Most people have probably heard of the Airplane Boneyard in the Arizona desert, a place where the US military keeps retired or damaged aircraft. I had seen it on TV or in pictures a number of times, but had never realized that it was open — or at least partially open — to the public. In fact, the tour is run by the Pima Air and Space Museum, which I think is even more interesting than the Boneyard itself! I…
Since I was heading back west to Tucson, I really couldn’t just drive by the turnoff to Tombstone without visiting it for a couple of hours. After all, this is where the shoot out at the OK Corral happened, where American childhood play of cowboys and Indians came from! Interestingly, Tombstone is still a thriving little town of just over 1,300 people, and the streets outside the old historic district have a decidedly modern feel to them. Ah, but the…
I’ve always been a bit curious about the early people that populated the Americas, from the first primitive peoples to the complex societies of the American Indians. So when I discovered that the Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument was not that far away, I took the opportunity to visit them. [Note: The correct pronunciation is “Hee-la.”] The dwellings are reached by a lovely drive though the mountains of western New Mexico, which turned out to be surprisingly cool and damp,…
When I discovered that, as beautiful as it was, I couldn’t get a more meaningful experience at the Grand Canyon in the time I had, and without some planning, I decided to put it on my ‘revisit’ list and rush off to something that I could experience in one day. In fact, I had to, it was only available for one day. The Trinity Site, the location where the first atomic bomb was tested at 5:30am on July 16, 1945,…
The Grand Canyon is probably the most iconic of all American road trip destinations, and it was certainly on my bucket list for this trip, but until I started approaching it, it never occurred to me to ask… which side do I go to? Well, because I’ve got all the time in the world at the moment, I decided to go to both! Since I was coming from Utah, the North Rim was first. The drive in was just beautiful,…