Our all girl vacation was awesome. We flew into Las Vegas and retrieved our luggage quick-like. Then we headed to the car rental counter and were out of there. Thank God. I don’t like that city but it was cheap to fly in there, so we did. Plus one of the girls would want to ride the rides on top of the Stratosphere on the way home. We made that happen. I’ll try to stay on track here. Those of you who know me well know that I tend to talk in circles and hey, I might write the same way on occasion. Bear with me the photos are worth it if the words aren’t.
We immediately drove to Flagstaff which is a beautiful place. I’m glad we drove. I really enoyed the ever changing landscape from Nevada to Arizona. One minute we were viewing deserts and canyons. The next minute huge piles of rocks were rising up from the ground in sporadic Stonehenge-like fashion. The next moment we were checking out pine trees and mountains. Flagstaff actually reminded me a little bit of Minnesota believe it or not. 
There were mountains, tons of pine trees and lots of trains in the area where we stayed for one night. And for one night only we crashed, at the Holiday Inn Express on Lucky Lane that was NOT marked. Just in case you go there.
The next morning we drove to the Grand Canyon to tour the south rim. It was a cold and cloudy 38 degrees. I had a sleeveless vest with a hood to wear and I was glad. Lauren stole my fingerless gloves my mom had bought me in New Zealand. Good for cold weather camera toting, that’s for sure. I love this photo of Lauren shooting a picture at the edge of the canyon.
The Grand Canyon is just huge. Ginormously huge. Vast. You just can’t even imagine how large it really is until you are actually standing there looking at it. We had clouds all day long so it didn’t make for the best photos. But of course I shot several anyways.
We spent the day there at the south rim, loaded up on souveniers and headed out. Sedona was our main destination and we couldn’t wait to get there. I drove this stretch from Flagstaff to Sedona. We took the scenic route of 89-A which took us through Oak Creek Canyon. This is the part where I wish I wouldn’t have been driving. It was spectacular eye candy. Once we arrived a little more deeply into the mountains, we had red rocks on one side and white mountains with pine trees on the other. As we drove further, we hit Oak Creek with its massive round boulders in the water. I wanted to just camp there and forget Sedona. For a minute anyways.
We checked into our hotel which was thankfully located away from the touristy shopping district (looked like Branson…yikes) and we got settled in. My friend took a walk down to Le Rouge Spa and Hotel to make her massage appointment for Monday. It was supposed to rain on Monday. And it did. And it snowed for most of the day as well. What did we do? We cruised the touristy shopping district and devoured an over priced lunch at a joint with an exceptional view. But that’s the norm. The view that is. Every direction you choose to turn your head allows for an amazing vista. I found it distracting to even drive the car because the views are fantastic no matter where you are.
At first I was somewhat disappointed that we had rain and snow the first day. The second day we had clouds most of the day. The third day, we had bright blue sky and sunshine. I found myself actually being thankful for nature. We were able to experience Sedona in different weather during the four days we were there. On Tuesday we would hook up with Akul for a tour of some Medicine Wheels. Read on.
In The Middle 