Holy crap!
We were woken up at 4 am (we had a 5:30 am alarm set) to the sound of thunder. Thunder! In SF! Incredible. Lightning that lit up the house, thunder that shook the windows, sporadic rain. If it had been any other kind of weather keeping us from leaving I would be *pissed* but this was totally worth it. Real weather in SF!
It delayed us by several hours, but then I got to see lightning out the window of the plane! (Don’t worry, it was like 30 miles away …) Super cool though. Several bolts of it and super bright and a little bit scary.
The Grand Canyon is amazing. We got to fly about as near as the guided tours do, only we didn’t have to share the plane with some random foreigners. Pictures were fun, if not somewhat limited by wanting to land before the weather got worse. (Click photos for a link to my Flickr)
The Best Western here is an experience all its own. It had the expected ‘aroma of Best Western’ but there was a bowling alley on the first floor. Don’t worry, one lucky winner will get the complimentary “Best Western” postcard. You are all dying in anticipation, checking your mail incessantly, I know you are.
The little town outside the Grand Canyon airport is about 3/4 of a mile long, so our food options were limited. Based on the airport shuttle driver’s reviews, we went with “We Cook Pizza and Pasta” where I had the unhealthiest salad since my excursion to Round Table with Miss Cari Turley. (Imagine this entire thing smothered in ranch dressing and including several kinds of cheese.)
After our clearly over-stimulating visit to Grand Canyon Village, AZ we headed off to San Antonio, TX. This is the closest I’ll be to the place of my birth (Houston, TX) since I bailed on the state at the tender age of 6. Even then I knew growing up in TX would be a bad idea …