On the second week of April we headed out to Arizona for spring break. We landed in Phoenix and then headed to Tucson, where Quinn is living. When we arrived and it was 96°, but a dry 96! Ha! We rented an Airbnb in a neighborhood called the Catalina Foothills with a pool. The house was beautiful – maybe the nicest Airbnb we’ve stayed in. And the neighborhood was also amazing. Very southwest looking houses surrounded by beautiful mountains.

On our first full day there, we did a two-hour horseback ride through the desert. We had a guide who led us and educated us about every possible cactus and plant in the desert. It was fun and very informative and our butts hurt for two days after.

After horseback riding we had lunch at a taco bar (the first of many) on the side of the road and then went to Segura National Park for a hike. It was beautiful and we were able to identify all of the cacti that we saw thanks to a guy that morning.

The next day we went to the Desert Museum, which is a museum all outside. They have all of the animals that live in the desert in their own enclosures so you can see them. We saw a mountain lion, javelinas, coyote, and a lot of different snakes and spiders, including an actual rattlesnake on a pathway that Sophie nearly stepped on. It was terrifying. It rattled its tail and slithered away quickly, thank goodness.

That afternoon we went to the colossal Cave, which is true to name, a huge cave that has not been fully explored yet. There had been electricity installed years ago, but a recent flood knocked it out, so we were given camping lanterns to walk around with.

The next day we left Tuscon and made a pit stop in Scottsdale where we met up with one of Dave’s former clients, Suzanna, who lives there. We rented bikes and explored the downtown. We of course had lunch at a taco bar (where else?) and then spent the afternoon at a beautiful botanical garden.

The botanical garden had a glass exhibit, so throughout the gardens were these amazing glass sculptures. The weather was amazing the entire day and the gardens were beautiful. It was one of my favorites things we did during the trip.

That afternoon we left Scottsdale and drove to Pine, which was about a two hour drive. About half way through the drive we stopped seeing cactuses and started seeing pine trees. It was wild – like an entirely different state. We rented another Airbnb there that looked a lot like a ski lodge – a big A frame with huge windows looking out at the mountains. It was also much colder – down in the 30s at night. Quite a change.

The town of Pine was very small, with just a few restaurants, some shops and a grocery store. There were also Elk just walking around. When we stopped into the grocery store to grab some food to make dinner that night they were just hanging out in the parking lot. The grocery store clerk gave us an apple to feed them on the way out, so they definitely knew what they were doing.

The next day we did three hikes. The first was a little disappointing – not a lot to see, mostly flat surface, the the “lake” we were hiking to ended up being just a small pond. After that, we followed signs to another trail head and that hike was much better, through the woods but also very steep. There was a fair amount of complaining involved with this one – from one child in particular who will remain anonymous.

After that hike we went to lunch at the Creekside tavern, which was a cute log cabin building situated along a creek and part of a campground.

After refueling, we headed to Tonto Natural Bridge State Park where we did a combo hike down to the water / rock scramble. It was one of the most challenging hikes I’ve ever done – and the kids loved it! As long as there are obstacles to traverse and decisions to be made about which direction to go – they’re all about it. It took us about an hour to get from the top to the bottom, and was totally worth it. The natural bridge was above us and the pool of water underneath was beautiful. It’s hard to capture in pictures the true experience.

We also saw some cool animals including Javelina, White-Nosed Coati and even a tarantula!

The next day we were up bright and early and headed to Sonoma, which was about 90 minutes away. It was very cool driving along and suddenly seeing the red rocks start to pop up in the landscape. They’re breathtaking. Once we got to the national park it was super crowded – and hard to find parking spot. But once we did, we looked at all of the red rocks and decided which one to climb. We decided to try Bell Rock, which looked challenging, but also like we could get pretty close to the top. Both were correct. The girls enjoyed it because there was a fair amount of rock scrambling. Once we made it pretty far up the views were just incredible. It’s hard to capture it in pictures.

We spent about 2 hours climbing and enjoying the views and then headed into the town of Sonoma for lunch. This was probably the least favorite part of our trip. It was incredibly touristy. We sat in so much traffic and it was hard to find a parking space. And after all of that, our lunch was mediocre. We did have some pretty excellent homemade ice-cream at a little bakery afterward, which made us feel a lot better 😉

That evening Quinn joined us again and we ate dinner at the house and all slept like logs.

The next morning we were up early and headed to the Grand Canyon, which was about 2 hours away. I drove with Quinn because she was going to leave directly from there, and the girls went with Dave in the truck.

Our first stop was Grand Canyon helicopter tours. It was just the five of us and a pilot and we went for an hour-long ride over the canyon. It was wild. They gave us headphones that played music to coincide with the trip, which was a nice touch. Again, something that’s really hard to capture in pictures.

After we got back, we drove into Grand Canyon National Park where we had lunch at a little café restaurant and hit the enormous gift shop before heading to the Canyon. We walked for a while around the rim and then did a hike down into the Canyon. It was a crazy switchback pathway all the way down. We decided to walk for about 45 minutes down, knowing that coming back up was going to be about double that. It was very cool to hike down into it and we were right – coming back up with tough. But very worth it.

That afternoon we parted ways with Quinn and headed back to Pine, where we had our last dinner at a little wood fired pizza restaurant that was delicious.

The next morning we packed up and headed back to Phoenix to fly out.

This was definitely one of my favorite vacations. It was a packed week and hard to believe we did it all in just one state. I also loved the opportunity to hang out with Quinn for almost the whole week. I’m already thinking about when we can get back there!