Category: Travel

Planning Another Family Trip to Arizona, Nevada and Utah!

If you follow along with our family travel adventures, you may remember when we went on a fabulous spring trip to Arizona, Nevada and Utah in April 2023. If you need a cheat sheet, once we returned from our vacation I broke the trip into bite sized posts:

Well, we loved the trip and the convenience of having Kanab as a home base, that we decided to go again! Which means I’m in full-on planning mode to determine what we want to re-visit in a different season, what we want to add to our list, and what we want to skip this time.

Here’s our current plan:

Day 1: Fly to Vegas.

Our evening flight into Vegas worked out so well that we decided to do it again. We will land in Nevada around late in the evening and take an Uber straight to our hotel. Last time, we stayed at the Excalibur Hotel & Casino right on the Vegas strip because it was incredibly cheap and looked ridiculous. However, it was a little icky, so this time we picked a different hotel. This time we will be checking out the Downtowner Boutique Hotel, which looks kitschy and adorable, is reasonably priced, AND has great reviews.  

Day 2: Vegas to Kanab, UT

Much like our last trip, we will check out of our hotel, find breakfast somewhere and pick up our rental car. However, this time we will also plan to pick up a lunch somewhere to take with us out of town. We plan to drive through the Lake Mead area (again) and stop at the Valley of Fire State Park (again), but this time we will be prepared with lunch so we don’t get hangry!

We absolutely LOVED Valley of Fire last time, so we are planning to spend more time exploring and doing some of the hikes in that area (on a full stomach!). From there, we will continue to Kanab to check into the house we rented for the week. We still need to figure out:

  • Where to eat breakfast in Vegas.
  • Where to pick up lunch to go in Vegas or on our way out of town.
  • Which hikes to do in Valley of Fire State Park.

Day 3: Explore

We have the full day open, so we need to decide which area we will be exploring. Some contenders for this day:

  • Coral Pink Sand Dunes – you can rent a sand sled for a half-day, which sounds pretty fun!
  • Johnson Canyon Road – located only 9.5 miles east of Kanab and gives you great views of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. Lots of sightseeing on the drive and also hikes you can do at scenic overlook points.

Day 4: Explore

Another full day open to explore, so we need to nail down where we want to see. Some contenders for this day:

  • Zion National Park – we went on our last trip and loved it. We may rent e-bikes again (depending on weather) and do that again, this time hiking different trails.
  • Toadstool Hoodoos Trail – this one is pretty near where we are staying and has a 1.9 mile round-trip hike that looks easy and fun to do.

Day 5: Explore

Our last free day for exploring! Some contenders for this day:

  • Bryce Canyon Park – we went on our last trip and there was snow, so we were limited to the trails we were able to hike on. Determine if there is snow this year – if yes, do we want to revisit? If no, we will get the chance to do the hikes we missed.
  • Mossy Cave Trail – a really beautiful trail right outside Bryce Canyon Park
  • Cottonwood Canyon Road – a 46 mile each way scenic drive through the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument. This is a heavy driving option – it will take about 2 hours each way for this sightseeing drive. A few stops along the way include: Grosvenor Arch, and the Cottonwood Wash Narrows hike.

You may be asking why I don’t have Page or the Grand Canyon on this trip’s lists. Well, we visited Page, Glen Canyon, Horseshoe Bend and Antelope Canyon on our last trip. We loved it, but since we have less days to explore, we decided to leave that area off our list for this trip. As for the Grand Canyon, we could drive to the Northern Rim… however, it is quite far and there is a chance that there will already be snowfall. So, we are skipping that this time too.

Day 6: Kanab, UT to Vegas

This is our packing up and traveling back to Vegas day. We will pack up at our VRBO, check out, and make the around 3-hour drive back to Vegas. Once there, we will return our rental car and check into Caesar’s Palace for the evening. Which happens to be Thanksgiving. So, if you have any suggestions on where to get a good Thanksgiving dinner in Vegas, let me know! Depending on the weather, we may do some exploring and check out some of the casinos (I think Jack would love to see the gondolas at the Venetian).  We will probably also go to bed pretty early, since we have to wake up super early to catch our flight home.

Day 7: Fly Home

We have a super early flight, so we will take an Uber to the airport and may do a little dozing on the plane.

Our trip is a bit shorter this time (last time we had 9 days and this time just 7), so I’m sure it will fly by! If you have any recommendations for places we shouldn’t miss – whether it be food options, hikes, stores, views, or a place to eat a fabulous Thanksgiving dinner – let me know!

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Writing the Most Positive Negative Review

This past weekend, Travis and I celebrated our 16th wedding anniversary. Yay! We typically like to go away on a little trip, but this year money is (still) tight due to the port shutdown issues and Jack’s unexpected broken arm bills. So, we loaded up the SUV with our stuff, the kiddo, the doggo and drove three hours to 7 Springs Resort in Pennsylvania where we rented a condo through VRBO. Our goal was to enjoy some fall foliage, their “Autumnfest” event, and the condo’s fireplace and hot tub.

And I didn’t take ANY photos.

Which I guess means we were having a really good time. So that’s fine. Even though I did wear a super adorable outfit with my new-to-me cowboy boots. But anyways… to the point of this post. The condo was not great.

In fact, it became a running joke that everything was *just a little bit broken.*

The hot tub was amazing and fantastic. But one side of the bubbles was broken.

The main bathroom was fine with a good-sized shower. But the wallpaper was literally peeling off the walls.

There were stains on the carpet. There was a STAIN ON THE BEDSHEETS.

The kitchen was stocked with spices (so many spices) and coffee. But the trashcan hinge had fallen off so every time you opened it… yup, a little bit broken.

Like, just enough that it was kind of annoying. But, didn’t hinder us from having a good time.

EXCEPT for the main bedroom’s bed.

Oh. My. God. I have never slept on a more squeaky bed in my entire life. Also, it was really small (I’m thinking it might have been “full” sized). So, you add in Travis, me and Ollie and there was no room to roll over unless you carefully rolled in place.

But even then. SQUEAK.

It squeaked when I moved.

It squeaked when Ollie – an 11-pound dog that is barely bigger than a rabbit – moved.

It squeaked even harder when I laughed. With each squeak timed to each one of my giggles.

It SQUEAKED WHEN I RUBBED MY ITCHY NOSE.

It was hilarious. And squeaky. And on top of the squeaks, the bed was so incredibly uncomfortable that Travis decided to spend the second night on the couch. (Which is oh so romantic for our anniversary trip).

Which brings us to the review.

After each stay, VRBO asks you to write a review of the property. However, they also have the property owners write a review of you as a guest. Here’s the thing — I love VRBO and we use it often when we travel, so I don’t want to be reviewed as a problem guest. But, I also need to be honest about a property that was… lacking.

So, on our ride home, I decided to use ChatGPT to write up the review for me.

Here’s the prompt I gave it:

Write a positive review for a stay in a condo where the bed was so creaky we couldn’t sleep in it, wallpaper coming off walls and everything is a little bit broken. But good location and had a hot tub.

And here is what ChatGPT came up with:

We recently stayed at this condo and had a generally enjoyable experience, thanks to its fantastic location and the added bonus of a hot tub! The proximity to local attractions made it very convenient for exploring the area, and the hot tub was a great way to unwind after a long day.

While the bed was a bit creaky and could use an update, we made the best of it and still had a relaxing time. There were some minor maintenance issues, like wallpaper peeling in spots and a few things that seemed a little worn, but overall it didn’t detract too much from our stay. With a few updates, this place has a lot of potential.

All in all, we loved the location and amenities, and with a bit of TLC, this condo could be a real gem!

Yup. That works.

Also, on the bright side. We got home last night and our bed felt AMAZING.

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Summer Vibes

After a hectic start to our summer, this past weekend we tried to unplug a bit with an escape down to Ocean City. We basically played the whole thing by ear because we weren’t sure if Jack would still be in his arm cast, or if my husband would have opportunities to work. But we were able to get away for a long-weekend and it was very much needed.

We are planning to spend a little more time down at the beach in August, but the long weekend was just enough to keep us going for another month!

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