Shorts & flip-flops in February!!!

Jose has the running bug... and his latest race was the Ragnar Del Sol Relay (213 miles from Prescott to Mesa). Of course, we had to make a family trip out of it because we all wanted to see the sun and breathe the fresh mountain air.

Our plan was to drive to Page and spend a day with Kristi and her family before continuing to Phoenix to spend a couple of days with Laura and Adam. But Kate and Rachel got a stomach thing the day prior to our arrival and we did not want to risk Jose puking his way through the race. So we drove to Flagstaff, spent the night, and then took a very scenic and relaxing drive through Sedona and the AZ back country on our way to Phoenix.

Oak Creek Canyon was beautiful!

Oak Creek Canyon...

We took a short hike along the canyon. Alex was disappointed that we didn't follow the trail all the way down to the creek so that he could go rock jumping! If you look closely, you can see the creek way down under the bridge, kind of over to the left!

Tuzigoot National Monument

So I just realized that even though I uploaded a number of pictures from Picasa, I guess blogspot only lets 4 of them appear in a post. So you are missing out on all of our fun in Sedona. It was a fun little town, although I about died at the idea of spending $60 on lunch - for a slice of pizza each. Luckily, I thought, "there must be some other restaurants somewhere off of this little Main Street Tourist Trap" and we only ended up paying $25.

Tuzigoot seemed like quite a funny name. But it was really an neat site. From what I read before arriving, I thought it would be cliff dwellings like in Mesa Verde. To my surprise, it was a stone castle up on the top of a hill. It was neat. We also went over to Montezuma's Castle, which was built by the same (Sinagua) Indians. They were both specatular. But, the most interesting thing was a timeline that put perspective on them. They were built at the same time as Notre Dame in Paris. We all had to pause and consider the great differences in life in Europe and life in the Americas.

Cerreta's Candy Factory

Laura is in Glendale, and as I searched for things to do close to her (besides swimming at the pool and playing at the vollyball court), I read about this little candy factory. Cerreta's gives tours each day, and we thought it would be fun. All of their chocolates are hand made. We enjoyed the tour and the samples! Alex really wished he could have a bite of the 330 pound Cardinals football!

Cardinal's Stadium

Although Alex could not have the Cardinal's chocolate football, he was thrilled to go to Cardinal's Stadium and go on a tour. It is an incredible stadium. Unfortunately, there were no players around. But Alex did go into the "Visiting Team" locker room.

Ragnar Del Sol...

Last, but not least, the reason for our trip to Arizona... the race. Jose's team ran the relay in 28 hours, 29 minutes, 32 seconds. They were 47th out of 214 teams, and 12th in the Men's Open Division. Jose had a great race. His average pace was 8:25 for the 17.4 miles that he ran. He even ran his last leg (a little over two miles) with an average pace of 7:52. Way to go Jose!!!

We (Laura, the kids and me) even decided to go pump him up for his middle of the night run. We drove out into the no-man-land close to Wickenburg, AZ at midnight to wish him well. He was very surprised to see us.

Saturday afternoon we met up with Matt and Kelly Fairbanks. We had a nice visit with them, and then went to eat at "In 'n Out Burger" We'd never been before and it has been such the controversy with the knock-off here in American Fork. After dinner we got on the road and headed up to Page. The stomach bug had passed, and we wanted to see Kristi and her family. We spent an enjoyable Sunday morning with them. Kristi fixed us a tasty lunch, and then we were on our way home.

Needless to say, I am already missing the sun and flip-flops of Arizona!