Our visit down south...

So we visited Arizona over Easter weekend and started our trip in Flagstaff. Our first trip was to the Meteor Crater right outside of Flagstaff. Will was extremely excited! We took a tour around the giant hole and learned some history about it.

A picture of the crater, about 2 1/2 miles wide and 550 feet deep...



Will at the crater...



We were glad that we visited the crater but were definitely ready to leave and see something else. We headed to the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, which was started by an astronomer in the late 1800s. We took a day tour of the facility and got to see the original telescope designed for the observatory.





Later that night, we went back for a night viewing of the stars. The main attraction...Saturn through the main telescope. Though it was a small image, you could see the rings surrounding the planet and could make out the area between the rings and the planet itself. It was really neat - we did not even know Saturn was one of the stars at night.

We woke up the next morning to began the long trek to the four corners, the one spot where four states all come together at one point (Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico).





After our long drive to just basically get a picture and try some Mexican fry bread, we headed up to Utah. We didn't know anything about Utah except there were alot of rock formations we needed to see...but Utah is really beautiful. We were driving in the Navajoland and just stopped to take so many pictures of the beautiful monoliths.





We drove through this little town called Mexican Hat, Ut (population 88 people!) which is known for a giant boulder that looks like a sombrero. Everything in Utah is not clearly marked on the road, so this was my guess as to what the sombrero was...



I thought that looked like at sombrero to me...Will wasn't so sure. So we drove a little further, and actually found a sign for Mexican Hat and this was what it looked like...



A closer look...I think it looks like a UFO placed on top of a rock...



What do you think? My sombrero or Will's??? We also found this park in Utah called Goosenecks National Park that has the San Juan River running through it...it was really cool! We were hoping there would be hiking trails, but we couldn't find any, which was disappointing. It was still neat to see though...







I thought the scenery looked like a Navajo rug...



We were driving towards Monument Valley, UT and Will thought this road looked familiar...can anyone guess why it looks familiar?



Anyone figured it out yet?? Well Will stopped us on the side of the highway to take pictures because he thought this was the road from Forrest Gump. He thought it was from the scene where he is jogging and just suddenly stops, turns around, and goes home...I'm not sure?

This is for Aunt Gail...we were driving through Monument Valley, admiring the beautiful rock formations, and found this horseback riding stand on the side of the road, and we signed up to go for a 2 hour ride!!



It was really fun, but what we didn't realize was that we had to go up a mountainside to get to our view, which was really stressful for Will and me!!
Here is what we went up...



We literally went up the side of that mountain to get up to Teardrop Arch, which was beautiful! Here are some pictures from the top...which was so peaceful and quiet!







Will taking a rest...



Can you tell how high up we are??









Overall, we had a wonderful first 2 days, and really liked Utah and definitely want to go back and hike and visit some more beautiful monuments!! After Monument Valley we headed back to Arizona to stay the night in Page before heading out to the Grand Canyon the next morning...more pictures to come!