Eastern Europe Trip

At last I slept properly as my body has finally adjusted to being on US time… so much so that Tracy had to wake me up in time for breakfast. Typical, as early tomorrow morning we’ll be heading for home…

Once again we joined our fellow guests for breakfast on the Cozy Cactus patio with the beautiful red rocks of Sedona as our backdrop. And again Carrie and Mark did us proud with a superb breakfast – freshly baked orange muffin, plate of fresh strawberries and pineapple, followed by a breakfast burrito filled with scrambled egg and ham. Once again with full stomachs we headed back to our room to pack the bags and load them into the boot of the Mustang. Saying goodbye to our hosts was very difficult – made all the more so by our desire to stay here in Sedona, a place we’d relaxed into so fully…

Once again Mark had made a recommendation that we simply couldn’t ignore. His advice was to head 10 miles north of Sedona and take the gentle West Fork trail, a walk that would take us a couple of hours and be in the shade of the woods – quite important as it was already very hot. So off we set, roof down, through the winding countryside to the car park at the trail head. Another early morning trek was just what we needed, and with the sun on our backs we headed off on the trail and over the bridge into the woods. Just here was an old derelict house that had been built by an early settler, as well as a cave in the rock that had once had a wooden door on – the frame still being in place. An ideal photo opportunity…






Now I don’t think I’ve mentioned this before, but the ‘mercans are very fond of singposting everything. Some of these signs are very informative, some are very necessary, and one or two are a little bit annoying. High up on my list of pet hates is the great big “Wilderness” signs that mark the start of the wilderness by completely ruining it with a ruddy-great big sign. Here was no exception, although at least this sign wasn’t the usual huge rusting rectangle – but even so, it still looked out of place in this beautiful wood…






But even such crass stupidity could not detract from the beauty of the walk through the woods alongside the creek. Actually, the path didn’t follow the creek so much as criss-cross it, with several interesting stepping-stone crossings and a few where tree logs had been laid down in a makeshift bridge. With Tracy’s balance still not quite back to normal, I naturally held back, camera at the ready for the inevitable splash…






After several crossings it became apparent that her balance was actually pretty good, and my attempts to encourage an action photo were being met with a less than enthusiastic response. So I gave up and concentrated on the scenery and the rocks walls that had been formed into stunning curves by endless erosion.






With me no longer bothering to whip my camera out every time we crossed the creek, it was inevitable that I’d miss the moment when Tracy’s balance let her down… and I did. I’d just turned round to check she was ok, when she slipped on a rock and her foot went into the water. Then she over-balanced before I could either offer help or get my camera out (I lost time trying to decide what was the appropriate action!) and she ended up sitting in the river. Of course, she blamed me. Her reasoning was that as it was the first crossing I’d not been taking the mickey with my camera out, that must have been the cause. Either way, she ended up with a wet bum…






With me suitably chastised, we continued the walk, admiring the scenery and listening to the gentle sounds of Tracy’s shoes squelching. And what a beautiful place this is…






Sadly after about an hours walking we had to turn round and head back, as we’ve still to get to Phoenix today. Before long we arrived at the crossing where Tracy had slipped and I decided to be gallant and show her the way across. Only I slipped on the same rock she had, and ended up with a very wet foot (I chose not to sit down in the river, though)!

Back at the car we drove into Sedona, so we could have a look round and buy a few last minute tee-shirts (the intention was to buy an ice-cream, but the “Life is Good” tee-shirts proved too good to resist). From Sedona we headed out on the scenic route through Cottonwood (where we got lost), Jerome (which was a very old copper-mining town with wooden houses), Prescott (where we got lost again) and finally on to Phoenix. The final few miles of the journey into Phoenix were along a very wide and dull highway, which at least had some interesting cacti to break up the boredom…






On arriving at the outskirts of Phoenix we realised that we’d not printed off a map of where the motel was. All we knew was that it was close to the airport, but we didn’t have a map that showed where the airport was, except that it was somewhere to the South of downtown Phoenix. Not wanting to drive into the centre of another major US city, we managed to find our way onto a ring road and before too long we’d found the airport. Just as I was congratulating myself on my excellent route-finding skills, we realised that we had no idea how to find the motel. So we drove around for a while with the sun gradually going down trying to find any sign of our motel – or any others – without success… By now the petrol gauge was back in the red (much to Tracy’s concern, as this was the 5th time I’d run it very low before finding a gas station!), so we found a garage and stopped. With a splash of fuel in the car we found a map in the shop and checked out the details – it was then we worked out that the motel’s address “3037 E. Van Buren Street” meant that it was between 30 East and 31 East on Van Buren St. Like most US cities, Phoenix’ streets are laid out in a grid, with the streets that run north-south are numbered from the centre, depending on whether they are to the East or West of the city – so 30th East was the 30th street running North-South to the East of the city centre. The streets running East-West were all named, and Van Buren St was one of these. So, all we had to do was get on 30th East and head up and down until we found Van Buren St and then head east to the motel… Easy, peasy. Even in the dark, we managed to find the motel fairly quickly (the only complication being the airport complex took up a sizeable chunk in the middle of the grid, so the theory wasn’t quite perfect). Once we’d checked in we decided to order a pizza to be delivered – largely because the area around the motel looked dodgy and there were no signs of any restaurants. So I dug out the number for Dominos and ordered a pizza and a bottle of sprite, and was talked into a portion of “hot wings”. Whilst we waited for it to be delivered we re-organised our bags ready for the early start, squeezing everything we’d bought alongside all the stuff we’d brought with us…






With the bags repacked, and the beer finally cold (having been sat in a bucket of ice since we arrived), the pizza arrived. It was a large pizza, but it was the 2ltr bottle of sprite that caught us by surprise – we were expecting a small bottle! So once again we turned in with our stomachs fit to burst, only this time with the alarm set for the early start tomorrow…