Samomatic

Armed with a stack of guidebooks, no sleep and zero knowledge of the place we were heading we began our journey.

3 days prior to the trip my parents decided to join and managed to find last minute flights out of Buffalo airport. However they would have to connect through Pittsburgh while we stop-over at Chicago.

Arriving in Vegas and greeted by a row of slot machines! It was quite a miracle that our planes arrived within 30min of each other and retrieved all our luggages.

This was our rental car, a convertible Jeep Wrangler (Photo borrowed from Net Car Show, because we never drove one).

Instead, to accommodate the larger group we rented a 27′ Mobile Home (also known as an RV) which we shall call home for the next 10 days!

Here is the floor plan for the RV, which includes a kitchen, bathroom with shower, a bedroom and 2 convertible beds at night.

After picking up the vehicle and loading up on supplies we started heading East into Arizona State.

Lake Mead, about 30miles out of Las Vegas, is the largest water reservoir in the United States.

The terrain is completely foreign to us, all around us is sand and rocks.

We started bright and early the next day, driving along Hwy 64.

We stopped for a quick visit at the Planes of Fame Air Museum near Williams, the nearest big town from the Grand Canyon.

One of the retired Blue Angles!



Finally we arrived at Grand Canyon! What a sight.
Stay tuned for next week as we go explore deeper in the canyons!

With Brian as our guide, Terry, Carmen and I ventured off to a day of adventures in Collingwood, about 2hrs North of Toronto.

Meeting bright and early, we made good progress in Brian’s modified Jeep Cherokee.

There was fresh snow the night before and the jeep feels extremely stable in the snow.

Off-roading in some small back roads. At one point we ran over a patch of ice and the jeep was sliding back down!


This is Doug, the owner of Rob Roy Farm.

At the farm they have dog sledding programs in the winter. The beautiful dogs sleeps outside in their own kennel.

A barn used for storage in the winter. Some really cool collection of stuff accumulated over the years.

We were very fortunate there was fresh snow and Doug happen to setup the teams for training so we stayed for some dog sledding!

Even though it is a pretty short track, it is amazing how much power the dogs can muster.

And we get to feed donkeys too!

Just a quick post as I am away on vacation at the moment.

What are your goals for 2012?

Every Christmas I look forward to the sumptuous Christmas dinners and potlucks. This year I think my favorites are the beautifully decorated treats for my sweet tooth!

Ginger bread cookies decorated for church Christmas dinner!

Cupcakes and cookies made by my friend Aly for her birthday party!

Salvaging some broken cookies into handicap ginger bread men by yours truly.

Cute snowman cupcakes, I think these rival her Alice in Wonderland Cupcakes!

Wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year for 2012!