21 July, 2008

My GoD! is it really 8 1/2 months since i last wrote. geesh- i swear i had good intentions. now i don't know where to start! to go all the way back to november, 2007, or to just give it to ya from here. well....progress is fun. i guess we'll go with the short version with lots of pictures.

ahh...november- it was delicious being in Flagstaff. i had NO idea how much fun a hostel could be. it was just really sweet to have a cozy bed and a shower. THEN there were all the amazing people...Maria from the Czech Republic was riding from Alaska to Texas. uh, got me there! she's soo cool. and lovely little Sara from Switzerland- traveling her way to her self via the world. so i played music in the dining room, which brought lots of people out of their rooms and we had such a fine fine evening laughing and story telling and all things wandering travelers. so i HAD to stay another night to enjoy these delicious people, and thank HeaVen and EaRtH i did because i met Sarah Emberson from Sheffield, England, and that's a treat of a lifetime. we ended up traveling with Sara and Jimmy on a little camping trip to monument valley, and we wandered our way there convoying with Roger and his Spaniards, who had to get to moab by midnight. we found winslow arizona for him (i liked it too :)
then on to the Petrified Forest, cause little Sara had to see it, and then to Canyon De Chelly (pronounced inexplicably De Shay) where i parted with my camera for a while in Roger's car. it was eventually reunited with me in LA where roger left it with paolina. how fun is that? anyway....did i say i would keep it short? i don't mean to lie. it just happened.

so these folks becamee my immediate new best friends and i cried when every single one of them left. and then of course when one leaves a new one comes, and i kept asking, is it time for ME to leave? and my heart kept telling me to be patient. so more new friends, lovely evenings with music and days with delight and then met a couple of chaps to hike up Mount Humphries (12,000 feet +/- ) and then one of them, lovely bloke, Jacob, was staying on a few days as well, so more hiking. turns out he was looking for a travelmate with a car to do a lovely route in southern utah he had laid out. so after a quick thanksgiving meeting Sarah from Sheffield and Oistein from Norway back in Santa Barbara while Jacob did a whirlwind week in mexico, we were OFF! oh my MyNess! it was all so incredible. the first time i can remember not feeling the need to fix something. it was PERFECT. our travels took us to gorgeous glen canyon (we 4X4ed over some old golf course), antelope canyon, which was closed, then to navajo national monument, which we didn't feel like discovering, because really i just wanted to get to my beloved Monument Valley. wOw. it was a lot colder than last time...a LOT colder. so next to the fire with guitar and gorgeous starry sky, and when we woke in the morning, it was so cold we couldn't even break down camp (like -8 degrees celcius) so we wandered about the valley...and so delightful sunrise tromping. packed up and headed up the ways to have a yummy navajo bread with breakfast in mexican hat at that sweet little restaurant at the big bend, over the river- you can't miss it! onward to Muley Point. ok- that drive is nearly unbelievable. you HAVE to do it! and out to the end of the road to the point, where we wandered our way down to ..... (to be continued)