I know you got worried because there wasn't a trip report last night

E-mail from 6 August 2010

We're alive and well...in L.A.!  We had a tough go of Arizona, so, after arriving in Flagstaff, we agreed that pushing through to Cali was in both of our best interests.  Three states in one day!

Last night, I wrote: Leaving Las Cruces this morning seems like ages ago now.  Our biggest problem was salvaging the tamales that Andres gifted to Drew during our stopover in El Paso.  The tamales quickly found a home in a gas station-purchased, Styrofoam cooler (with complimentary ice).

There was great scenery traveling through New Mexico.

We drove through a little rain, but no terribly threatening weather.  However, the rest of our day was "wrought with adversity."  There were two life-threatening (but not for us) avian encounters.  The first early in our day when a pigeon swooped in EXTREMELY close to the car, almost crashing into the windshield, and both of our first reactions were to duck for cover!  We had a good laugh over it, and the pigeon survived her non-encounter with Drew's car.  It wasn't much later before a road runner literally crossed our speedy path...Meep meep!

We stopped for lunch in Pie Town, NM, at the Daily Pie Cafe.  The locals made us feel very welcome.  We did not eat any pie.  I know.  We should have.

Things took a turn for the less-than-ideal when we crossed over into Arizona.  Their highways and intersections are not labeled well, so we almost missed several important turns.  There were a few times where we turned around and around and around looking for a junction, and more times where we made hairpin turns, so that we wouldn't have to turn around and around and around.

We were glad to reach the Petrified Forest National Park.  We stopped at the souvenir shop for a map, took pictures at the entrance, and were disgruntled to find a $10 park entrance fee.  Agreeing that calcified wood just wasn't worth it, we turned the car around and continued on our quest for the Grand Canyon.
Hoping to catch another natural wonder in Arizona and fulfill our tourism quota, we tried visiting the Meteor Crater just outside of Flagstaff.  It was also a perfect time to stretch our legs after being in the car for so long.  We wound down a 2.5 mile dirt road to a mountainous formation surrounded by prison-like barbed wire.  We got out of the car and up to the ticket gate where we stopped in our tracks.  They wanted $15 per person to look at a hole in the ground.  Outraged, we got back in the car and continued on to Flagstaff.

It wasn't much further to Flagstaff, but Drew needed a nap and my mood had soured.  The thought of driving further still to the Grand Canyon and back, spending the night in Flagstaff and getting up for a third day of driving was not appealing, so we stopped for a meeting of the minds over Chicken McNuggets and cheeseburgers.  It was decided that our hatred for Arizona and their tourism ploys was too deep to stay there any longer.  We had no choice.  We had to carry on to Los Angeles.

So we did it!  And we're here, two border patrol inspections later (the first I'd ever experienced!).  We're looking forward to three days of getting Drew's house in order, beach-going, seeing friends and orienting ourselves to the Pacific time zone.  I know the weekend will fly by.  I'll keep posting pictures on FB of our LA adventures, so be on the lookout!