Earlier this year, I visited Arizona for the first time and had a wonderful adventure with my cousin. It was even the first time I ever blogged domestically, because my dad insisted I blog on my trip - he told me "he lives for my blog!" In case you're interested - you can read those posts here.
However, during my Arizona adventures, I had stumbled upon an obscure hike on the border of Arizona and Utah, and those details will come later, but my friends and I managed to get in. So another Southwestern adventure - twice in one year! Feeling very blessed to come back to this region which was so unexpected and I blog again, for the 2nd time, domestically.
Today, my long-time and dear friend Kristin whom I met through volunteering many years ago, and I left New York bright and early. I had a bit of a debacle getting to the airport with a crazy Super Shuttle driver who managed to let my luggage fly out of the back. While going from terminal to terminal, legit - the door swung open and I yelled for my luggage as he got out of the van and walked about 50 meters to get it. Cars lined up behind it and patiently waited for my luggage to be picked up from the road....Never in my life have I had such a ridiculous experience!
After not thanking my driver, at the airport, Kristin and I zipped through as she had booked our tickets under her status and we boarded our flight to Las Vegas. After researching our hike destination, the drive from Vegas was only 3.5 hours while Salt Lake City was about 5 and Phoenix was about 6.
Our flight got in about 45 minutes early and we picked up our hybrid rental car at Hertz and made our way to the "Seven Magic Mountains". Its about 20 minutes south of Vegas and is a temporary sculpture installation in the middle of the desert. You can see the brightly painted stones below:
Here's one of Kristin taking a photo and the beautiful sky above with the streaks of clouds:
Kristin comes to this area to mountain climb often and she wanted to show me Red Rock Canyon which is due west of Vegas. As we were hungry for lunch, we stopped at a Mexican place where we noshed on nachos and lunched. It was right near the entrance of Red Rock Canyon, so it was super convenient.
We entered the conservation area where it's a scenic loop. Here's one of the stops - what a beautiful day!
After our scenic drive, we headed to Kanab, Utah - about 3.5 hours northeast and near the border of Utah and Arizona. Our ride was quick, but confusing at times. Nevada is on Pacific coast time, Utah and Arizona are on Mountain time, but Arizona doesn't follow daylight savings. But the Navajo Nation within Utah does. Ahhhh - as I explained all of this to Kristin and was part of some confusion on when we thought we were arriving and communicating that to Marie. I had this same problem when I was in the region last time as our GPS would pick up different signals due to the proximity of the different zones. So our watches, phones, and GPS said different times - but we managed to arrive safely and timely.
We checked in at the Hampton Inn, and met Marie, my colleague from Equinox who lives in Scottsdale. Her husband, Steven, and their neighbors, Steven M. and Leanne were joining us for our adventure.
We dined at Sego, an Asian fusion tapas restaurant attached to Steven M. and Leanne's hotel and where they had Chihuly inspired pieces all around. We got excited for our adventure as we tracked down our hiking guide and the logistics for our hike. Marie, Steven, and I went to the grocery store where we picked up pita pockets and some deli meat for our lunch tomorrow.
After a day of driving and flying, we were all ready to get to bed early to rest for our first hike to the Wave!
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