More Christmas Adventuring...

I didn't get to see my family much while we lived in DC, so I was very excited to have my momma in Arizona ALL of December! (no sarcasm intended, I was genuinely excited to have this sweet little lady around!) She stayed for a week with each of my sisters that live down here. While she was with us we took her to see Montezuma's Well and Tuzigoot, two Sinagua ruins just a few hours North of us.

The well itself is actually a sinkhole with a constant mysterious flow of water that runs into it. Over a million gallons of water flow into this hole every day that is unaccounted for, as of yet scientists have not been able to track its source. This mysterious water flow gives the place a magical, mystical appeal. It is a small little ruin, but still fascinating to wander around.

This is another likely storage space at the base of the well.

My sweet momma.

Chloe doesn't share my fascination with old places yet, she slept through most of it...

After we left the well, we drove about 15 minutes North to the Tuzigoot (Apache for 'crooked water') ruins. Normally there is fee to enter this site, but because the visitor's center was under construction, there was no fee, no rangers, and no other people around. We had the place almost entirely to ourselves.

This is the view just below the ruin, right before we started climbing up.

This is what you see as you look out from the top.

This ruin was once an estimated 110 room village with an amazing view.

It was really fun exploring with my momma, I love this lady!

Christmas Break Adventures

Over Christmas break Sam and I decided to explore Arizona a bit. We drove up to the Superstitions, pulled over on the side of the road and started hiking. We didn't have a destination plan, but serendipitously found Canyon Lake,
beautiful.

The weather was amazing and Chloe was the perfect little travel companion. I love love love the desert this time of year.

A few days later we decided to drive out to Goldfield Ghost Town. Its an obvious tourist trap town and I loved every minute of it! Only the mine and the foundations of the buildings were authentic from the original town, the rest was rebuilt for our touristing pleasure.

We were expecting this little white church to be a quaint historical place of worship...not so. Inside is a shrine to Elvis and all of his movies--apparently a few were filmed in this area. And for a small fee here in this church the King himself will preform your nuptials. I feel cheated that I didn't know about this sooner.

On the weekends every hour on the hour from high noon to four, they stage a gun fight. The guns are really loud and we were a little nervous that Chloe would scream through the whole thing and annoy the people around us, but...

...she slept right through it.
Strange that she'll sleep through a gunfight, but if we sneeze during her nap time at home...