We slept in a little so we just took the bus back to Yavapai Observation Point to see the canyon from the same physical point but at a different time of day. As you might expect, it looked somewhat different. Then it was back to the lodge to pack up and hit the road. The drive to Albuquerque was a little over six and a half hours, farther than we had driven in one day for quite a while. And to add to that we added a little bit of a scenic route to see a portion of the Painted Desert. That proved to be worthwhile as the two major attraction of the day were on that route. The first was the Tusayan Ruins and museum about 22 miles east of the park entrance. There was a small museum and a short hike to see the ruins of a village inhabited by Anasazi Indians in the 1100's. It was about a 20 minute stop and Eve spotted a 3 or 4 foot gopher snake in the ruins. See picture. Down the road from there was stopped at Desert View where there was a 70 foot watchtower built in 1930 to mimic the towers built by the Anasazi. We climbed to the top where were were treated to a spectacular view of the Grand Canyon on one side and the Painted Desert on the other. From there we began the long drive to Albuquerque where we would meet, for the first time, our first cousins once removed, Bob and Kay Sturm. We arrived around 9pm, a little behind schedule, to a very warm welcome from Bob and Kay. We all sat around for a while before Eve and the kids went to bed and I sat up for another hour or so with Bob and Kay. On the way through Arizona we saw this really cool arrowhead cloud pointing our way Albuquerque.
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