Day 57, 13th October 2011. Monument Valley - Grand Canyon, Arizona

The alarm went off really early this morning, as we had to be ready to leave by 6.30am, so we could go and watch the sunrise. We were of course asleep in the van, and I think we were the first ones up. Me and Kirsty walked to the toilet and then got all our stuff ready for the day. It was horrible not having any running water so we couldn't even brush our teeth. We had hand sanitizer to be clean, but because it was so dusty it felt like there was a layer of dirt on everything. 

At 6.30am, Jordan picked us up and drove us to the spot where we would be watching the sunrise, it was so beautiful. It was definitely the best time of day to see Monument Valley, even if it was really cold!

The moon was still up

Gary, being Gary, decided it was a good idea to climb up this huge rock called a 'Mesa'. I was so worried about him because he climbed up so high, I could hardly see him.. in this photo he is still climbing... if you can spot him!

Gary stayed up there the entire time, so I had to keep worrying about him in case he fell. Luckily he didn't but I was glad when he got down. We then went to have some breakfast, the Navajo's had got some breakfast laid out for us which was so nice, and there were grapes! I was so excited about the grapes, we hadn't eaten any since we were in California, I don't know why, but I was so happy to have them, I ate loads. Thanks Navajo's!

Jordan then drove us back to the entrance of Monument Valley and we went straight to the gift shop to firstly use the running water in the bathrooms, and secondly spend as much money as we would in the store. We were always trying to be careful with money while we were there, but now I'm home I wish I'd have bought more stuff. 

We stopped a few times on our drive back to the entrance to take some more photos. Monument Valley definitely looked better in the morning light than in the evening.

On the way out of Monument Valley, we stopped at a navajo jewellry stand on the side of the road and spent some money there. It was all traditionally hand made by the navajo people and they had so much nice stuff. I got a bracelet and Leah bought me some earrings as a late birthday present. It is really nice stuff and I still wear it now.

When we got in the van, I charged my phone, and we started driving into Arizona. We stopped for lunch at a place called Cameron Trading Post, and there were loads of shops there. After we had eaten we had about an hour to explore so we all did some more shopping. I only bought a few little things including some dreamcatchers and a cute little purse. Gary said I had spent too much money (I only spent about $30) and thought that he deserved to buy an iPad because I'd spent so much... 

After a few more hours of driving we reached the Grand Canyon. Mark drove us to a viewpoint area and made us close our eyes when we got out of the van, so that we didn't see it gradually, and we could just open our eyes and see it all at once. I was a bit dubious at first, knowing Mark's track record I was worried someone would fall of the edge, but it was a really cool way to do it.

The Grand Canyon was of course amazing, but for some reason I wasn't as impressed with it as I was with Monument Valley. It was still beautiful though, and it was cool to see a place that is so famous worldwide. We spent about 45 minutes at the viewpoint taking photos and having a look around.

Then we drove to camp to set up. It took about half an hour to get there and it was late afternoon by the time we had set our tents up. Mark had decided we would have a picnic while watching the sun set tonight, so we wold have to leave camp before it got dark. I was stressing because I thought we only had half an hour before we had to leave and I wanted to have a shower, but then I realized that we had moved into a new time zone earlier today and we actually had an hour and a half. I don't know what I was doing when everyone else changed their watches, but I clearly missed the memo, haha.

It was so nice to have a shower after feeling so dirty from yesterday, the only annoying thing was that they were pay showers. A quarter a minute, I know it's not much, it was just annoying to have to try and find a load of quarters. This has just reminded me of the other reason I collected quarters. Early on in the trip I decided to collect pressed pennies (like the ones you get in Disney) where ever I could. I actually got loads of them, maybe I should count how many... I know, I'll do a blog post with them all when I finally finish the trip report. Anyway, I was always worrried that I would see one and not have any quarters or pennies for the machine, so I became a coin hoarder and wouldn't let Gary spend any and had a bag full of them. So I was sad to have to use my precious quarters on the showers. 

I had a bit of time to spare after and used the wifi at camp to look up Vegas wedding chapels. We didn't have time to really look into it properly so decided that tomorrow we would have a proper think about it and decide if we should do it. When we were all ready to go we went to Mather Point to watch the sunset. We took photos by the entrance sign on the way in... I'm totally annoyed with Gary for putting his legs like that over the sign.

The sunset was nice but really busy, but I suppose you have to expect that at the Grand Canyon. And the fact that the sun wasn't actually setting in the direction we were facing so we couldn't actually see the sun.

Mark laid out the food, and loads of tourists thought that it was like an official thing and they were asking if they could eat it too. It wasn't exactly dinner, more like a snack, so I was still hungry, as usual. We did have more grapes though, so basically all I are on this day was grapes.

Dinner with a view, it was cool to say that on this day we saw the sun rise in Monument Valley, and the sun set in the Grand Canyon.

Once the sun had set we went back to camp, stopping at a supermarket on the way to get some snacks and gatorade for our hike tomorrow. We were leaving really early so we had to have everything ready tonight.

When we got back to camp, it still felt quite early, so Gary asked around to see if anyone wanted to do anything tonight, and a few of us decided to go bowling. There was a hotel just around the corner from the campsite that had a bowling alley in it and we decided to go there a bit later on.

It was getting really cold, compared to how warm it had been earlier, so I went to get changed before we went out. The only good thing about it being a bit colder was that I got to wear some of the new clothes I had bought, my cute new jumper from Forever 21 and my new jeans too.

While I was changing, Gary spoke to Nick and Dean about us potentially getting married in Vegas and asked if they would come. They were really excited about it, and I called Leah into the tent to tell her about it too, she was shocked and was asking if I was really being serious, and said that she would of course love to come. We didn't want everyone to know what we were planning, so we both had agreed on inviting just 4 people. 

Kirsty had obviously been my best friend from the start and we had spent every single day with her so she was of course no.1 on the list. We also got along great with Leah and she had been so friendly and lovely to us, so that's why we decided on her. Nick and Dean were in the other tour group and they were Gary's best 'boy' friends on the trip as we only had one other guy in our group, Matt, but him and Gary didn't get to know each other that well. Since our first group had left us, Nick and Dean had always been really good friends with Gary even though he wasn't in their group, so of course those were the 2 boys he wanted to tell about the wedding.

We didn't end up going bowling until about 9.30pm. There was just 6 of us, me and Gary, Steph, Amelia, Nick and Dean. It was so cheap at only $4 a game, so we played 2 games. At one point everyone had gone to the bathroom or to get a drink, so it was just me, Nick and Dean, they told me how excited they were about the wedding, which I thought was so sweet. It made me feel really happy because we were going to be keeping it a secret for a while, so it was nice to have come enthusiasm from the people that did know. Of course we couldn't talk about it all night because Steph and Amelia didn't know.

Steph doing some bowling

Steph won the first game of bowling, and I came last (joint last with Nick) and Gary won the second game, in which I came last again. There was one really funny time where I just carelessly and gently rolled the ball because I was past caring about the game and got a strike... I think that was the only time I did well in the game.

We were all drinking and having fun, and during the second game, me, Steph and Amelia started having a good chat that we didn't really care about playing it any more. I have talked a lot on here about how me, Gary and Kirsty didn't really get a chance to get to know the people in our group very well, and this was the time that it really started to change. I talked to Steph and Amelia a lot about what had gone on and they told me their end of the story in regards to the person who had said bad things about us. It was really nice to chat to them and we all got to see how we had all had bad impressions of one another but now that had changed. They seemed to appreciate the fact that we didn't go straight to them and start bitching about a certain person, the same way that person had bitched about us to them.
We had a lot of fun and I was so glad that I was feeling way more a part of the group, I wish Kirsty would have been there too but she was really tired this night and had gone to bed early.

Me and Amelia

Boys being silly

When we were finished bowling, we had a drink in the bar, and Me, Gary, Amelia and Nick walked back to camp while Steph and Dean stayed in the bar. We had a really fun night and I'm so glad we did it. We got back to our tent at 12.30am and I had the worst night ever, it was SO cold. I had so may blankets and stuff but nothing seemed to make a difference, so I hardly slept.I was shivering all night, and the fact that I had been drinking means it made it harder for me to sleep too, so I felt like I was awake all night just being ridiculously cold. Not good when you have to get up at 5.30am the next morning.