Woops

And today started out so well...

I have to start with a quick image of the view from Leora and Malcolm's porch. Cara and I ate breakfast outside and couldn't stop marveling at how beautiful it is there. Every window's view gets better, and eating outside we couldn't imagine ever wanting to leave. Here's a few shots of what we were looking at...


This morning Cara and I packed up the car and were ready to leave Albuquerque, but of course something must go wrong on a roadtrip at least once and today was the day for us I guess. While backing out of Leora and Malcolm's driveway I hit a railroad tie in their yard and cracked the bumper. The damage wasn't actually too bad but the mud flap over the front tire was loose and hitting the tire. Cara and I waited for Leora and Malcolm to get home and then with some shoestring and lots of ducktape we managed to patch it up well enough to get to Flagstaff.



By the time we left Albuquerque it was already 4 o'clock so our plans for the day were pretty much out the window. We did stop at Alcoma Pueblo, a historic Native American city on the top of a hill that's been preserved. We couldn't tour it because it was too late but we walked around the museum for a bit and took a ton of pictures of the landscape which was generally breathtaking.



We spent the rest of the day driving out to Flagstaff, Arizona and arrived around 10 PM. We did make one quick stop at the Wigwam Motel in Holbrook, AZ. The motel bosts rooms in buildings shaped like wigwams and it was pretty cool just to take pictures of. Plus a lot of the old cars in the parking lot were the inspiration for the cars in the Disney/Pixar film CARS. This is a nice shot of me standing outside one of the hotel rooms.


From there it was only a few hours to Flagstaff. We're staying at a really nice hostel and the plan is to get up early tomorrow and hike around the Grand Canyon (about an hour drive North of Flagstaff). Hopefully we'll get back in the afternoon with plenty of time to take the car to one of the body shops in the area so we can have everything fixed before heading out to Los Angeles on Tuesday.

I send much love to you all and I can't wait to post some great Grand Canyon photos tomorrow.