May 20, 2019

Maycation Day 9

Monument Valley

A drive through Monument Valley before hitting the road again. It’s not a long distance drive but takes a while because nobody wants to rush a drive like this.

Panoramic view of Monument Valley

This is more or less what you see on all sides for the 2 hour drive through Monument Valley.

POV image while driving through Monument Valley It’s overwhelming. It’s easy to stop and take photos and be okay with not simply relaxing and taking in the beauty because the beauty is constant and the sites seem to go on forever. Likewise, there is no need to take photos of everything. So you can take tons of photos and soak in the views without bothering to document them and you will still have more beauty than you can either absorb or document.

John Ford Point, Monument Valley

Panoramic view of The Thumb, Monument Valley

A view near The Thumb, Monument Valley

Monument Valley

Artist Point, Monument Valley

On The Road Again

Today’s drive as shown on the Maps: Monument Valley to The Grand Canyon The drive from Monument Valley to The Grand Canyon isn’t bad but the weather was, at times.

Snowy roads on the way to the Grand Canyon

I’m sure this has a name but I don’t know it. Among the random weather events between Monument Valley and the Grand Canyon: patches of warm sunshine and blue skies mixed with snow storms rolling across the desert. Dust clouds that flew up into the rain clouds, giving them a red glow. Rain. Sleet. 30-ish degrees. 60-ish degrees. Dead still air. Strong gusts of wind. The full range of normal random weather patterns, I guess.

The Grand Canyon

A View of the Grand Canyon near Moran Point

A View from the South Rim of the Grand Canyon

Random Elk grazing near a Grand Canyon Visitor’s Center

Random Elk Fact: Bulls shed and grow a new set of antlers every year. Read more Elk facts at The Elk Network.

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May 19, 2019

Maycation Day 8

More Motel Safari

Tucumari Tonight! A mural at Motel Safari in Tucumari, NM

Motel Safari in Tucumari, NM

On The Road Again

The Groundhog enjoys one of I-40 West’s unique rest areas. This one is in New Mexico.

at&t asks if I’ve noticed an “Off-Network” and offers useless advice. The most troubling part of this “Off-Network” warning from at&t is the fact that I have all “data roaming” options turned off in settings. Theoretically, this shouldn’t be possible. In reality, I used well over 400MB of roaming data while in New Mexico and Arizona.

The alert says “iCloud Photos Has Not Updated In 7 Days” My iPhones tend to start acting weird after a week offline. These alerts don’t help matters. I had internet (cellular, wifi, etc) almost all of the time during the 7 days preceding this message. I’d even received a warning from my carrier about using too much internet while off-network.

Monument Valley

The Groundhog sits on his balcony at The View Hotel at Monument Valley and wonders how the hotel was named. This is your groundhog, seeing the shadows of giants and hiding for the rest of the trip.

A view of Monument Valley from a balcony at The View Hotel at Monument Valley It’s a rather ridiculous view. It was hard to leave the balcony. The view from the other side of the hotel was the type of view most hotels would kill for but was so weak compared to this view that there weren’t even rooms on the other side, it was just what you saw when you were going to and from the parking lot.

And now for dueling panoramas. The first was taken by the default iOS camera app in Panorama mode: Panoramic view of Monument Valley from a balcony at The View Hotel at Monument Valley

The 2nd was taken as several different images and automagically stitched together into a panorama by Google Photos. Panoramic view of Monument Valley from a balcony at The View Hotel at Monument Valley

I often take a series of pics in hopes that Google Photos will make a panorama. It works 2/3 of the time but not all of those panoramas are keepers. This one isn’t perfect, you can easily see at least one or two of the lines where the photos were stitched. Both of these panoramas were cropped, the colors were tweaked, etc.

vacation holiday florida roadtrip maycation2019 newmexico arizona groundhog monumentvalley motelsafari

May 18, 2019

Maycation Day 7

Desperate Measures

It was late. The first 4 hotels were full. The motel had a room.

The kitchen at the motel in Shreveport, LA

It smelled like bug spray, the non-carpeted floors had a weird slick feel, the kitchen was a microwave sitting on a mini-fridge by the door, but there was a vacancy, it was cheap, and there was a pool.

There was a pool.

Texas

Texas has the best rest areas and picnic areas.

An oil well themed picnic area in Texas

Texas also has the worst weather.

Dark Sky explains the Texas Weather

Not good for driving. Shortly after the storm hit, a flood warning appeared.

This warning to avoid flood areas would be more helpful if I had any idea what the flood areas were.

The best part about driving through Texas was seeing the wind farms. Felt like living in the future. Or maybe I have cancer now?

Some windmills in Texas near dusk

Tucumcari, New Mexico

The day ended with me going to sleep in a motel that is basically the dream version of the motel I woke up in that morning.

Motel Safari is one of a handful of Route 66 motels in Tucumcari that provides a bit of the original flavor from America’s road trip glory days. It is hard for me to believe people stay at the cookie-cutter chain hotels and motels closer to the interstate for any reason other than that they are in Tucumcari by accident and don’t realize what they can find if they drive a few more blocks. I stayed in Tucumcari 2 or 3 times before I realized what I had been missing.

Motel Safari in Tucumcari, New Mexico