Five Months in Austin

After the Grand Canyon, we went to visit Peggy, Rich, Logan, and Torrin in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It was good to see them. We had not had a chance to visit since they were in Grenoble, about 7 years ago.

They live near the mountains. Peggy and Rich took us all up the mountain on the lift. Unfortunately, the clouds came down to the top of the mountain at the same time we arrived. We could see the ski area over by Santa Fe, and the valley in between, but not much else.

Peggy has arranged her house to feel both roomy and cozy at the same time. She had enough space for the seven of us. The boys did have to hand over their rooms while we were there. Logan seemed not to have slept so well the first night. He was exhausted during soccer practice the next day.

Diane traveled that day with a ribbon identifying her as a birthday girl. She did not get most of her presents until we returned here.

 

We learned this morning that most of Arizona does not use daylight savings time. We came close to showing up too early for breakfast at the hotel. (nous avons traverse trop de decalages horaires durant notre voyage a Grand Canyon, reculant regulierement d’une heure. Si bien que le matin de partir a Grand Canyon, nous avons failli nous enerver contre le serveur de l’hotel qui n’etait pas encore pret : en fait, nous avions de l’avance sur lui, il etait 6h30 !!)

Everyone wanted to get an early start to the Grand Canyon. Even Tim, who is getting pre-adolescently blasé about family outings, was pretty impressed when we pulled up to the first lookout and saw the monstrous hole in the ground.

Nathalie, Michel, and I took plenty of photos. No doubt none of them come close to doing justice to the natural phenomenon. To appreciate the size of the canyon, you must be looking into it, the cliffs and crags cut into the Colorado plateau taking up your entire visual field.

We spent the day on the southern rim, first on foot, then everyone but me taking the bus where we could not ride and park. I ended up starting down Bright Angel trail, billed as the most traveled of the descents down to the Colorado river. Plenty of serious hikers were coming back up. The cool, windy, even slightly rainy weather was good for walking, but I did not want to take too much time.

The suggestion was to plan twice as long to climb back up as you spend walking down. So I strolled down until I could feel it in my shins, about half an hour. Then I started back up. In the end, I was back up in only about half an hour. It felt good to walk quickly, as we have spent two days cooped in the car.

If we ever get back, I would like to try the 6-9 hour hike. In only half an hour, I never made it to the more interesting layers of rock. Other hikers were coming back up with red dust over their shoes and socks. I only have limestone dust to show for my walk.

J’espere que vous aurez compris ce que Mark racontait… En fait, c’etait vraiment impressionnant, comme si on avait une image grandeur reelle devant les yeux, une toile peinte qu’on a du mal a imaginer vraie.Difficile de decrire ce que l’on voit ou ressent face a cela, si ce n’est qu’on est tres petits et tres jeunes ! Il vaut mieux aussi eviter cet endroit aux personnes ayant peur du vide ou accompagnees de petits explorateurs energiques (n’est ce pas Mick et Jeanne ??) car peu de chemin sont balises le long de la falaise , sauf ceux evidemment ou on se presse tous avec nos appareils photos. A part cela , les gardiens ont beaucoup fait pour laisser l’environnement a son etat naturel ou presque , tout en le rendant securise. Et le resultat fait que l’on a l’impression d’etre dans la nature, meme avec beaucoup de touristes et l’infrastructure qui va avec.
Nous avons eu de la chance, le temps etait agreable, suffisamment beau pour profiter du paysage et ne pas etre brules. Et il n’y avait pas beaucoup de touristes…l’ete, ca doit etre l’enfer, par la temperature et la frequentation : nos amis, Peggy et Rich , ont essaye debut mai de reserver une randonnee dans le Grand Canyon (de 6-9 heures de descente et nuit en bas, puis remontee) pour mai 2008, et c’etait deja complet ! ils leur ont conseille de rappeler a 7h le 1er juin, mais pas plus tard, car deux heures apres, en general, c’est complet pour le mois !

Early this morning before dawn, Tim and I were awake. After a couple of walks, we went up to the top balcony and looked over into Juarez.

Later on, we drove out of El Paso during the morning rush hour. The mountains around there are relatively dry.

As the morning wore on, we went from dry to arid, crossing New Mexico on Interstate 10. We stopped at one of those places that sells everything from fountains with built in smoke machines, to stuffed armadillos wearing sheriff outfits, to huge packs of fireworks, to jalapeño peanuts. The children could not make up their minds.

In southern Arizona, the temperature climbed to 99 F, not quite making it to 100. Tucson was busy when we stopped for a late lunch. Phoenix was traffic jammed at 3:30 p.m. local time.

On the way to Flagstaff, we went through a few sprinkles as the cacti and desert gave way to pine covered hills. The temperature dropped to 60 F. Here in Flagstaff, it was 70 F when we got out of the car.

Tonight we did our first all you can eat restaurant. Tim and Emma were pretty happy with all you can eat soft serve vanilla cones. Diane only had enough room left over for one.

Today we drove from Austin to El Paso. Google Maps gets it about right. Without portable DVD players for the children and a selection of DVDs thanks to our friends, it might have been a tough day. With a couple of movie interruptions, high doses of candy, cookies, and soft drinks, things went relatively smoothly.

The speed limit on US 10 in rural west Texas is currently 80 m.p.h. for cars. Even that seems a bit slow, though. There’s lots of open space in west Texas.

We saw a some interesting things from the high seats of our rented Ford Expedition. The aftermath of a hailstorm, rocky hills that appeared bigger from afar than up close, many oil derricks, windmills which seemed to be there to power the derricks, heavy rain and rushing muddy water almost up to the highway, flooded streets and plains, a smashed up semi truck that had overturned in the median, a small, out of the way town Nathalie was glad she does not call home, lots of bikers without helmets or much protection, truck stops in what seemed to be the middle of nowhere.

Michel filmed some of the wide open space. He also tried filming the back seat, in particular three small children with headphones, absorbed in the glow of 7″ LCD screens.

They are all glad to be in the pool now. Nathalie went down to the front desk to ask about pool towels. She had hardly opened the door when the man at the front desk asked her, “Pool towels?”

There nothing more obvious than three kids in bathing suits.

Pourquoi avoir dans la maison toutes les tailles de TV possibles, de l’ecran geant a la taille reglementaire si pour finir, un tout petit ecran de lecteur DVD portable est suffisant pour trois enfants, et qui , exceptionnellement, ne se battent pas !

On est alles voir Philip , le copain d’a cote jouer au base-ball samedi dernier, et apres une 1/2 heure, on a abandonne ! malgre l’aide et les explications d’Andrea et de Megan, on ne comprenait rien de rien …et c’etait long…moi qui ais deja du mal a suivre une finale mondiale de foot ou la France nous donne (a son desespoir) du spectacle !

A cette epoque de l’annee, c’est, il me semble , le meilleur moment de visiter cette “ferme”, qui nous laisse cueuillir des citrouilles en automne, des tomates en juin, des pommes de terre en mai, des mures en juin, mais surtout en ce moment des fraises ! On s’en est donne a coeur joie (meme Mark qui avait trouve des excuses pour ne pas venir les ramasser, mais n’a pas ete en reste pour les devorer !) Resultat, on est revenus avec 10 pounds (5 kg) de fraises dans les paniers, quelques unes dans l’estomac pour Tim, Emma et moi, et probablement un kg dans celui de Diane, qui n’arrivait pas a se resoudre de les mettre dans le panier ! elles n’etaient jamais assez belles pour les ramener a la maison ! Autre performance, 24 heures apres, il n’en restait plus qu’un seul panier ! fraises a tous les repas !

Toute famille qui se respecte et qui passe le printemps au Texas se doit de faire une photo des enfants dans les Blueblonnets. Heureusement que cela fait plus d’un mois qu’ils sont fleuris et qu’ils le sont encore car je viens seulement de faire LA photo !

Mardi avait lieu la sortie de fin d’annee d’Emma dans un grand parc de fleurs sauvages du texas qui est actuellement magnifique, car c’est la parfaite periode de floraison. Malheureusement, ca a ete le seul jour “pourri” de la semaine et le voyage n’a pas ete annule nous nous sommes retrouves coinces a l’interieur pour observer les fleurs, alors que le parc semble meveilleux. Il FAUT absolument que j’y retourne avant la fin des fleurs…

Dimanche dernier, tout le monde semblait avoir trouve son occupation : Mark a tondre le gazon et se reposer avec des bouquins, Emma avait ete invitee a un anniversaire d’une copine de classe dans un parc aquatique pas tres loin et Tim avait invite son copain Ben a passer la journee ici. Au programme des garcons, foot avec Philip, cabane chez Philip toujours, BBQ a la maison, et Tim m’a finalement convaincue de l’emmener a la peche dans la riviere en bas du lotissement : ils sont malheureusement revenus bredouilles mais contents, malgre leur grande patience, le “traffic” des jet-skis et des skis nautiques avait eu raison des poissons !
Ca n’etait pas perdu pour tout le monde, Diane et moi avons donc fait la sieste a l’ombre avec un livre pour moi et pour Diane, une seance de yoga.