We left Moab behind and began our drive through the pretty sparsely populated SE corner of Utah. First stop, Monument Valley! You feel sooooo out in the middle of nowhere that you feel like you can get away with doing all kinds of stupid crap in the middle of a highway road. 🤣 There really aren’t too many people around to make fun of us, so why not?
At first, we acted like adults and took a responsible picture in a small portion of the road.
Since there were only about two cars that could be seen 10 miles in either direction, we got a little goofy and Chris had to reenact THE SCENE… “from that day on, if I was going somewhere, I was run-ning.” – Chris Mather (and Forrest Gump). Despite Chris needing a haircut, he wasn’t quite scraggly enough to pull off an exact replica of the scene.
Hannah became the newest, most popular human sundial in remote Utah.
Talk about desolate. Our prayer is always for no mechanical issues in this part of the drive. No cell signal for hours and definitely no AAA help out here.
Check out this weird old elevator!
Ann remembered this from our last time through the area. She couldn’t get a pic fast enough last time but had the camera ready this time and still almost didn’t get it!
Turns out, it is NOT a house with a really deep and spacious, but quite inconveniently arranged basement. It is just a grain elevator with augers and stuff housed up above.
Still kinda neat though. You could make one tower the mega outhouse.🤢 Never mind. Bad idea lol
It was a calm, easy day through the mountains and valleys. It still kinda feels like we are driving around on the surface of Mars out here.
We made it to Page, AZ without issue and with plenty of daylight left to setup camp and check out the little campground!
The kids decided to surprise Ann for her birthday by asking her to make lemon bars and then presenting them back to her while singing Happy Birthday as off key as we possibly could! Mather family tradition. Ann loved it (I DID truly love it! I don’t typically get to celebrate my birthday with the kids anymore, which made it so much more special 😍).
The next morning, it was off to the Upper Antelope Canyon to tour the slot canyons!
Plus, there was a pressed penny machine there as well! Score!
The tour operators have this stuff down to a science. They sequence when tour groups can be lead through the canyons, and they do a fantastic job of stoping very frequently for great photos! Our guide even had a few extra minutes, so he took us through a little slot canyon off to the side while we waited for the groups ahead of us to make their way through.
We start every hike with a “Last Known Location” photo. Probably won’t do anyone any good since I take my phone with me, but it’s a good reason to get everyone to pause for a photo before plunging in.
Brace yourselves, I don’t have a lot of comments for these upcoming photos, and there are quite a few pics. We love going through these canyons!
Hannah, Tomb Raider
Sand was continually and gently cascading down from the top of the canyon 100 feet above us to the floor below. This man in our tour group, who was from Holland, was getting an eye-full of sand, but I bet he got a spectacular photo!
When it rains in the area, it often causes floods to rush through these narrow canyons. Water can quickly reach 30+ feet in depth in these canyons, so whenever it is raining anywhere around here, the canyons need to be kept clear.
When the floods do wash through, the water moves very quickly and very turbulently through these canyons. The water swirls and creates whirlpools in its rush to get downhill, which causes the swirls in the sandstone walls. So, what you are seeing here is the effect of water and wind whipping through these canyons over God knows how long, at least three weeks. 😅 Maybe more.
Below is what the tour guide called the Dragon’s eye.
I call it the $50 tip photo because that’s what it got him.
Our guide, Ricky, showed us a stock photo of a dragon eye on his phone and then asked for my phone, fiddled with my photo settings a little, took this photo, placed my phone next to his of the dragon eye and bam, I was absolutely floored.
We made it through the slot canyons and back to the camper, where it was still pretty hot and windy.
We decided to go check out a few of the local attractions, so off we went to Horseshoe Bend State Park!
This one is a bit of a sad story…the last time we came though Page, in 2023, right after Ben retired from Parker, we brought our mini dachshund, Pepper on our road trip because she would have been lost without Ann.
We took Pepper with us on this short hike down to Horseshoe Bend. She bark bark bark bark barked at every single person all the way down to this very rock, where we lovingly placed her on the rock in a semi time out. We took her photo and then got her back on solid ground so she could keep barking.
Pepper sadly passed away in March of 2025, so we could not bring her with us on this trip, but we said hi to the spot where she observed the rest of the park and where she continued hating everyone in it.
This was another high altitude park, and we were, once again, internally saying “get away from the edge. Get away from the edge. Ugh!”
Our last hiking stop on our whirlwind trip was to a neat little sand cave positioned conveniently behind the shell station, right in Page (not only a gas station but they have fresh jerky too!). A quick “last known location” us-ie, a quick hike up the shifting sands to the cave, and that was the last of the group hikes on this trip!
Back to the campground once again, where Chris and Maya quickly scrambled up the hill behind the campground and then texted the rest of the gang to say, look up! There they were at the top! I still hadn’t taken my boots off!
We are having a wonderful steak dinner for Ann’s birthday tonight, with steaks cooked by none other than the best steak cooker in our family, Ann herself! Back to Vegas in the morning! It’s so hard to believe that our days with Hannah, Chris and Maya are almost done!
TaterTotTales 