Day 9 - Monument Valley & Grand Canyon

Hello together,

Today was a relatively eventful day, so there's more to tell. Our accommodation today is great, but the internet is really bad. But we'll try. We stayed in our little cabin in Indian country. We did see some Indians, not the wild ones, but the typical Indians. And they all looked the same, as you would imagine them - at least in their faces. Similar to how the Chinese look similar :-)

Anyway, we started the day relatively early - at Monument Valley. This was a place I was really looking forward to from the beginning. Since I had already sent the following picture to some friends and no one really knew what to make of the background, here's some enlightenment for the cultural barbarians :-) Monument Valley is actually world famous and everyone has seen it in classics like John Wayne, Winnetou, National Lampoon's Vacation, Back to the Future, or even Forrest Gump. But it has also been seen in more modern films, such as Transformers or Mission Impossible.

It was absolutely awesome to see it with the first rays of sunshine and we had plenty of time to take some unique photos without much crowds.

Afterwards, we continued for about 3 hours to the Grand Canyon - another highlight of the day and the whole trip. Honestly, I have to admit that I liked Bryce Canyon better - now that I have the direct comparison on two consecutive days. Here, we visited a few famous viewpoints and of course took a few snapshots:

Around the Grand Canyon, we also had luck with the theme 'wildlife'. Here's just a quick picture - Luisa has the really good ones on her camera. The animals are wild and shy - although not as shy as in Germany. But it was really lucky that we spotted them.

Since we had some time at the end of the day and there was a 'bear park' not far from our accommodation, we made a little detour here as well. So now we've seen all the animals :-)

Now we're in Sedona, at our accommodation. We just had something delicious to eat and we'll probably go to bed relatively early tonight. Tomorrow we'll continue to Phoenix and from there we'll head to L.A. We're leaving these beautiful landscapes with mixed feelings - sad to leave but also a bit excited. Personally, I'm looking forward to our 4 days in L.A. The past few days of driving have made me a little tired. And I'm also excited to have a fixed 'home' again instead of checking into different accommodations every day, some better, some worse. Los Angeles will be a kind of 'vacation from the vacation' :-) Of course, we'll also visit and report on some things there, but everything is more central there, so we don't have to drive for hours and we'll return to the same room for several days in a row. And we also have the opportunity to take a day off if needed.

So... unfortunately, the internet here in this tourist town is even worse than yesterday with the Indians, so I have to limit the pictures to the essentials again. But after the vacation, we'll create a nice album and everything will be explained in detail :-) We'll be in touch tomorrow...

PS: There are a few typos in this blog (also in older ones); I can't correct them because of the bad internet. Everything is so delayed - there's nothing I can do. So just overlook them :-D I'm typing in bed in the evening, and it's not always easy to be completely error-free on the quick. But today, I even lack the possibility to correct the obvious things - Forrest with 2x R, the really good ones (pictures) Luisa has, etc. So please don't hold it against me :-)

Dean + Luisa