Our guide for the ride, Bill, was a self-proclaimed 81 year old hippie (who did NOT look like a hippie or an 81 year old – he looked like a 60ish cowboy!) who told great stories about the land we were riding through, the ghost sightings at a hotel in the next town over, and his own experiences in the area and with his horses – including the horse that saved his life, in a roundabout way. And he took a nice family picture that didn’t look like a glamour shot, so we appreciated that about him too.

It needs its own post. The girls loved it, and for good reason.

We could have probably spent hours and days hiking different trails in Sedona, but the kids were pretty much done with hiking after going down and back up the Grand Canyon earlier in the week. So we did this quick one and then headed back to the snakes and the hotel pool. It was beautiful, a little warm, and a lot windy in some spots.

This might have even placed above the hotel pool and hot tub, so you know they liked it!!

A couple guys who run a rescue organization based in Sedona had a bunch of friendly animals that anyone could try holding – they are trying to help people to understand that not all ‘scary’ animals are actually bad, and they are working especially hard to change people’s perceptions about snakes.

After a LOOOONG drive from Page to Sedona, that included a trek back through the Grand Canyon park after we were turned around by a wildfire burning across the highway we were planning to travel on, we finally arrived in Sedona. A 2.5 hour drive turned into a 5 hour drive, but everyone was relatively upbeat about it. And it was nice to get another glimpse of the Grand Canyon as we drove through.

Luckily, our first meal at the hotel in Sedona was a good one, so it made it feel worth all the extra work it took to get there. And the pre-dinner swim in the pool was pretty nice too!

We went on a tour of one of Arizona’s most famous slot canyons, led by a Navajo woman named Rosie. It was other-worldly. Unbelievably beautiful. And nice and cool compared to the hot Arizona sun shining on us once we were back outside! Rosie told us that these canyons were found by Native shepherds whose flocks would wander in to get out of the heat.

We spent a decent amount of this day at the hotel pool, but I didn’t get any pictures of that. We were supposed to go kayaking but there were high winds forecast so the company cancelled our trip. But we found a few other cool things to do in the area, including hanging gardens, a swim in VERY COLD Lake Powell (where it did get extremely windy!), and a visit to the Glen Canyon Dam (and a *different* sort of family photo!)

We spent our last morning hiking down to the first rest house on South Kaibab trail (less than a mile down the trail). It was a good way to say goodbye to the Grand Canyon. Hopefully we will be back!