Year Two - Days One Hundred Seven thru One Hundred ??? - end of trip

Our next stop was Tuscon, AZ.  While there, we spent a day visiting the Pima Air and Space Museum and the Boneyard, where all retired military aircraft go. Sam just LOVES airplanes, and this place had several buildings full!  Jim even saw a plane from his same unit while he was in the Marines, so it was a kick for him! This is the Bumblebee, which is the smallest airplane that ever flew.

The Boneyard is only viewable by bus tour, and it was a good one.  This place is enormous, and the tour guide was a retired military man who knew his planes and their history!

Another day, we went to the Zoo in Tucson, which was a small zoo, but it gave us a close and personal encounter with the animals.  Cool place!

We decided to visit the BioSphere 2, which is a totally enclosed environment where scientists enclosed themselves for two years to experiment with self-sufficiency. It was cool to walk around and see all the different environments they were studying, and their living quarters, etc.  It is now owned by a university, and there is a project being built to study erosion.

Our next stop on the road trip was Carlsbad Caverns, NM. This is the most visited cave in the United States.  It was an awesome day spent exploring the cave, with all of its formations.  We had lunch in the cave, and we climbed out to exit the main opening.  Most people take the elevator out, so we were given high fives by the rangers!  :)

Our last stop on the way home San Antonio, TX.  Our first stop was The Alamo, and we spent a day touring it. We also went downtown to walk around at the river walk, and we ate dinner there.  It is such a nice, relaxing atmosphere.

After that, we pretty much drove straight home to take care of business for another winter.  It was a great road trip!!!

Year Two - Days One Hundred Four thru One Hundred Six

On this day we drove down to the town of Williams, just to stroll around, eat some lunch, and do some more geocaching.  Sam climbed around on some trains, and it was a gorgeous day!

One day we drove south to check out a couple of sights in the area:  Meteor Crater and Volcano Crater.  Two totally different environments, and both very interesting.  We hiked around the volcano area, checking out the different rock formations.  The Meteor Crater is a lot bigger than I would have thought, and we spent a little more time there, reading on it’s history and formation.

Our last day at the Grand Canyon, we checked out some more sights, and drove to see some more view points.  We hiked around the rim area some more, and made a point to be there at sunset to see it in the canyon and try to catch some pics.  Pictures just don’t do it justice!

Year Two - Days One Hundred Two thru One Hundred Three

After a recovery day for Jim, (lol) we drove down to check out a place called Bearizona.  It is a wildlife refuge that specializes in bear rescue.  It was a really nice place, with a drive-through safari, as well as a walk-around area like a zoo.  They had several different kinds of animals, and we saw a neat bird show.  The best part was the different young bear areas, where bears were separated out by age groups.  This one area had a cave-like enclosure where viewers could look in from the back, and the baby bears all gathered in there for a while and wrestled and played – it was awesome!  Where else do you get the opportunity to watch baby bears wrestling only inches away?!

Sam and Jim were geocaching as much as possible during this trip, so we stopped in the area to find a couple nearby.

Year Two - Days Ninety Seven thru One Hundred One

We left Vegas and drove to the Grand Canyon, camping is small town that was the closest to the southern gate called Tusayan.  It was so small, I am not sure it qualified as a town, but it had what we needed!  J  It was nice and quiet this time of year.

The first day we drove to the visitor center and walked around the canyon in that area for awhile.  We then drove to Mather Point, and checked out some different views along the drive there and back.

The next couple of days, we hiked down into the canyon for about a mile-and-a-half.  At that point, Sam and I turned around and came back out, but Jim opted to hike down another 2-3 miles (or so he thought at the time).  After Sam and I left him, we talked to a few people, pointing out the area where he wanted to stop, and were told it was about 7 miles in!  Not knowing if he would stop earlier, or go all the way to that point, we opted to come back and pick him up about three hours later, estimating that he would realize at some point that he would not make it all the way to the point he had picked out, and then turn around.  When we came back, we found him at the same place we had parked earlier, and he said he had just gotten there!  Great timing!  He was pretty wiped out, having walked about 13 miles, half of it uphill – whew!