Spring Break trip NM & AZ

I grew up in the Southwest and had never been to see the sites!  For spring break in 2014 we took a trip to check it all out!  We spent 6 days doing a loop from our home in Utah, down through Arizona, across to New Mexico and then back to Utah through Colorado.  It was amazing!

Itinerary:

Day 1 - leave home and spend the night in Cedar City

Day 2 - St. George, Zion National Park & the Grand Canyon

Day 3 - Snowflake AZ & the Petrified Forest

Day 4 - Aztec Ruins National Monument

Day 5 - Mesa Verde & the Anasazi Heritage Center

Day 6 - Arches National Park & then back home

Zion National Park is beautiful!  We love driving through.  There are so many things to do in Zion NP like hikes and playing in the river.  My boys have had scout camp outs there and had a blast!   But this trip we only had time to drive though.















In St. George we stopped to see the temple.  The weather was beautiful in March and we loved walking around the grounds and visiting the Visitor's Center.

The Grand Canyon is quite a ways off the beaten path.  It's not really on your way to... anywhere!  Because of that, we'd never been to the Grand Canyon before.  We decided that if we were ever going to get there, we'd just have to make a point to get there!  It was amazing!  We only had a few hours to spend there and wished that we'd had a few days.  We drove through and got out to look a few times but weren't able to do any of the hiking that the Grand Canyon is famous for.

We took a short detour to stop by the Snowflake AZ temple.  It sits atop a hill and over looks the whole valley.  My great grandparents are buried in the cemetery in Snowflake so we enjoyed visiting the area where my grandpa grew up.

We loved our time in the Petrified Forest National Park!  It is a small space COVERED in huge pieces of petrified wood.  Petrified wood is ancient trees that have completely transitioned into stone.









Often on this trip the kids would ask, "where are we?"  And I would answer, "The middle of no where!"  Here's a picture of "the middle of no where!"

I grew up in the small town in northwestern New Mexico of Aztec.  Aztec got it's name from the ancient ruins that are there.  When they were first discovered, they were thought to be Aztec Indian ruins.  Later it was realized that they were actually Anasazi Indian ruins, but the town's name stuck.  The Aztec Ruins National Monument is a well kept secret.  The ruins are amazing and there is a fully reconstructed Great Kiva.  If you're ever in the area, this is not to be missed!

Mesa Verde National Park in in southwest Colorado.  We had never been to Mesa Verde before and once we got there, we wished we had gone years earlier!  Mesa Verde has nearly 5,000 known archaeological sites, including 600 cliff dwellings.  The most famous is the Spruce Tree House and we loved being able to walk right up to it and in and around it.

 Close to Mesa Verde in nearby Cortez CO is the Anasazi Heritage Center.  It brought all of the things we had seen in the ruins to life as we saw how the ancient Americans really lived.  We were able to weave cloth on a loom and grind corn with grinding stones.  We were also able to see what their villages and home would have looked like.  Well worth the few hours we were able to spend there.

Back in Utah, we stopped at the Monticello temple and walked around the grounds.

Arches National Park was our final stop on our spring break trip.  I think Arches is by far our favorite national park to go to and play.  There are dozens of hikes and dozens of arches to see.  We have only taken short hikes when we have been there, but there are hikes of all distances from beginner to advanced.  Our favorite is Sand Dune Arch.  It is a very short hike inside the rocks and it opens up to a huge sand pit.  My kids could stay and play in there all day!  Even on hot days, the sand is shaded and much cooler than the outside temperature.  The little ones sit down and play in the sand while the older kids hike further in and explore more arches.  We can't wait to get back to Arches NP!