Kingman AZ

Finally we made our way back to Sin City, a route which took us across the top of Hoover Dam (although a new high level bridge is nearing completion which should greatly help the traffic situation). Like all traffic, as we approached the dam (this is the main route into Vegas from NW Arizona) we had to pull off into a checkpoint where an officer looked at us and determined we were not terrorists or whatever. From there on in it was a straight shot into Vegas for our 3-night finale.

The first of our nights was at the "Golden Nugget" on Fremont Street. The "Nugget" is the only Strip-quality hotel on Fremont - the rest seem to be dives where it's fun to gamble but you wouldn't want to stay there. The hotel was pretty nice and even had a shark tank aquarium. The funniest thing to my warped mind was the fact that the hotel swimming pool had a water slide which shot you through a clear plastic tube through the shark tank. I can just imagine some drunken guest zipping down the slide and not realizing this only to come face to face (through the plastic) with a huge shark. Aaarggh!

The next two nights were at the New York, New York hotel and casino, which was also fun and in fact we recommended it to our nephew Joe for his upcoming, at the time, trip to Vegas. Turns out he and his friends enjoyed it.

And that, folks, was our trip to the wild, wild West.

How Grand Was My Canyon

Okay, the next day we left Kayenta and headed westward again through the vast Navajo Nation. As we drove along U.S. 160 also known as the Navajo Trail, we passed a spot where a huge overhead conveyor crossed the road from south to north. From there on for many miles the road was paralleled by a set of railway tracks which, judging by their power poles and wires, were for electrically powered trains. I later found out that this was an isolated railroad which existed to bring coal from the huge Black Mesa open pit mine to the Navajo Generating Station near Lake Powell. The coal crossed U.S. 160 on the conveyor and was then loaded on rail cars for the trip to the power plant. Incidentally, the power plant also supplies electricity to run the line's electric locomotives.

But onward to the Grand Canyon. We entered the park from the east and started stopping at lookout points and taking pictures:

Our first view of the Grand Canyon, near the eastern edge of the park

A better view of the Colorado River from the same area

Michelle and I on the walkway in the main part of the park. A friendly young Russian couple took the picture for us.

A view of the canyon from the main part of the park.

Me, standing near the edge. Michelle kept saying: "Step back just a little further."

A panoramic video of the canyon taken by Michelle. Probably better than any of the pictures it gives an idea of the enormous size of the canyon

I'm not going to include anymore photos of the canyon. Many people have, I'm sure, seen it for themselves and there have been about a bazillion documentaries on TV and magazine articles with photos much better than anything I could take.

We stopped at various lookout points, walked along the rim trail, and took a shuttle bus to the farthest westward viewing point in the park. Along the way we ate at the park cafeteria. I recommend it for good food and reasonable prices. There was also an interesting exhibit center explaining some of the geology of the canyon.

Finally, as the day drew to a close, we drove south to our motel for the night, and a good night's sleep in preparation for our next day's adventure.

For dinner that night in the tiny town of Tusayan AZ we made the mistake of stopping at a place called "We Cook Pizza and Pasta". It was awful. When Michelle inquired if there was any other type of pasta beside spaghetti (i.e. ziti, penne, etc.) the counterman volunteered that they had macaroni and cheese. Enough said.

Next: Sedona AZ

She Wore a Yellow Ribbon

Actually, no one on this trip wore a yellow ribbon, but the John Wayne cavalry flick of that name was filmed on location at our next goal of the journey - Monument Valley. But first, we had to make the long drive across the Navaho Nation to the town of Kayenta, which was just south of Monument Valley. Along the way we passed through mostly agricultural land - the Navajo people seemed to mostly be farmers and cattle ranchers. There was also the obligatory casino and a high school. Funny thing about the high school. Some years back, my nephew Joe's high school in Parsippany N.J. got all politically correct and decided to change the name of their football team from the "Redskins" to the "Redhawks". The theory was not to offend Native Americans or something. Well, the Navajo high school had a football team named-you guessed it- the Redskins. Oh well, I guess it's OK for them.

Anyhow, we finally made it to Kayenta, and turned northward toward Monument Valley. Monument Valley is not a U.S. national park but since it is on Navajo land it is considered a tribal park and is administered by the Navajo Nation. A small fee got us in and we started to check the place out. The first thing one sees is a big new modern resort hotel with restaurants etc. that the Navajo have built overlooking the valley. It was quite impressive with an excellent view of the area from its terrace.

The main event, so to speak, is a 17-mile dirt road which starts at the hotel parking lot and wends its way through the valley proper. There were tours available in open four-wheel drive trucks for a nominal fee for those who did not wish to drive their own vehicles over the trail. However, since we were driving a Ford Escape - a small SUV- with decent ground clearance, we decided to do it ourselves.

Monument Valley Visitor's Center

This formation is called "The Mitten"

This is "John Ford Point" named for the famous director of Westerns who used this area extensively for his film locations. See this clip from "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" - watch the landscape as they ride out of the fort: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhnDe_rTk_o

We drove along the 17 mile road and the little Ford held its own quite nicely. We stopped along the way for photos and just to take in the scenery. One funny thing happened when we stopped at John Ford Point. A busload of foreign tourists had just disgorged and listening to them speak I figured out they were from Italy. Between their broken English and my fractured Italian, we exchanged greetings and I ended up taking a group picture for them. Actually, on the whole trip, we saw nearly as many foreign tourists as Americans. I'm glad to see people coming here to see our natural wonders (and spend their money-ha,ha).

Elephant Butte - Supposed to look like an elephant?

Some interesting towers.

Some more "John Wayne" scenery

Finally, a fairly massive formation.

After we toured the valley, we headed back down the road to Kayenta and our motel - the Hampton Inn of Kayenta. I would recommend staying here if you are in the area. It was fairly new, clean, and the beds were comfortable.

The Hampton Inn Kayenta - I think that's John Wayne's wagon in the front.

The nicest surprise of the day was the restaurant recommended to us for dinner by the desk clerk. It was a real "locals" place just down the road called "The Blue Coffee Pot". It had good food and was very reasonable. I had short ribs of beef with a salad and two sides for under $ 10.00.

"The Blue Coffee Pot"

After dinner, we went to the nearby supermarket to pick up some snacks and soft drinks for the road the next day. Looked like any other supermarket except the pet food section had 100-pound bags of feed for horses on sale. Hmm. did Big John and the cavalry shop here? No, actually if you recall, many of the Navajo people are ranchers and horses are still important in that business. Also, I'm sure many folks just like to ride - it is the wide open spaces.

Next: The Grand Canyon

Mesa Verde and The Four Corners

We left Durango early the next morning (after our free continental breakfast at the Best Western - that was one of the good things about the place) and headed back westward. Not far down the road we came to the entrance to the Mesa Verde National Park. Mesa Verde is the location of some of the most well-known Native American cliff dwellings in the U.S. True to its name, it is located on top of a high mesa and is entered by a steep, winding road (not unlike the Arches N.P.).

Mesa Verde has a number of sites which were inhabited by ancient native peoples from around 550 A.D. until around 1200 or so. The people are referred to as "Ancestral Puebloans" and are believed to be the ancestors of a number of modern tribes in the southwest U.S. including the Hopi and the Zuni.

The most notable sites are villages built of stone located in natural alcoves in the sides of canyons. The alcoves provided protection from the elements and probably gave them a defensive capability superior to villages built on flat ground. The official Mesa Verde website is here: http://www.nps.gov/meve/index.htm

Anyway, we stopped at the visitor center to determine which site was the most easily accessible given the limited time we had to spend at the park (we had a considerable distance to drive that day). The young woman ranger at the front desk recommended the "Spruce Tree House" as a site that did not require a guided tour. She also assured us that it was a short, 1/2 mile walk into the site. This sounded good to us, so we drove on down the road to Spruce Tree House.

It was a 1/2 mile walk alright: vertically. The site was reached by a series of steep ramps leading down into a canyon. We were hesitant at first, knowing that the walk down was no big deal, but we would, at some point, have to walk back up again. Well, in for a dime, in for a dollar. We hiked down to the site and it was spectacular. The hike back up was, once again, a breathtaking experience (don't forget-we were at about 7,000 feet elevation).

The entrance to the trail

Looking down on Spruce Tree House from about halfway down the trail

Approaching the dwellings

Looks like my old apartment in Jersey City...

This is a "Kiva" - an underground space used for ceremonial purposes. Modern-day Puebloan cultures still use Kivas for ceremonies.


In this view, you can see the cut stone that the buildings are made from.

After our tour, we continued on our journey to Monument Valley - a trip which would take us across the vast Navajo Indian reservation; more properly known as the Navajo Nation.

On the way, we stopped at a kind of touristy, but fun spot called the Four Corners Monument. It is the only place where the boundaries of four states: Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona, come together. It is also the boundary between the Navajo nation and the Ute Indian Nation. It's administered by the Navajos as a tribal park, so my old-fart pass didn't get us in free. No matter, we paid the fee and went on in.

Tio Bob casts his mighty shadow over four states

Tia Michelle does likewise.

After posing for the obligatory pictures, we ate some Navajo fry bread from a nearby stand. It's similar to a funnel cake - delicious but probably not very good for you.

Next: The Navajo Nation and Monument Valley