#usa roadtrip

The first two days at Big Sur have been amazing. The morning fog washed away by the afternoon and Jess and I took a trail down the cliff and made our way to the water. We rock scrambled our way up and down and explored the coastline for a few hours. After we got some lunch in our stomachs, we headed to Pfeiffer beach for a few hours which is a cool sandy beach spot ( 10$ - ouch.) Today we will be exploring a few waterfalls and taking a couple of trails within our campground (Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park). The trails lead you through the big beautiful alluring coastline redwoods. The redwoods are unlike anything I have ever seen and truly make you feel pint sized. With the morning fog and the large redwoods rising up hundreds of feet surrounding you, it truly feels as if you are in a dreamland. 

The Pacific Coast Highway truly is America’s most beautiful scenic highway. The winding road along the cliff face overlooking the lightly colored greenish blue ocean is surreal. The landscape is so charming and I can safely say Big Sur has me lured in. The only downfall I see and I must write this because it really is unfortunate. I pulled up to a gas station yesterday at the price was 6.77$ a gallon! That’s highway robbery, no pun intended. French toast at a local restaurant that Jess and I went to check out was 19$! I understand raising prices because of the touristy area, but the prices here are absolutely disgusting. I don’t mind paying for good food and I never complain about gas prices, but that is ridiculous. Otherwise the natural beauty certainly makes up for any downfall. 

Tomorrow we head to Yosemite National Park, I am so excited.

The Grand Canyon is unreal. It’s feels as if you are staring at a painting or a backdrop for a John Wayne movie.

Jess and I visited the South Rim. I really would have liked to to gone to the North Rim just to avoid the Disney World crowd like madness. Our trip was originally planned for coming up from southern Arizona so the South Rim made sense. Due to the fires in the Coconino area and our reservations being cancelled our trip changed last minute and was rerouted.

After setting up camp we headed to the visitor center to attend to our ritual, postcards and a sticker. The visitor center had to have thousands of people there, total madness. The stress levels started to rise. After coming from Bryce and Arches, the crowds just were too much to handle.

Luckily Jess and I read up on a few cool hikes to beautiful views of the South Rim away from the overwhelming crowds. We headed to the first hike’s trailhead, two other cars in the small parking lot was a great sign. We headed down the trail excited to get “our” views of the Grand Canyon. The Grand Canyon is a very spiritual place, I didn’t want that compromised because of the stampede like crowd of tourists. So two cars in the parking lot was an exciting view. The trail was only a little over a mile each way, cake. Coming around the last bend was more than we could have asked for. A ledge that ultimately sticks out into the canyon, I saw Jess’s face light up. After spending hours that only seemed like a mere five minutes we headed back to camp.

This morning we woke up with a family of Elk in our campsite. Grazing the grass and paying no mind to Jess and I’s excitement. We hung out with the elk as one while we ate our egg white burritos. The smile wouldn’t leave my face, waking up with Elk 50 feet from us is what it’s all about.

This morning we are headed to a few more view points including Desert View which I am pretty excited about. I definitely would like to come back to the Grand Canyon and hike down into the canyon. Unfortunately when I booked the sites, all the backcountry permits for camping were booked up. Always next time. Now we are headed
back into the magical state of Utah to experience Zion National Park. We only have two nights there. We will be nonstop, fitting in as much as we can. We can always sleep this fall when we head back east.

On the road to Zion…