Horseshoe Bend

Monday - June 1, 2015

We wake up and my first thought is: what am I going to have for breakfast today???

My parents, always worried about the dearth of Asian food (they've expanded their palate in the last 30 years they've been in the States.  In addition to Chinese food, they now also eat Japanese food, Korean food, and now...even Vietnamese food.  See how international they've become?) they always travel with some Chinese food.  They have learned their lesson well.  On our very first Alaskan cruise that was 7 nights long, my parents were so Asian food deprived that my parents went to the EXTRA PAY restaurant onboard the NCL Sun for Japanese food.  My dad, who thinks it's a sin to eat in port when there is plenty of food on a cruise ship actually PAID for miso soup and sushi while on a cruise.  That's how dire their situation was.  

Knowing there's a dearth of Asian restaurants in Page, my mama packed away some rice (for porridge they can make in an electric kettle), noodles (same), and some marinated and pickled veggies they can eat along with the rice when overexposure to burgers make them want to cry.  So for breakfast our first morning, that's what they ate - because the overabundance of red meat the night before made them crave plain white rice.  My mom used her electric kettle and made rice porridge for her and my dad.  I am not a fan of rice porridge unless I'm sick and need something bland, so I toddled my way to Paris to forage for breakfast.  Because it's fake French and we all know the Frenchies make delicious pastries.  So I figure fake French people have to make at least semi delicious pastries.

First I stood in line at La Creperie with my eye on either the Nutella crepe or their cinnamon bun crepe.  After about 5 minutes of the line NOT moving, I realized that I didn't love crepes so much that I would wait like, 20 minutes for it.  Also, I live in Orange County where we have a lot of places that offer crepes, so it's not like this is some kind of deliciousness that will elude me forever if I didn't wait in line for 20 minutes with other tourists.  So I got out of line and walked down the Rue de Paix (why do they think if they stick a "Le" or a "Rue" it makes it super French?  I mean, seriously, Le Burger Brasserie Grille just sounds super duper pretentious.  That extra E at the end of Grille?  That doesn't make it any fancier than a Sizzler yo) and found JJ's Boulangerie.  There was a line out the door - BUT it moved pretty quickly.  I like the way it was set up because it was very clearly marked WHERE in line you're supposed to order, where you're supposed to pay and where you're suppose to pick up your fancy drinks.  And you order at the last of the three long glass cases; the first one held all sorts of savory deliciousness like prosciutto sandwiches (for $10!!!), different quiches (the bacon quiche looked tasty, although bacon is magic and makes everything awesome) and other tasty looking things.  The second case held desserts: they had tiramisu, cheesecake, eclairs, and various tarts - I wanted them all!  Alas, I was there for the last pastry case: breads.  Specifically - croissants.  Because when we went to Paris, we went to the boulangerie (run by real Parisians, not Sue from Alabama, who was super nice) every morning and bought fresh croissants.  And because I'm a gluttonous fat ass, I also got a chocolate twist, which was basically a pain au chocolate that was made into long twisty stick.  Two croissants and a chocolate stick came out to just under $13.  Not cheap, but not horrific either considering the tourist trap we were in - so I happily walked back to my hotel room and chomped on delicious buttery carbs.  Was this as delicious as real French croissants?  No, but it's hella better than a donut shop croissant or Costco's croissants.

display of delicious, delicious carbs.  OMG.

And...bran muffins.  Who's ordering bran muffins when it's next to cinnamon rolls, chocolate chip muffins, and perfectly iced danishes?  Masochists?

I uh, ate my chocolate twist.  And most of a croissant (told you I was a pig) before I though to stick my camera inside my bag to take a photo of my delicious croissant.

A random note.  As I'm walking down the Rue de Paix I see a new (to me anyway) restaurant called Yong Kang Street.  

fake Yong Kang Street across from La Creperie

This excited me for a few reasons: I love food.  Also, Yong Kang Street is a real street in Taipei, Taiwan that's famous for Taiwanese eats - specifically soup dumplings from Din Tai Fung and braised beef noodle soup.  I LOVE soup dumplings.  Because they are delicious and I love all things delicious.  Except for cilantro.  That just tastes like ass to me.  But I was kind of excited about easy access soup dumplings on the Las Vegas Strip...until I saw the prices.  $11.88 for SIX dumplings?  Are they out of their freaking minds?  $13.88 for meatless Dan Dan noodles?  That's highway robbery!  (OMG, I've turned into my father).  On the bright side, it's a lot cleaner and prettier than the food stalls in Taipei...which is pretty much a street market.  But still, clean bathroom or not, I ain't paying $14 for a bowl of $5 noodles.  Because not even I'm not that crazy yet!

Anyhoo, after I stuffed my face as I'm wont to do all the time we finished packing our stuff up and set off for Page.  Before we leave our room, I herd my family together for our first family photo of the trip.  Inside our hotel room, which lemme tell you, is the blandest Vegas hotel room evah.

the Bendi does not look impressed

It's 275 miles from Las Vegas to Page, AZ - and we left at 10:30 am and arrived around 4 pm after stopping once in St. George (which has greatly expanded since we were last there around like, 20 years ago) for In-N-Out.  St. George was about a little less than halfway there, and I knew it was a relatively large city/settlement so there would be a place we could stop for lunch and for my mom and I to switch off driving.  She starts and I finish because she says she has more energy earlier in the day.  So after about 130 miles or so of driving, we drive into St. George on the 15 freeway.  It's a lot larger than I thought, and there were a variety of food choices.  My dad always, always, always picks Arby's if it's available.  It was, but then we saw a sign for In-N-Out and my mama and I overruled my dad. My mom doesn't like burgers.  We've been here over 30 years and she's still not a fan.  However, she does like In-N-Out burgers - it's seriously the ONLY hamburger she'll actually eat.  So we get off the freeway and mosey our way to the shopping center right off the freeway with the In-N-Out - and since it's about 1 pm, it's packed with people.  It was about 90 degrees, and we couldn't leave the Bendi in the car because 1) it's illegal and 2) I didn't want to roast my puppy, so we grabbed one of the outdoor seats.  They have umbrellas for those tables and it actually wasn't bad at all because there was a breeze.  As long as we sat in the shade (and there was plenty for the 3.5 of us), the breeze made being outside not only tolerable, but pretty comfortable as well!  My parents and Bendi staked out our spot (not that people were competing with us for an outdoor table) while I was inside (in the a/c because I'm weak) waiting for our food.  A very nice lady who worked there brought out a tray of cold water for Bendi and he had fun dunking his whole face into the french fry tray lapping up water.  It took awhile because of the crowd, but our food finally came out!  And it was just as delicious and tasty as ever.  I don't know what kind of magic they do, whether it's the kind off cheese they use or the meat or the fact that we get it with grilled onions, but it's just so freaking good.  Ahem.

deliciousness.  I'm so happy we got to have In-N-Out in Utah!

Bendi is happy too

After we eat we drive.  And drive.  Thankfully the time goes by relatively quickly - it's actually a pretty scenic drive and my mom took some photos of the terrain we passed by.  

Around 4 pm, we pull into the parking lot of Days Inn & Suites in Page, Arizona.  Why did we pick Days Inn?  Because they accept dogs.  And they had decent reviews on Tripadvisor and basically for pet friendly accommodations it was between this, some other tiny motel in town, or the Courtyard by Marriott, which was charging hella more for a smaller room.  So Days Inn it was.  The wifi, laundry facility, and free breakfast were also decent selling points.  When we pulled in, we were not disappointed - the place looks pretty new and while our room isn't posh (at all), it's a decent size and pretty comfortable.  The bathroom is kind of no bueno - it's very small and cramped, the towels are thin and scratchy and the lighting inside is very harsh - BUT - the rest of the room was fine.  There's a nice sized mini fridge and microwave in the room - the kitchenette has a small sink so there are two sinks in the room.  The king suite we booked (I busted out my air mattress again as the rollaway I requested never made its way to our room) had a separate living area so that's where I set up my bed whereas my parents took the bedroom.  Two TV's, so mom and dad are happy and we can watch different things - and the best part: we're on the ground floor with a sliding glass door so it's easy to take Bendi out instead of going down multiple staircases or waiting for an elevator and walking far, far away so he could pee.  Also, we could pull our car right up to the sliding glass door to our room and it made unloading so much easier.  When we went out my parents would just exit through the sliding glass door and I'd stay inside to lock it, then exit from the lobby to make sure all of our doors were locked.  They just drove around and picked me up outside the lobby.  I do kind of wish they had some patio furniture for the ground floor rooms like they do for the balcony rooms - there's no place to sit outside!

We unload our car right outside our room and settle in for a break since my butt is still asleep from sitting in a car for so long.

bedroom area with king bed

desk and TV from the bedroom

looking towards living area from bedroom 

tiny living area with kitchenette

TV in living area - with me in the corner.  Hello!

My mom decides we should eat dinner first and then see if we're up for hiking to Horseshoe Bend to catch the sunset.  So she performs culinary mom magic and has dinner on the table in like, 20 minutes.  No joke.

Bendi looking at dad, "when can we eat?  Why are we taking more pictures?"

salmon, mustard greens, wok'd beef (no, we didn't bring a wok with us, she made it at home), and marinated roast beef

rice porridge.  (in our awesome electric kettle from the Korean market,  You could actually COOK in this kettle!)

So we eat.  Although I wasn't very hungry since I ate half my bag of trail mix while "resting" earlier.

 By resting, it means I was sitting on my butt stuffing my face while surfing the internet.  But we finish up dinner, clean up, and all get ready to head out a mile down the road to see Horseshoe Bend.  I thought the turnout would be hard to find but maybe because I was expecting it, I thought it was pretty well marked and there were two buses and lots of cars parked in the dirt lot.  It's only a 3/4 mile hike, but it's steeper than I thought - and though it wasn't bad, a lot of it was in the sand which made it not only more strenuous, but a pain in the ass because sand got in our shoes and socks!  The good thing is that the sand is so fine there that it didn't rub any of us raw, but it still wasn't the best feeling though it was tolerable.  Bendi had a blast, I haven't taken him to the beach yet so he's never walked on sand.  He got soooo dirty but he had so much fun.  He kept tugging on his leash the whole time because he thought we were too slow.  Also, stupid Bendi took a big poop right when we started hiking, and there's no trash receptacles, so my poor dad was holding his bag of poop the whole way there.  And the whole way back.  And he couldn't throw it out until we got back to our motel. 

There are a lot of people there, more than I thought there would be, and there were actually lots of real photographers with their tripods staking out their spot.  I'm not even an amateur.  I'm a crappy point and shooter with my phone 90% of the time, and even though there are a gazillion photos of Horseshoe on the internets, I wanted my own photo of it dammit!  

But man, it's harder than I thought!  First of all, you've got to find a vantage point that shows the entire bend, which isn't as easy as I thought since there are photographers already stationed everywhere.  Also, you're facing the sun during sunset so there's the big ass ball of fire in the sky messing with the photo so it looks like the horseshoe is wearing a dayglo hat.

There were better spots where you could take photos without the rock outcroppings interfering with the river bend, but 1) I was too scared to get close to the edge since there are no railings and I'm afraid of height and 2) those photographers with their fancy tripods were awfully territorial over their spots.  So I just found a place not too far from the edge that I could sit and at least see most of it.  

Before that though, we walked around and took photos with just the rocks, because we didn't want to get too close to the edge, especially with a small hyper dog.

our mandatory awkward selfie

I took a lot my pics of my dad that I like, except for the fact that he's carrying a bag of Bendi poop in all of them:

Then the sun came down low enough for me to try to take photos again

And being me, of course I had to stick my big fat feet in the photo to say "I'm here!".  Though it's not like anyone else could tell whose wearing those old ass Adidas sneakers that look like big ol muffins.

And while dad is trying to capture the scene with his camera phone, mom and I go a little further away from the ledge and take selfies because we're awesome.  Awesomely awkward.

And you can see dad behind us taking photos on his phone.

Then dad and I take turns playing photographer for each other.  Neither of us are very good :(

do you see how he made us walk ALL the way towards him?  He doesn't know how to use the zoom.  

At around 7:30, we start hiking back towards our car.  Bendi was still super hyper with a lot of energy and I ended up taking the leash because my mama's arm was tired.  I feel like the hike back is a bit more strenuous than the hike there because there's more climbing on the way back, but it wasn't too bad.  We went back to our hotel, got some gas for the next day, and vegged out for the rest of the night watching TV, playing on the internet, reading, and eating snacks.  

Bendi had a very long day.  He looked like this around 9:

I downloaded our photos and organized them, and around midnight, I looked like Bendi too.

The next day, we go to Antelope Canyon!