Before the baby...

JR and Amber, who probably consider themselves the real babies of my brother's household, really enjoyed having extra people around to pay them attention.

A day at the Big Hole

No trip to Arizona can be complete without a trip to the Grand Canyon.  Of course, the day we went, it was chilly and rainy - what are the chances of being cold and wet in Arizona? (Higher up north, of course, than in the desert, where my brother lives).

Luckily, the sun came out later and warmed us up.

Perhaps the visibility wasn't quite as good as it might have been on a clear day, but it was still rather impressive.

Between the weather and having a small baby with us, we didn't do a lot of walking along the trails - mostly used the free shuttle buses and just got out and had a good look at some of the viewing points. Someday, it would be nice to go back, and spend more time there - stay overnight perhaps and try to go down into the Canyon itself.  But it was a nice introduction to this rather spectacular piece of geography.

Here's the Colorado River, a mile below us on the Canyon Floor. It looks tiny, but it's still hundreds of feet wide at many points.

We saw a bit of wildlife - Western Bluebird,

and some ravens, which seem to be all over the place. We also saw an elk, but only from the shuttle bus, so the photo is terrible!

I also enjoyed the flora - still quite scraggly and very different from home, but much more lush and green than down in Scottsdale.

Some of us perhaps didn't get that much out of the visit, but as she lives in Arizona, I'm sure she'll get another chance!

Dad & Mom enjoyed the Canyon, though - first road trip for Baby Elise!

A brief tour of Scottsdale and environs

We started out from my brother's house and took a wee drive around the local area, just to have a look at things like cacti and mountains and so on...

This palm is actually in a neighbour's garden.

The roads are all planted like this around where Steve lives.

We went out to the start of a trail up into the mountains - not to have a long walk, but just to check out the flora and fauna.

Teddy Bear Cactus

Prickly pear

A bit of cactus skeleton from a dead plant.

Barrel cactus with a blossom coming out.

Dessert rabbit trying to pretend he's actually part of the rock...

Little skink or something like that.

Sideways saguaro  not sure why it's sideways as I turned it before uploading it... will try to turn it again later.

Some partridge crossing the road - there were tons of them crossing the road in cute little families.

And then there was swimming...

A Day in DC

As our friends Rosy and Robert came down for the weekend from Boston, we had a nice tourist day in DC - Rosy is English and has never been to DC and Robert is from upstate New York, so although he has been here, it was an 8th grade field trip or similar.  So we all played tourist.  It was the same day as the memorial 50th anniversary March on Washington, but later in the day, so not quite so crowded.  This is the National Gallery, where my mother went during the day.

The weather was gorgeous. 

Other than my mother, we went to the Museum of the American Indian (she's been a couple of times recently, so decided to do something else, and lucked out with an exhibit about the Ballet Rousse at the National Gallery). 

First, we had lunch in the cafe. I had a selection of sides - fried green plantains, roasted squash with peppers, and a grilled watermelon and heirloom tomato salad. 

Alex had buffalo chili cheese fries. As it was a huge helping, some of the rest of us had some as well...

We had a wander around, looked at pottery

read about various Indian cultures, 

listened to tradtional stories, 

looked at fertility statues

and so on. 

Then we headed out of the museum to see the sights of the Mall - here's a Segway tour heading towards the museum - there were quite a few segway tours tooling around - looked like fun!

We headed down to the Lincoln Memorial - you can still see lots of people assembled on the steps, many of whom were remnants of the morning's march. 

The recycling bins were overflowing all along the Mall, and we passed trucks gradually picking up all the recycling - I bet it took the rest of the day!

Some of the more tired members of the party waited at the World War II memorial while the rest  of us walked down to the Lincoln Memorial. 

We then wandered over to the Korean Memorial, but I didn't take any photos there (I have before, when I've seen it, just was very tired by this time - two days on my feet all day in a row is harder than it used to be for me!)...  And then home.  A lovely day.