Holidays, Hurricanes, Visitors .........

Holiday - Arizona (Phoenix, Sedona, Monument Valley, Williams, Grand Canyon)
Hurricane - Ike
Visitors - Marg & Pete Germein and Julie Harris

Itinerary summary: 1 night in Phoenix, 2 nights in Sedona, 1 night in Monument Valley, 1 night in Williams, 2 nights in the Grand Canyon, another night in Williams then to Phoenix where the 5 of us flew back to Houston.

The part of Arizona we were exploring is known as ‘red rock county’ and it’s not hard to work out why. They say a picture is worth a thousand words so I will say little and put in lots of photos!

Our vacation was booked months ago and who would believe that the day we were due to leave would be the day that Houston went into lock down awaiting the arrival of Hurricane Ike (Fri Sept 12th). Our flight was due to take off at 8am so we left very, very early for the airport as we knew the roads would still be bumper to bumper with traffic evacuating the city. However we were mistaken and hardly saw anyone on the freeway and made it to the airport in record time! We booked our luggage in and then the attendant told us that our flight had just been cancelled!!! 45 minutes later saw us booked on a later flight and all was well – for us anyway but not for many others whose flights had also been cancelled.

Anyway we arrived in Phoenix in plenty of time to meet Marg, Pete & Julie who were flying in from Australia (they had actually spent a few days in Hawaii and San Diego on route). It was great to see them and catch up on all the news. We hired a car which was to become our main mode of transport for the trip. Marg & Pete bought a huge painting that eventually was posted back to Australia from Houston however during our Arizona holiday it became part of our ‘family’ – we could easily have named our holiday “5 people & a painting!”

Phoenix – the capital of Arizona and had a really nice ‘feel’ to it – very clean and a place we could easily spend more time exploring. We also jumped aboard the free bus and toured Old Town Scottsdale which has the look of the old west (but is really just a bunch of souvenir shops selling Indian jewellery). We saw large cactus (or should I say cacti??) everywhere – it was certainly cowboy and indian country! While on an early morning walk we discovered a farmer’s market and tried some new foods including serpent of sicily, purslane and some kind of cactus – all very interesting! We also drove along Route 66 on several occasions during this trip – and guess what song we started to sing? Sooo many songs come to mind when travelling through the US!

Sedona is surrounded by red rock formations – absolutely stunning. On Saturday we visited the most amazing church that has been built into rocks on the side of a mountain - the Chapel of the Holy Cross. We also experienced the most striking sunset as well as an impressive view of the moon.

On Sunday John & I attended the “Raw Spirit Festival” and spent the day with our dear friend Nancy and also caught up with some other friends from Houston and listened to several speakers and also got to meet several authors of books we have read (we were photographed here with Dr. Doug Graham, author of 80/10/10) - it was a fun day in an extraordinarily beautiful city.



Monument Valley has been featured in many movies including lots of John Wayne’s westerns and more recently Back to the Future 111, Thelma & Louise, Mission Impossible 11 and lots more. This area is part of the Navajo Reservation and I’m sure that everyone will recognize the rock formations from movies, tv or magazines. It’s awesome!

....Grand Canyon – this was an absolute highlight, especially the train ride there from the little town of Williams. We stayed in a magnificent hotel in Williams and were entertained with a cowboy show before leaving on the train and then on the return journey from the Grand Canyon to Williams, we were ‘held up’ by marauding cowboys on horseback! It really was fun. We walked the south rim of the canyon and walked down for about an hour before retreating to the surface. It was very hot and we were not equipped for the journey to the bottom – however we have put it on our goal list to come back one day and experience the Colorado River at the bottom of the canyon. We might even go down by mule!! The Grand Canyon is one of the 7 natural wonders of the world and it is easy to see why.

This is very much Indian territory and we found ourselves deeply immersed in Indian jewellery – lots of vendors along the roads selling their wares, souvenir shops at all the local attractions and gift shops in the hotels.


Didn’t buy too much – a Kokopelli necklace and a few little trinkets. Kokopelli is a hunched back dancing flute player and is regarded as the universal symbol of fertility for all – be it crops, hopes, dreams or love and is known to spread joy to those around him.
























Our week together in Houston –

John went back to work but that didn’t slow us down too much. Lots of local attractions were closed due to the aftermath of Hurricane Ike so we weren’t able to showcase the best of Houston although we were all able to witness the incredible damage nature can deliver. Fortunately the power and water had been restored to our apartment a few days before our return however we didn’t have telephone, television or internet for nearly a week. Most of the traffic lights were not working so driving really was quite hazardous (especially with the sheer numbers of cars on the Houston roads and 3 weeks later there are still 500 sets of traffic lights not working!) and the amount of debris still lying around is startling – it is even difficult in some places to walk as the footpaths are piled high with tree roots and branches. The extent of damage was quite mind boggling – the view from our apartment has changes dramatically as so many trees have just disappeared, the large skyscrapers in downtown have many windows boarded up as the glass was blown out during the strong winds leaving the streeets littered with broken glass, lots of billboards have been blown away, power lines hanging on the ground, and many houses have suffered roof damage. It really was an experience just to see the aftermath but thank goodness we weren’t actually here to live through the storm – apparently it was very scary. On our return lots of shops and restaurants were still closed yet we managed to find the ones that were operating!! We would have loved to have driven down to Galveston however that was totally closed to everyone – not even the residents were allowed back as the damage was too severe. We had just spent a wonderful weekend down there a couple of weeks earlier and we know that the wonderful little jetty we spent some time on looking back at the lights of Galveston is unfortunately no longer there – washed away by the enormous water surge and the extremely strong winds that did so much damage.

This is a tree in our backyard!!









Our sightseeing options were lessened however we did manage to squeeze quite a bit in during the week including -

- oriented them to our local venues, including Path of Tea, Field of Greens, Sweet Tomatoes, SouperSalad and of course Krogers and Whole Foods (our supermarkets!)

- lots of eating out and one very delicious raw food dinner prepared at home!

- lots of shopping (including a visit to Katy Mills and Bass Pro Sport)

- a visit to an RV centre where Marg nearly got Pete to buy a fantastic 5th wheeler caravan (trailer is the local term) although shipping it home seemed too much of an obstacle so it is still on sale

- we had a final farewell to the painting – after several trips to PO and having to repack it in a smaller box (which was still very large!) it was finally on its way to Australia.

- yoga class (Marg, Julie & Julie)

- visited Old Town Spring, the Sam Houston statue and Huntsville

- Lake Conroe – dinner at Sam’s Boat

- Julie joined us for our Saturday morning Houstin Fit Training and walked 8 miles – well done Julie!

- John, Julie & Julie attended an afternoon meetup group – “Tony Robbins Power Team” with the focus being the book “Think & Grow Rich” by Napoleon Hill – interesting afternoon

- a concert of Japanese drumming at Miller Theatre - lots of banging!

- John, Julie & Julie went to see Joel at the Lakewood Church (Marg went to St. Anne’s, the local catholic church & Pete stayed home…..)



































Marg, Pete & Julie are currently on a 7 day cruise to the Carribean, probably enjoying lots of eating and relaxation and no doubt more shopping at their ports of call. The cruise was due to depart from Galveston but luckily it was able to leave from the Port of Houston. We are picking them up from the ship on Sunday morning and they will be spending another 2 days with us before flying up to New York. Our friend from Australia, Charlie Maiden, arrives here on Monday for 4 nights so we look forward to another fun week.
Oh - did I mention that we are meeting Marg, Pete & Julie in Las Vegas in 2 weeks!

As usual, stayed tuned……..