Adventure to Sedona - the trip begins

To Mom with love - sending healing energy.  Mom fell and broke her hip recently, is recovering and is back at home with dad.  My family has kept me informed of her progress and I have been in touch with both Mom and Dad today, the report was good.  Thank you Michele for all you have done for Mom and your communications with me.  Patti, I'm very happy you got to visit and kept me abreast of all the goings on.  Sara, Caroline, Nicole - love you very much.  Mike I'm at the other end of a phone if you need me.

Which leads to this blog.  We start with a journey that began as a plan to go to the Redwood forest for a vacation with my daughter Noelle.  When Mom fell and broke her hip, my instincts were to try to get to Arkansas.  Noelle, Phil and I began a journey, as we have to, with the attitude that we are going to live and put ourselves out there.  My family actually discouraged me in a loving kind way before we even started, but we set out with determination and love in our hearts.  They all know what a long journey it is, as I do, but those damn rose colored glasses...  Phil and I have many wonderful memories crossing the 40, visiting Route 66, the Grand Canyon and New Mexico, it sounded wonderful.  I thought with the past trip to Oregon under our belt, that were ready for this adventure.  I forgot to take in consideration some important facts and I let my heart take over for a minute.  We had our budget from various spots -  Noelle cashed out her motel rooms in Northern California, dog sitting and a couple of wonderful gifts.  We set out in Penelope with anticipation and resolve.  Our first day would be  long because we had to travel across the desert and we wanted to try to get to the Flagstaff area to stay.
We were using last minute bookings on the road, as we find that we can get nice rooms for great prices.  So we set off with a wing and a prayer.

We found a spot in Sedona that was offering a small one room suite for $79., seemed like a wonderful deal, maybe almost too good to be true.  We went ahead and booked it for 2 days, knowing that we would be tired and would need to go slow.  Phil has problems with swelling due to some drugs that he takes and needs to move during travel.  We stop, get out and move around every couple of hours.  I based some of my travel experience to our trip in Oregon.  I now realize how much love and care Chris and her husband Scott put into us during our visit there.  They did a wonderful job at giving us our wings, but they definitely had given us loving care, during our visit.  Our time driving each day was nothing like what my first day was like on this trip.

It was late when we arrived in Sedona, we were exhausted, Phil looked like an overblown balloon, he face was very swollen and it had been a long hot day.  We pulled into Sedona Summit Resort, it was dark and we were way past tired.  We checked in with me thinking I lost my bank card, I called the bank and cancelled my card from the car while Phil checked into the hotel.  They told Phil they were giving us an upgrade and we ended up in the most beautiful 1 bedroom suite with a kitchen and a pull out couch for Noelle.  It was incredible, we settled in and I found my bankcard in my damn front pocket, a place I never put it.  Look for this great deal on Expedia or bookings.com, we were using both online looking for rooms with much success.  This deal was just fabulous and the resort was clean, beautiful and the staff was wonderful.  The room was spacious, clean and the beds were comfy.

When we pulled in it was dark -  when we got up with the sunrise we were surprised by the additional bonus - the view from our room:

None of us could believe our eyes, Noelle and I ran out and went for a sunrise walk around the property.  Fabulous view, incredible property and a gorgeous sunrise to start the first day.  Phil stayed back and took it easy, he didn't start the day off feeling great.  I could however see his joy at the view out of our window.

Noelle enjoys the sunrise.

The view out of our back patio was of the beautiful red rocks.

After we all got up, ate and were dressed we headed out to walk among the Red Rock.  After experiencing our drive the previous day, we were already discussing that we may not want to take the drive to Arkansas......But we all said that we would wait and live it day by day.  No decisions, just living, seeing how everyone felt.  I myself was beginning to be tired and we had only just begun.  The dry weather, the switching of altitudes was hard on our bodies in ways that I didn't think about..... Worrying about Phil, doing the driving and just being tired from what we are going through was playing on me.  Worrying about the amount of driving ahead of us was scaring me.  I expressed my concerns, both Noelle and Phil encouraged me to live in the moment.

We headed out into the red desert and saw Merlin on the way.

Noelle went on a little adventure and we took a walk in a couple of art galleries and another walk in the desert later in the day.

We all returned to our room early where the discussions on our continuing trip would start.  There were some emotions,  and tears but ultimately we looked at the length of the trip, how many hours in the car and what it was already doing to us and decided that our trip would take a different route that would take us on shorter days, longer stays and would get us closer to home.  This decision was not made easily and we gave it great thought.  After talking to daughter Nicole (who I also wanted to see) and my relatives it was decided that our next move would be going down state and circling around back into California.  Again we would set out with no plans except we were heading toward Tucson.

Early to bed and we all got up in the morning with anticipation of what was coming up for us.  We started off with a trip to the Chapel in the Red Rocks.

After Sedona we head into the Arizona desert - stay tuned.....the next blog takes us to Tucson .  What a spiritual, soul searching, emotional time we had in Sedona.  We learned about ourselves, we knew to accept our "new lives" and we keep moving forward......... A change of plans didn't deter our spirit, we headed out with hope.