02/18-19/16- Thursday to Friday
Faeln and I have been dying to go to the Grand Canyon, but things like school and homework have been getting in the way. We went online and decided to just pick a date and book a hotel. We were planning on leaving at midnight of February 18th, but instead decided to leave at 10:30pm so we could catch the sunrise at the Grand Canyon. We loaded up our bags and snacks and took off.
Faeln drove for the first two hours and then we switched. We continued to switch every two hours during the drive. Both Fae and I started off very awake, but we slowly began to get tired. Once it reached 4am and we were driving in the pitch black night… well now morning, we began to feel exhausted. We realized we had been driving all through the night, you know that time where you usually sleep, but we continued to fight through the tiredness. We drove into the park at 7am, parked, ran to where we could see the sunrising and gasped of disbelief. It was the most beautiful sunrise I had ever seen. You could see a bright yellow color peer from behind the multicolored silhouette of the canyon. I kept blinking as if I was gazing upon some kind of unreal picture.
After 30 minutes of just staring silently at one of God’s most beautiful creations, we set off to explore the rest of the park. We drove around and found another breathtaking spot to park at. Once we parked, we got out and followed a trail. After being in the windy, cold weather for a few minutes, I could feel my feet slowly freezing and my teeth chattering. We decided a warm break inside was needed so we entered a little store. There I bought a magnet and a postcard which, for those of you who don’t know, is my thing.
It was now about 9am and we hopped back in the car and continued on a route where we made several more stops. Every view, from all different angles, was incredible. Some say that they look at the Grand Canyon for a few minutes and were easily bored but not us. Fae and I could’ve stayed for hours just sitting in silence thinking the same thing, “Isn’t this just beautiful?”
After hours upon hours of sitting in the cold and staring at the most gorgeous national park we had ever seen, we headed out to our hotel. But since this is a road trip, we did make a couple stops here and there. First we stopped at a cafe outside of the park for some coffee (for Fae of course since coffee disgusts me) and a bagel. We also stumbled upon an area decorated as if we were in an episode of the Flintstones. When we arrived at the hotel at noon, we were told that we couldn’t check in until 2pm. Two hours to kill? We can do that. We drove to Flagstaff where we had lunch, walked around, and looked at little shops. After we headed back to our hotel where we took a well needed two hour nap.
For dinner, we decided to go local. We walked around the city and chose a cute little family owned restaurant. After, we looked at more shops and headed back to get a good nights sleep for another long day to come.
Exploring the World 