Day 13 - Tombstone, AZ

Today we travelled from Tucson to Tombstone, which is only about an hour away. We had a great time walking around Historic Tombstone. It was amazing to go right inside the OK Corral, see where the gunfight took place and watch a reenactment. The gun fight was staged like a drama and was really well done. The kids had to keep checking that the guns were fake and Sarah couldn’t quite seem to grasp that people were being shot, falling to their death, but not dead. Repeatedly she would ask me if it was real. After it was over we were able to take our photos with the Earps & Doc Holiday and that hopefully gave her some reassurance everyone was still alive & well, although now that I think of it, the cowboys that were shot, weren’t there to greet afterwards. ☺ We also got to watch a film on the history of the town, walk through the old streets and ate lunch in one of the old saloons. It was really neat to “experience” the Wild West; it’s hard to believe it all happened only 130 years ago! It’s truly amazing how much the world has changed in the last century. Human nature of course is still the same, but technology seems to be moving at light speed. We left Tombstone late afternoon and headed for San Diego. We drove through pretty mountain ranges, valleys covered with hundreds of catcuses and had a front row seat to another spectacular sunset.

The only building in Tombstone that survived both town fires.

Two of the Earp brothers.

The gunfight reenactment was excellent.

Doc Holiday, the Earp brothers... and visitors from the future.

The actual spot where the gun fight took place. In the foreground is the map Wyatt Earp drew after the fight.

Joshua & Megan attempting to lasso a bull :)

Cowboy Josh!

Tombstone Courthouse.

This is where we had our lunch :)

A little petting zoo.

A fun, full day of walking about - Sarah is looking tuckered (she had a good sleep once we were back in the truck ☺)

Picacho Peak

Day 12 - Leaving Goodyear

This was a crazy morning. Even though we were up until midnight last night packing, we still were up by 7am busy getting stuff to the storage unit and packing suitcases for road trip. We decided we didn’t want to take everything with us so when we’re stopped in busy cities, we don’t have much in the back of the suitcases. So it took a bit of extra planning to pack clothes and items for these upcoming six days and get everything else into storage in Goodyear. Obviously we didn’t want to pull the trailer either, so we’ll head back through Goodyear to pick everything up as we make our way next week to Lake Havasu City. We had to be out of the rental by 10am and we also wanted to get to Harvest Baptist Church for one more Sunday, so the time crunch was on! We managed to get to church *only* 10 minutes late. It is the friendliest church we have ever been in! Such wonderful people, very sincere with a love for Jesus that shines brilliantly. After church we realized we forgot the burgers David had BBQ’d that morning for lunch in the fridge so we quickly popped by to get them from the fridge. It worked out perfectly as we were able to quickly heat them up, take them outside and enjoy a “tailgate lunch” :). The kids were able to play a little more at the park and then we did some sight-seeing up around Estrella Mountain. It is another beautiful community with a fantastic park and two golf courses. We enjoyed our time looking at show homes and the area. Joshua & Sarah were getting antsy to get back on the road so by about 4pm we pulled out and headed to Costco for an early dinner, ice cream treat to cool off and set the GPS for Tucson, AZ. It wasn’t a very long trip, only about two and half hours. In that time Sarah had guzzled a large water bottle and was anxiously needing a bathroom. We finally pulled off and found a Circle K. Feeling very relieved, she said “my uterus feels so much better.... no I mean my udder!” We all had a good chuckle and explained to her it’s actually her bladder that is feeling better. :) We pulled in to the Days Inn at Tucson and got the truck reorganized from the mess it was in and settled in for the night. We’re looking forward to our exploration tomorrow :)

We enjoyed fruit salad nearly every morning, this morning we had some vanilla bean ice cream that needed to get eaten before heading out - no one complained :)

The entrance into Palm Valley where we stayed this week.

The city has done an amazing job with the medians, so beautiful with all the shrubs and palms.

At Estrella Mountain - one of the lakes and part of the water park.

While David was at the information center the kids decided to have a little game of soccer. The palm trees on each end made perfect goal posts!

Sarah finding a little shade to cool off.

Megan dipping her feet in the cool water.

At a pit stop on route to Tucson, AZ.

Between Phoenix & Tuscan... incredible sunsets night after night.

☀

Day 11 - outlets in Anthem, AZ

We started the day with a little school and then were off to the Outlets in Anthem. What a beautiful place Anthem is! You can imagine how Joshua felt about shopping {again} so he & David brought their bikes along and after a little look around and some lunch, they ventured out and explored a nearby park. After a nice ride, they came back to pick us girls up at the mall. We found a darling little baby shop, and the girls helped me pick out a couple of little things for the baby. We also came across the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory and after the boys joined us we purchased {and enjoyed!!} a couple of amazing chocolate caramel apples! After our treat, David drove us over to the park that they had biked around. It was one of the most beautiful parks we have ever seen with so my activities available to the community residence: basketball, beach volleyball, soccer, baseball, tennis, roller hockey rinks, huge playground, catch-and-release fishing pond, water park, train (similar to Stanley Park) for the kids, skate park - it was incredible!! We got back to Goodyear and started supper while the kids played with their new friends in the neighborhood. It’s amazing how quickly friendships are formed. After gobbling down their dinner, they were back out until the sun was no longer visible, stars were out and the streets were dark. Joshua called over the walkie-talkie “Mom, can I go scorpion hunting with Justin?” HA, not something you get asked every day! After seeing a scorpion on the doormat this morning I was quick to answer no! Apparently these kids have a black light that they use to shine about and a glowing green means there’s a scorpion. Their technique is to grab the scorpion by its tail and then they collect them in jars which they were quite excited to show the kids, claiming that they’ve really only been stung or bitten once. Once the kids were back home they helped as we continued to pack up the house for our last night - it was a late night for everyone as we had to be out of the house by 10am the next morning. We’ve had a great stay again in Goodyear and wish we had more time. Next time we’re down we’ll plan more than the one week we had this time.

A window shot at a few of the choices....

The kids picked "Rocky Road" and "Avalanche" - SO good!!

Anthem had a lot of cactuses - the kids like this series of 3 :)

There are so many different shapes & sizes!!

A little petting zoo in the parking lot at the outlets.

We stopped at the huge park and let the kids run off a bit of energy before heading home.

Little pond beside the playground.

Day 10 - an afternoon in the sun and sand

We were up early again this morning (why can’t I sleep in?!) and got a start on school. I should clarify that “we” was me, Joshua & Sarah; David & Megan seem to be able to sleep in much longer than the rest of us. For Megan it’s the teenager excuse, for David it’s trying to sleep with me in a queen bed and all my pillows! HA. I think once I get out of the bed, he can *finally* stretch out, have some space and sleep! We are looking forward to “our” king bed in Havasu! It’s hard to focus on school with that sunshine streaming in the windows, the quails making their morning call and beckoning us outdoors... but we pressed through and got {most of it} completed. David went for a bit of a bike ride after helping the kids with their math and we finished up while he was gone. David went to pick up the trailer while the kids splashed for a couple hours in the pool and we enjoyed some sunshine. Once back, David whipped up a delicious iced coffee/mocha for everyone, packed up our lunch and water and we were off to the desert! An afternoon FULL of quadding in the sandy trails, temperatures in the low 30s, sunshine beating down on us - a perfect day! We applied and reapplied sunscreen, but still all came home a little pink and a lot dusty! It was around 6:30 by the time we got home and we fired up the grill for an evening BBQ and some America’s Funniest Home Videos! Everyone savored their burgers, put their feet up and enjoyed some down time. It was a full day and we were all ready for sleep. Actually David is snoring on the couch as I write this post ☺. Typically we walk down to the pool to get online (there’s a hot spot there and no wireless internet in the house), gather our email, and post our blog for the day. I think a nice bath and a cool bed is going to win out tonight. We hear that Fort Mac is getting 20-30cm of snow this weekend and it’s already falling -- sure makes being here all the sweeter! ☺

Hope you all have a fantastic weekend! Tomorrow is our last full day here and we pull out Sunday morning to continue on our journey.

Morning pool time ☺

Megan is a good sport and lets Sarah dunk her, climb all over her and gives her rides through the deep end too :)

ahhh... soaking up the sun.

A nice decision to be faced with.

There's a belly photo for you Julie! :)

Joshua loving the jumps!

Josh & Megan at the pit stop :)

That, was a good ride!

Sarah taking Megan out for a little spin.

Day Nine - Some Expected & Unexpected Excitement

We seem to enjoy the routine of getting up for family breakfast & out for a morning walk. Today it was particularly warm out which we knew meant a hot one in the afternoon. This causes David great happiness. :) We decided to make our way out to Arizona Mills, which is a big, indoor outlet mall. Joshua & David weren’t as excited about it as us girls were, but they were good sports. I was in desperate need of summer maternity clothes and Sarah had her hopes set high for her Arizona highlight - getting her ears pierced. Her attempt to get them pierced three years ago didn’t work out well for her, and she’s been asking ever since to get them done again. The deal was that as soon as she was able to stop her habit of biting her nails she would be able to get her ears pierced. She has conquered that habit and done very well for a few months now, so she was over the moon to see Claire’s at the mall. She walked right up to the cashier, asked them her list of questions (among them.... can I still go in the pool?) and proudly sat on the chair with a little whisper to me.... “Mom, can you hold my hand?”. In her nervousness she chatted non-stop to the lady getting everything all ready. OK, Sarah talks non-stop regardless of what is going on, but this was in particular a lot of chatter, even for her! It was very cute to watch her great excitement build along with the nerves. She did awesome and the lady doing the piercing was fast & wonderful. For Sarah, this was a great day!! We continued to race through the stores as we knew our time was limited with the boys ready to go after an hour or so :) Everyone was pleased with their purchases (we even bought baby-boy Gray a couple of onesies) and we set the GPS to home where David whipped up some yummy fruit smoothies and we sat in the hot sun. It was at this very moment we heard someone outside hooking up our trailer to their truck!! Off we went around to the front only to find that our trailer was being impounded. UGH. Apparently the owner of the rental thought it was OK for us to park our trailer on the gravel area, and obviously this was not the case. Thankfully (we try to always look on the bright side, right?) we caught him in time and didn’t have to pay the full impound fee. So once we got all that settled we had to head to the storage unit to rent a space to store the trailer. This wasn’t a huge deal as we knew we were going to drop it off next week as we head out for a week to San Diego (and areas), it just caused a bit of a scramble, which one does try to avoid during a holiday :) We’re looking forward to a slower day tomorrow, that I am sure will involve some sun soaking, quad riding, cold drink sipping, good times! As for the rest of the night, we’re going to enjoy a late dinner and watch the sunset. Even though it was a bit of a crazy day, it was still a great one!!

The "Before" shot...

first one down, one more to go....

Yahoooooo!!!

Sorry about the sun glare, but Esther loves to be informed ☺