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Passports Not Hallpasses

Family of Four Traveling the World, Exploring New Countries and Learning a Lot Along the Way

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Micha's Blog

A Week of Drycamping in the Coconino National Forest

Our trip from Tucson ended just south of Flagstaff in the Coconino National Forest. I had learned of some good spots to drycamp (no hookups for the RV) in some of the roadschooling sites we are in. The place we ended up was nothing short of amazing.

Our views outside the RV window.

The forest in our area had already been somewhat cleared by the Forest Service. So there were trees, but not crazy amounts of them or a ton of underbrush. The kids went wild walking around. Our very first evening there, they stumbled upon a large herd of elk. The elk weren’t really concerned with the kids or us, and just continued on their way. It was exciting to see all the babies.

In between our day trips out to the nearby parks and monuments, we had a blast in the forest. Scott was able to set up our solar panels. We were able to get almost all of our power from the solar and only needed to turn on the generator in the late evening due to the freezing temperatures. The only exception to that was one day that it actually snowed. It was beautiful seeing the huge snowflakes falling all around the RV and in between the trees. The only thing more enjoyable than the snow was the sunset.

The forest was fun for hiking and mountain biking. The kids and I went on a long (almost all uphill) mountain bike path. It almost killed me. Once we finally made it to the top of the mountain, it was smooth sailing, but there were moments when I considered just laying the bike down and napping on the side of the trail.

Gracie loved the forest. As long as there was no one around, we let her wander around with us off leash. I was surprised that she wouldn’t go outside without one of us though. It would’ve been handy on that snowy day…

KIB also got in on the great outdoors and even enjoyed a walk about on the ground outside the RV.

KIB enjoying a sunny afternoon on the patio.

We had the place almost entirely to ourselves while we were there. On the beautiful weekend days, some other outdoorsy folks would drive past us or unload bikes near where we were, but aside from that, we rarely saw anyone. It was brilliant and by far our favorite place to park the RV. Our last night there, we finally used all of our fresh water tank. We never really intended to stay for six nights, so we hadn’t filled up our tank all the way. It worked out fine since since we had a few gallons of water in the RV.

Finally we forced ourselves to leave and headed towards Death Valley. The only surprise there was that we drove through Las Vegas without stopping for a single gamble.

The Grand Canyon

On our second day in the national forest, we realized we were just over an hour from the south rim of the Grand Canyon. We had previously planned to camp for a few days there, but we were all so in love with staying in the forest that we decided to make the drive that morning.

The Canyon of course was beautiful.

We didn’t really go for any hikes, since we only had the day. The kids and Scott managed to go down a steep rocky outcropping to get some amazing off-path views.
The man in blue who happened to be doing some kind of photo shoot made the views even better.

The wildlife at the Park was even less scared that the ones near our spot in the forest. Mommas and baby elk alike walked past us within a few feet.


Through the crowds, we caught the highlights of the Canyon. We made the scenic drive to finish up the kids’ junior ranger badges at the far ranger station.

All in all a decent trip to the Grand Canyon. Since we weren’t able/willing to hike down to the bottom of the canyon, the day trip served us perfectly.

A Day of Geology and Social Studies

About forty minutes from our campsite were two beautiful places to visit. The fact that the kids could earn junior ranger badges made them all the more enticing.

The first stop was Sunset Crater National Monument. We were all surprised to learn that the scientists are still uncertain what caused the volcanoes in northern Arizona to form. Whatever the cause, we were all shocked to see such a stark contrast there compared to the surrounding areas. Lava Flow trail was stunning even with my big mug in the photo!

Aspen trees next to pine trees seemed to be the majority of the very little vegetation scattered among the volcanic rock. Unfortunately the crater itself was closed to visits in an attempt to help preserve it.

The other (and directly adjacent) monument was the Wupatki National Monument. On the way there, we stopped so Scott could help push a couple of women out of the ditch. The kids thought it was hilarious that one of them refused to leave until I hugged her. Backing up, putting my hands up, and even verbally closing it down, she still insisted on hugging me. I didn’t even push her car out!

Finally at the monument, we were able to see pueblos built by the indigenous people over one thousand years ago. The knowledge that went into building the pueblo included making it possible for the people to have a well vented fire room to stay warm in the winters without suffocating. We were all impressed with what it took to make such a large, essentially town-center for hundreds of people, work so well.

The largest and most restored of several different pueblos built in the area.

While we weren’t allowed to go inside the rooms, the walkway took us right up to the building. The complexity of a building so old was amazing.

[I laughed when I started editing these pictures. What the photos don’t show is how unbelievably windy it was that day. There were a few moments where the kids hid behind us while using us as windbreaks. Had we not been there, they may well have blown away. We skipped the last two ruins due to the winds.]

Petrified Forest National Park

Petrified Forest was about two hours from our camping spot, so we shot for a relatively early start. To break up the drive, we stopped just outside of Winslow, Arizona to see the Meteor Crater. Other than actually seeing the almost-mile across crater that was created 10,000 years ago (by a 150 foot meteor!), the stop was ridiculous.

Way down there, is a six foot tall cutout next to a flag. This is provided to give a sense of how deep the crater is.

After not being impressed, we continued our journey to the Petrified Forest National Park.

We had heard mixed reviews on the Forest. I was expecting very little and was very happy when my expectations were exceeded.

The scenery was beautiful.

Even the ridiculous kids thought the landscape was some of the most interesting we have seen.

I was worried we wouldn’t see much petrified rock, but it was everywhere we looked. The badlands areas had very little, but the “forests” were exactly what you would expect in terms of the amount of wood.

Some pieces were small and vividly colored.

Othe pieces were huge and littered the ground.

We managed to make a few smaller hikes to see some of the less discovered areas. I was surprised by how few of the visitors left the paved roads and walked down any of the unsaved paths. Behind the second visitors center on the south side of the park, we were able to see Old Faithful. This particular tree is approximately ten feet in diameter.

Old Faithful is huge!

The kids finished up their junior ranger badges at that visitor center as well. The park ranger happened to be a volunteer. He was pretty entertaining.

All in all, Petrified Forest was well worth a visit. When we left, Keali mentioned that it was her favorite of the parks so far due to the crazy changes in landscapes around every corner. The badlands to the cliffs, the reds to the whites, and all the layers of deposited rock as seen in the Grand Canyon made it interesting. The abundance of petrified wood was fun to learn about. (See Keali’s blog if you are interested in what causes the wood to petrify.) This park is a “must see”.

Tucson’s Many Activities

Tucson had so many opportunities to learn. We barely had time to squeeze in the top activities.

We made it to the Pima Air and Space Museum which was pretty fascinating. We knew to buy the tickets for the tram around the boneyard when we arrived.

I’m so glad we did! We rode a two car tram for about an hour while we toured acre upon acre of various planes. We saw the first nuclear bomb carrier, the Glass Eye (a 24 hour-in-the-sky plane staffed with generals during the Cold War), an early Air Force One, and countless other notable planes and helicopters. The retired Air Force pilot that served as the docent was a great source of information.

I’m sure Caden would say the highlight of the visit though was getting to fly a F-15 similator. (To be fair, he shot down all the Russians jets attempting to blow him up. The ex-pilot who ran the similator was impressed. I guess video games are good for something.)

Once Scott made it back, we hit a few other highlights. A couple of months prior, we had been to the McDonald Observatory. The University of Arizona is really the only place that makes the large mirrors for the huge telescopes. In fact, they are also making the mirrors for the Giant Magellan Telescope. Since we all loved Chile (but hadn’t made it to the Aticama Desert) and all loved our McDonald Observatory visit, we decided to tour where and how the huge mirrors are created. Informative and fun, I think we all were made to appreciate exactly how much glass, work, and time goes into making even a single mirror.

The kids learning about just one of the Giant Magellan Mirrors being created.

It’ll be  another couple of years before they complete the remaining mirrors for the Giant Magellan Telescope. We hope to go down and see it in the 2020s given the opportunity.

Scott had learned that the Biosphere 2 was also located in Tucson.

The tour in that place was incredible as well. It’s hard to not be impressed with seeing virtually the five main biomes of Earth in a single place. Knowing that it was man-made and that scientists lived there completely enclosed for as long as they did made us all appreciate how much science went into the place. University of Arizona has taken over the stewardship of Biosphere 2. I think when the kids saw how involved in science and space-exploration the university is, it suddenly became an interesting place to consider as an option in their future.

A real boojum tree inside the biosphere!

We spent a couple of other days in Tucson gearing up with some Target runs, hanging out at the pool, and goofing off. One afternoon the kids went to an organized scavenger hunt in the RV park, but no one else showed up. The organizer agreed to let them paint pottery and then use the face paint as well. The kids made the deal that they would color each other’s faces, not tell what they were coloring, and that neither could wipe off the paint until bedtime. I was impressed that they stuck to their guns once I saw the end result.

Caden colored Keali’s face first, obviously. She made him “into a princess”.

One other extremely interesting thing we did was go to the Titan Missile Museum.

This is the only site remaining in the area of missile silos that were destroyed when Reagan negotiated with Russia (USSR? Soviet Union? I get the time of each confused.) We were able to actually go down into the silo and see the command center. Again, we lucked out with our docent. He was a retired military guy who actually had active duty in the silos for three years. He was incredibly insightful and knowledgable. The key take away from the visit was that if there was to be a nuclear attack, the silo was a great place to be holed up in.

I was picked to do a mock-launch of the nuclear missile. He didn’t know he picked the only pacifist in the room…

With Caden’s help, we mock-ended the world. My reward was this key.

We ended up extending our Tucson stay by two nights due to high winds north of Phoenix. Our last night there, the small trash bin outside of our front door caught fire after some very dead (but evidently not all the way dead ashes) lit up some styrofoam. Fortunately we were leaving the next morning so Scott was going in and out of the RV putting things away. After only being indoors for about five or ten minutes, he walked out to flames almost as tall as him. Two fire extinguishers and a water hose later, we were able to extinguish the fire. Some trim on the RV was melted and the trash bin was no longer recognizable, but we were all safe. Thank goodness we had purchased two new fire extinguishers just a couple of days earlier.

Where the bin sat is visible as is the melted trim. Just inside that slide is the propane-run refrigerator. Lucky is an understatement.

The only activity we wanted to do in Tucson that we weren’t able to do was to go to the Mt Lemmon Observatory for night-sky viewing. Unfortunately some weird weather going through the area made the temperatures below freezing in the evening. Unprotected and with only warm weather clothes, we had to bail out of the stargazing. I hope to do it next time we are in the area.

And the next day we were off to northern Arizona.