Travels and thoughts

An old saying goes A family that prays together stays together, I like to modify it for my family and say, "A family that travels together grows together." My sister and I are the typical Air Force BRAT(s).. born, raised, and traveled. Ours was a house where we would need to find out which city would be our next stop. It was rare for us to stay in the same place for more than two years. Although this was cyclical, we felt it was one lifelong holiday. This nomadic life in our young days set the tone for our adult years.  The desire to travel, explore, and discover new places is deep-rooted with no end to satisfaction. This year, Europe was the desired destination for our family tour. However, with my Indian passport and apathy of VHS combined with the rejection rate of visas for Indians, we could not travel! Overcoming the initial disappointment, we started to look for places within driving distance in the USA. Sanchitram took the lead and came up with the plan to travel to Gr...

Welcome to one of the seven natural wonders of the world. Grand Canyon was on my list of priorities - somehow, despite expressed and unexpressed desires, it never came about despite numerous trips to the USA over the last ten years. However, not one to easily let go, I sounded out my kids - now full-blown adults - for a trip to GC over the July 4th weekend, 2019. To my happy surprise and a bit of astonishment, they undertook planning and arranging the trip. Grand Canyon is 277 miles (446 km) long, up to 18 miles (29 km) wide, and attains a depth of over a mile. Located in the northwest corner of Arizona, close to the borders of Utah and Nevada, it was carved by the Colorado River and its tributaries which cut through layers of rock while the Colorado Plateau was uplifted, over the centuries. Landing in Vegas a day before, we had a restful night and a hearty meal at 3 am at the Cosmopolitan before setting off on our road trip to North Rim. The five-hour Arizona road trip from Vegas to t...