Going for a Circle

I remember my Papa, whenever he would take a drive somewhere, he'd say he was "going for a circle".

Well, my friend Vanessa and I needed a "Get out of Dodge" Day.  We needed a girl's day.  I've been wanting to go home and check out the fire damage, so we loaded the babies up and took a Saturday to drive a circle.

It was a great day.  Lane and Cairo were awesome.  We had some fun pit stops along the way.

My whole childhood, whenever we drove through Holbrook, I wanted to stay at the Wigwam.  Oh come on, you know it looked fun!

Well, we didn't stay at the Wigwam (I'm still trying to convince John to swallow his pride and just take me there one of these weekends before we die), but we did stop and pet the dinosaurs...which really freaked Lane out.  He wanted nothing to do with them.  

And actually "petting" the dinosaurs is a bit of an exaggeration.  There were "DO NOT TOUCH!!" signs all over, and the very not so nice man who ran the "Rock Shop"  refused to take a group picture of us.  He must have been having a bad day.  Kind of a let down since I've been wanting to stop there for the last 20 years. 

So we continued on our circle, me a little disappointed. But my day was brightened when I ran into Mr. Jacobs at the Springerville Safeway!  This pic is for you Sarah and Bonnie!

And Safeway was much more exciting for the boys than the dinosaurs anyway.

I couldn't leave RV without showing Vanessa what the huge ball you could see from miles away was.  Oh, good ol' RV dome, when did they give you a paint job?  I kind of got used to the pink beach ball look.

Then there was the old house.  It looks so different without Daddy's trees.

Then we went to see the trees.  This is outside Greer.  It's really something you just have to see with your own eyes.  I was amazed by two things.  First, that the fire came right up to the edge of town.  I knew it had gotten into Greer, but I guess I just didn't realize how close to Eagar it got. 

The second, was despite all the damage and burn, the mountains are still so beautiful.  I love the White Mountains.  The smell, the feeling, the people.  I miss it.

Across the street from Molly Butler's:

We hung around Greer for a while enjoying the cool mountain air.

Then we headed for Payson to eat at the sooooo yummy Gerards Bistro.  Love it!  It was a great way to finish up our circle before we headed back over the hill. 

 

It was a super fun day, but we were ready to be home and out of the car by the end of it.  Besides, we were starting to miss the other guys.