Thursday night we fly out to Phoenix (yay direct flights!) and head to Couchsurfing host #1: Karen. (OH YEAH! Mom went couchsurfing with me for the first time! SO proud of her :)) Karen's a fantastic lady with a fantastic wolf-like dog named Tuffy. Next day we get brunch at a Greek restaurant in Tempe and then make our way to Sedona.
Oh Sedona. The red rocks. The blue skies. The green vegetation. It's quite picturesque. We hiked around with our couchsurfing host #2, Henry. Beautiful red rock monoliths, walked along streams, saw several rock-topped gardens, and experienced the scenery in the magic hour light. I can understand why the people are so spiritual. I would be too...
Henry cooked us spaghetti for dinner and then we headed to an outdoor cafe with a bassa nova band playing. Sedona is filled with artists galore (and many many tourists). The next morning we ate at a popular breakfast diner (Elvis had been there!) that served incredible eggs benedict. Afterwards, mom and I scoped out uptown and more scenery (a church in the cliffs) and slowly made our way north.
We had to get to Peach Springs by nighttime, where the Hualapai lodge was to start our rafting adventure from there the next morning, but we had time, so we made a pit stop in Flagstaff. It's a lot smaller than I had imagined, but fun shops & crafty store filled streets. It was quite windy and chilly though! I had only looked up the temperatures for Phoenix (90s) but Flagstaff, being up near the mountains is considerably cooler (60s). Hit up a museum of old Flagstaff and got dinner at a Thai place. We made it to Peach Springs around 9pm and crashed.
So. Now for the adventure! First a ~1 hr minibus ride to our starting point. This rafting trip is located in the Hualapai region of the Canyon, so it's all run by that tribe. They were all wonderful. Our rafting guides were Hualapai as well and provided us with great folklore and stories of the Canyon. It was a great perspective to hear. Funnily enough, our whole raft (minus mom and guides, of course) was from Ohio. Koinkidink. Made a pit stop to take a short climb to a hidden waterfall, and then another stop for lunch, where they provided us with lunch.
The first half of the trip was filled with white water rapids and we got DRENCHED! Granted, a little chilly (water was 45), but the sun was out to dry us each time. Also, if you do this, I'd recommend you don't sit all the way up front... that's definitely the major splash zone.
The second half of the trip was all calm waters and we got to enjoy the scenery and hear more great stories. Where our tour ended, we got helicoptered out, which was AWESOME (I went a little snap happy at this point). It was quite windy and it felt like we'd get thrust into the canyon's walls at any time. Then a 2 hour mini bus drive back to the lodge.
Highly recommendable. I guess I was expecting to get ripped off a little since it's such a tourist destination, but the Hualapai were very sincere and didn't even pressure us to buy the pictures their photographer took of us. However, we hear the skywalk is overrated...
When we got back to the lodge, we made our way back to Flagstaff on Route 66 and met up with couchsurfer host #3, Brandon. Another great person (aren't they all?). Had a fun and lengthy dinner, great (and at times inappropriate ["MOM!"] conversation, and then went back to Brandon's. Stayed up later than I had planned due to more awesome conversation then finally crashed.
The next morning, Brandon took us to another great breakfast diner (LOVE these places!) and then accompanied us to the Waputki Indian Ruins. These were neat... definitely fun to imagine how peeps back then used to carry out their lives.
Dropped Brandon off, then made our way back to Phoenix since our flight was the next morning (how time flies). Phoenix downtown is a GHOST town after 5pm on weekdays (not sure about weekends). So much potential... kind of reminds me of what Cincinnati was like 3 years ago. We find a wine bar and have a drink before we meet up with couchsurfer host #4, Omayra. Such a fun personality. Knows what she wants in life. Get late night dinner at a Mediterranean restaurant, more fun convo until we notice they're turning the lights off, and head back to crash. Next morning we fly back to Cincy...
What a fun vacation with mom. Great bonding experience and I'm so glad I was able to do this with her. I love her. (And imagine, we only fought ONCE, lol). Happy Birthday, Mom! Here's to many more adventures together. She LOVED the couchsurfing experience, which built some trust in it for her (she still doesn't like me hosting guys alone).
Nashville next weekend with the girls! :)
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