When we originally planned this cross country move, Alan asked me what I’d like to see.

I only had one request: Grand Canyon. The whole trip was built around this. It was totally worth it.

My dad showed us a newspaper article he’d found about the Grand Canyon Railway. It’s a train that goes from Williams, Arizona, up to the south rim of the Grand Canyon. We decided to give it a try, and I’m glad we did. This was an awesome way to see the canyon.

Believe it or not, the road trip to our new home is officially finished. We went from Virginia to Alabama in a day and a half. Then it took us six days to go from Alabama to California. We took turns with the driving, and we kept it fun, even through endless miles of desert.

The Cowboy Comedy Show

Before you board the train, the cowboys put on a comedy show for you. It was cute. My favorite line was actually before the show started. This kid was leaving the area, and a cowboy shouts over to him, “Hey! Where you goin’? The show gets better!”

This was just the beginning. There are cowboys and laughs all day long.

Seating

There are different levels of seats that you can buy: coach, first class, observation deck, and luxury class. On the way to the canyon, we did the observation deck, as seen in the photo above. On the way back, we rode in first class. I know, I know. How obnoxious are we? If you notice, the leg room in the observation car in the photo above, you will understand. Alan is 6 foot 3. We had crazy amounts of leg room on the way back.

All of the cowboys were pretty funny. This guitar-playing one was amusing and also talented. He did a really funny Willie Nelson impersonation.

view from the train leaving Williams to begin our journey

You have to drink a lot of water to help with the altitude sickness and dehydration. We managed to stay well hydrated, but I definitely got an altitude headache.

This is set up beside the tracks, and they use it for Christmas time, when they run a Polar Express version of the Grand Canyon tour.

The Grand Canyon Railway employees gave us this paper and a brochure all about the railway history and the canyon. They kept telling us about all the stuff to see at the “village” at the Rim.

Alan turned to me and asked, “So what do you want to do when we get there?”

My answer was pretty obvious, “I just want to see the Canyon.”

“Good. Me too.” I love it when we are on the same page.

The Grand Canyon is so vast. It is the most incredible sight.

You can’t really see to the other side in any direction. I can’t wait to visit again some day on the other rims! There is even an area now that has a glass pier you can walk on and see down into the canyon.  That was about 180 miles away from us. Yes, the canyon is that big. Go back and look at the map that I posted at the top of this page.

I just loved this. I was also thankful we did not have Daniel with us. A three-year old on the loose would have made for a very different day at the Grand Canyon!

Alan zoomed in on what looked like little rectangles from the top. We wondered if they were cabins.

Sure enough. Cabins.

People have been hiking to the bottom for as long as people have found the Grand Canyon. I have no idea how they get down there, though. It was definitely not accessible from any points that we were at.

We spotted this bird inside the canyon, and zoomed in on it. It was pretty large, but just please don’t tell me it’s just a crow. I know it could be, but that would be so disappointing….

me and my bag….A good tote bag is essential to hiking at the Canyon. We got this one for $3 at the Railway gift shop.

First, let me say that no, I did not climb a tree in a skirt.

That is not actually a skirt. It’s a skort–shorts that look like a skirt but have shorts inside of them. I love skorts. You know how I like to climb stuff. 😉

At the last minute, Alan said, “Are you wearing flip-flops? Oh no, we are going back to the van and getting you some tennis shoes.”

“That’ll look weird with my outfit.”

“April! We are hiking the Grand Canyon. You don’t wear sandals to hike the Grand Canyon.”

Another reason I married Alan.  I was very happy in my tennis shoes.

We thought we were clever, taking our pictures in this tree. As we were walking back, 30 minutes later, we noticed lots of people were doing the same thing. I guess the tree beckons everyone to climb it.

You see this picture. This is why bringing four children would make me insanely nervous. Did you know hundreds of people die every year, by falling off the rim?

On the way back to Williams, this marshal appeared.

He said, “At 5:00 we are going to have a little surprise for ya’ll, so be sure to look out the A & B seat windows at 5:00. We like to schedule our surprises.”

5:00 Train robbers!!

You can tip the train robbers….letting them feel like they are robbing you. It was all completely non-scary and comical.

We took this map photo the next day, at the Hoover Dam.

It’s the best map I have found to show exactly how humongous the Grand Canyon really is.

You really should go see it!

And no, I was not paid to write all of this propaganda. Ha! I so need to find a job like that….

The post The Grand Canyon Railway Is The Best Way To Visit The Grand Canyon appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

Grand Canyon 2014

Today we took the day off from the endless driving and spent the day doing tourist-y things instead. My dad told us about this Grand Canyon Railway that takes you to the Grand Canyon, and we decided to give it a shot. We had such a wonderful time.

The Grand Canyon was amazing, so I have more to share on that next time.

This time I just want to share a few amusing quotes from the trip so far. Why? Because I love funny quotes.

1. We were all at Alan’s parents’ house a week ago, and Joshua spotted Alan’s book, Calculus for Dummies. Joshua was incredulous. “What!!!?  I’m not a dummy!”

Alan replied, “Oh, no, that’s my book, Joshua.”

“What!?  You’re not a dummy!!”

2.  After spending weeks with his grandparents, Joshua forgot to do something. I asked him about it, and he said, “Oh, I’m sorry! I’m getting older.”

3. Sometimes I am a horrible listener. On Friday, we were at Cracker Barrel for lunch.

Alan said, “They have Fried Fish Friday today. Or did you want a breakfast menu?”

I replied, “I don’t know. Did you know that it’s Fried Fish Friday…”

4. Just for the record, Alan and I have been eating a little too much Cracker Barrel on this road trip. I have probably gained about 7 pounds. I usually have to wear a belt to keep my pants up, and I noticed today that a belt no longer seems to be required.

What keeps us coming back to Cracker Barrel??  The campfire chicken and the corn bread. Oh, we are loving us some corn bread!!! (Remember, we are truly Alabamians, and always will be).

Tonight, after we negotiated with our waitress the ratio of corn bread muffins to buttermilk biscuits that we wanted, she walked away. I think she had some idea of just how important our bread is to us, but probably not exactly how far I’ve taken this.

I told Alan, “I didn’t tell her that I already have a whole box of Cracker Barrel breads and jellies stuffed into my suitcase.”

Alan joked, “Yes, we don’t want to eat the bread. We just like to collect the bread and put it in our suitcase.”

For some reason, we just busted out laughing at this. Okay, Alan chuckled, and I laughed hard for about five minutes about all the bread in my suitcase. People at other tables were staring. In fact, even now, I can’t even type it without giggling.

Sadly, there were no leftover muffins or biscuits from tonight’s meal.

5. Okay, this is not so much a funny quote, but we’ve been hearing a rattling sound coming from the back wheels of the van when we go over bumps for a couple of days. It turns out a bolt that was holding on our brake cali-something fell out, and we were a ticking time bomb for disaster. We have it fixed, and we’ll start back out to driving more tomorrow!

Is it possible to take a road trip from DC to California without having some type of car trouble? This makes our second car issue in one trip.

6. Okay, last one. We talked to the boys on the phone yesterday. It was PRECIOUS. Joshua was really good about talking to us. Caleb said he didn’t want to talk to us.

Then Daniel got on the phone and said, “Me Daniel!…(a few seconds of silence on his side).. Bye.”

He misses his mommy, but he is having a blast at Nana and Granddaddy’s house. Ya’ll are so wonderful to do this for us!  Thank you!!!

If all goes well, we could be finished with this road trip Monday evening, Pacific time. Knowing us, and all our little tourist stops, it will be more like Tuesday. Hope you all have a great week!!

The post “We don’t want to eat the bread; we just want to collect the bread.” appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.