all the grand sites to see in AZ!

Hey, if you’ve come back for more – thank you! It’s fun to know that people are traveling with us!

We finished our time in Prescott on Thursday, July 29. During the last few days we were there, we had fun touring Jerome, Prescott’s historic district, and the Grand Canyon – lots of pics in the gallery if you’re interested.

We also, unfortunately, had a barrage of mechanical issues – not super unexpected, but pricey and frustrating, nonetheless – and our first major injury (Deron smacked his head pretty hard but even though I’m a terrible nurse, he’s all patched up now).

Looks like we’ll need a new fridge installed soon – but we’re making do with a mini fridge for the time being. And we’ll need a new leveling leg at some point – but we’re doing ok just using blocks for now. And we’re so thankful that when we had a mechanic out to check on a weird engine “pinging” noise (which he was unable to repeat so could not diagnose), he randomly happened to discover that our water pump had just deceased – which would have been a MUCH bigger problem than the pinging had we attempted to continue traveling! Thank You, Jesus, for protecting us!

The Christensens came to see us off on Thursday morning as we headed off to Holbrook, just outside the Petrified Forest National Park, via a brief stop at a dog park in Flagstaff. Driving through a crazy thunderstorm was fun!! Then, as we arrived in Flagstaff and Deron carefully navigated construction on the way to the park, we suddenly felt a sharp bump – did someone run into the Honda??? Because of the narrow streets and construction, we couldn’t pull over right away (in case you’re unaware, you can’t back up when you’re towing a vehicle, so that, added to our overall width and length, makes driving a unique experience). There was a car behind us for a bit as we continued heading toward the park, but we couldn’t tell if they were purposefully following to tell us they’d hit us. Eventually they stopped following, so we’ll never know. When we got to the park – sure enough, there was a partial license plate imprint in the dust on the Honda’s bumper, but happily, no damage at all. It was actually kind of funny. Just another proof of God taking care of us!

Yesterday we drove through the Petrified Forest National Park – really interesting fossilized logs, and the “painted desert” is so beautiful! (See the gallery for some pics that don’t do it justice at all.)

Last night we made use of our Harvest Hosts membership and stayed in the parking lot at the Junkyard on 66 Brewery – a brewery located on old Route 66 on the premises of a working junkyard. Weird, right? As Harvest Host members we can stay overnight in the parking lot of participating businesses for free; they just ask that we patronize the business, so we had some yummy BBQ and beer. The décor was super unique and the staff was super nice – had us bring our dogs in rather than taking food out to the RV

Today was a first – we crossed into New Mexico, a state neither of us had been to before. The opinion we’ve formed so far – the scenery is pretty, but monotonous, and the cities have weird names. We let the dogs run around at a dog park in Truth or Consequences, and tonight as I write this, we’re in a place called Elephant Butte.

Well, that’s it for now. Be looking for a new post next weekend!