Arizona (part 1)

“We need the tonic of wildness...At the same time that we are earnest to explore and learn all things, we require that all things be mysterious and unexplorable, that land and sea be indefinitely wild, unsurveyed and unfathomed by us because unfathomable. We can never have enough of nature.” 

― Henry David Thoreau, Walden: Or, Life in the Woods

We went to visit this lovely lady a couple of weekends ago.

She is working on the Navajo Indian reservation in Arizona. When we started this adventure we each had our own little bucket list. Brent and my list were a little more on the adult emotional side of what we dream about for our family. Mattie really wanted to see volcanoes and dinosaurs. All Zadie wanted was to see Indians. I am pretty sure she had this picture in her mind of beaded head dresses and spears and nothing we said was going to change that image. Going to the reservation was the easiest way to check off her bucket list and to finally convince her that Indians are average joes just like us! :) Plus, we got to hang with someone we adore which totally helped all of us with our homesick blues.

I was so excited to see my friend that i didn't think to much about what we would do when we got to Arizona. She said we were going to go on a really cool hike and she was not lying!

 When we drove up to this place I had NO IDEA what to expect.

The visitor's center was pretty sweet. They had two Indian structures that you could look at and walk inside which the girls loved. One is still used for religious ceremonies on the reservation.

And we saw so many of these structures, hogans, on the reservation. They are the traditional Navajo Indian dwelling. 

Driving to the canyon was really strange. It is hard for me to wrap my brain around the fact that this beautiful places are in the middle of this little nondescript town. 

We got out of our car and started to walk down a path and we were met with the most gorgeous view. We were standing on dirt and stone but staring down into a lush beautiful valley. It was a surreal experience, far more stunning than these pictures show.

We started our trek to the bottom of the canyon walking on cool stone steps, stumbling through dark tunnels, and hiding in little caves along the way. The hike was around 3 miles round trip and Zadie did the whole thing! That may not sound that hard but you have to factor in that the end of the hike is straight up out of the canyon. I was hurting so I know her little legs had to be so tired too! Mattie crashed in the ergo on Brent's back. She has gotten really good about taking little power naps on our hikes and waking up ready to go conquer the world again!

The bottom of the canyon was like.... WOW! It was green even though the river was completely dried up. It was so crazy to look up and see these huge stone walls climbing to the sky. It was a breathtaking view.

We had several people on the hike confuse Candice for the girl's mom. We were cracking up. I didn't blame them, my blond babies do look like they could come from her!

Can you see the cat face???

There were really cool ruins built into the side of the canyon walls and on the canyon floor called the White House Ruins. They are said to have been occupied between 1040 and 1275 AD. I felt like I was in one of my old History text books. We were all dying to walk around the ruins in the nook on the wall. I wonder what is would have felt like to live and raise my kids so high off the ground... talk about upping the stress factors!

We also visited Spider Rock while we were in the area. Cool fact, part of the new Lone Ranger movie was filmed in Canyon de Chelly and Spider Rock. I haven't seen it yet but now I am going to have to make it happen!

We are going to have to add binoculars to the girls' Christmas list this year. They were in love with Candice's pair!

The views were so incredible that I feel like my brain had a hard time processing it all. Everything we looked at was so vast, the sky, the canyon, the rocks... It was hard to take everything in. But I would not say it was overwhelming. It was grounding in the way that it makes it impossible not realize what a tiny part we are in the intricate system of our world. It is good to be reminded how ancient our planet is and how we, as humans, are just one stage of the earth's long life. It makes you want to take yourself less serious, which is always a good thing in my book! 

We were going to stick around the reservation and explore the next day, but we didn't realize the Navajo nation is over 27 thousand miles big. That would have taken us a little longer than a day... ;) So we explored some Navajo trading posts and we headed to the Painted Desert and the Petrified Forest. The pictures from that adventure are coming your way soon! Until then, we are sending you guys all our love.

The Browns <3