Well Folks! Anyone who knows the Whites knows that when we play we play hard! We have closed down Disney World many times, but closing down the Grand Canyon maybe a personal best! We went from daylight til dark for three full days....and had a blast! Once again my kids amaze me. They are awesome..no whining and crying. They can hang better than most adults! I love my life and I LoVe my family! Hope everyone enjoys the pics!
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| "Look mom! Its a long way down!" |
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| Brinson Made an Indian Toy, a horse. This is how Indian kids entertained themselves!Its made from a bendable plant. |
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| East end of Grand Canyon. Watch tower in background. |
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| check out Colorado river in background |
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| Indian Art in Watch Tower on East end of Grand Canyon |
The Grand Canyon is exactly that, "GRAND". Pictures do not do it justice. There is no real way to get the depth perception on film. At the top of the Canyon it is about twenty to thirty degrees cooler than the bottom. The couple of days we were there the winds would pick up in late afternoon to around thirty to forty mph. The altitude and wind bothered our nose and lips a lot. We went thru a whole lot of chapstick. The cabin we stayed in the first night of our trip was cute but there was something missing ....airconditioning! I almost had heart failure! NO air! It took me about thirty minutes to realize the thermastat was for heat only! Then David reminded me that you can Open windows and use a Fan and guess what....we were very comfortable! I forgot where we were..8000 feet above sea level. The next night we stayed in a motel. This time we had air conditioning. The kind that you have to put ICE CUBES IN! I'm not kidding! It was like a fan and you put ice cubes in and for three hours you had yourself cool air! There again, thats all you needed. After that the temps dropped and nights were very comfortable! Amazing that three hours from Tucson, where it was 115 degrees, you can sleep without air in the Grand Canyon!
Arizona is a very different place! Southern Arizona is cactus desert land...Then head north and you are in a National Forest in the mountains! In Southern Arizona you can see for miles and miles....no trees in sight. The land is covered in scrub brush and cacti. The only thing blocking your view is a mountain that rises out of no where! Northern Arizona is a bit different. Beautiful trees and lots of mountains! One thing that is the same all over, is the population of animals! They are everywhere. On the side of cliffs, or in a field of cacti. You can find deer, hog, lizards, bird everywhere.
One other thing I forgot to mention about Arizona as a whole, is that there are very few street lights. There are several Observatories here. So all outside light is prohibited ....or at least voltage is monitered. I told David when I first got here that I could see the stars better here than at home. Then I noticed the abcence of street lights. So I inquired about this. That is when I learned of the Observatories throughout the state. When we visited the Sonoran Desert Museum there was a fella there with a telescope letting people have a look. We got to see Saturn and its beautiful rings! It was awesome.
On our trip to the Grand Canyon we passed through the Navajo Indian Reservation. It is a very large area of land given to the Indians. I was a LITTLE disappointed. I still cant figure out if they like their life like this, or if they dont have any options. Most lived very primatively. In VERY old single wide trailers or "huts". The "huts" were very small eight sided buildings made very poorly. On top of lots of homes you would see old tires. These tires would hold thier roofs on when the winds were high and during monsoon season. Most Navajos had no running water or electricity! Scary!!! They would take thier water tanks to the closest store and fill up for the week. The stores charged them a dollar. OK...all you medical people...Water setting in a tank in 115 degree weather for a week.....GROSS!!!! Im not using it. I guess they build a fire and boil it...not sure. They have their own small school. I wonder what the kids are taught. If a child is to be taught English they are bused outside of the reservation to the closest school. I can tell you that is a very long way! There was a couple of small communities in the reservation that had electricity and running water....about ten houses in each community. This was not at all what I thought the Navajo Indian reservation would be like. Of course, the Indians are very secretive. Which I understand. They do not trust our government or our people. I wonder why....just because we ran them off their land and did them very wrong...I guess I understand why they may not trust us!
More coming soon! SOooo many photos!!! Hope you like!
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