Finally made it back from our road trip. Made the jaunt from Missouri out to Arizona, up to Utah, then across to Colorado and back home. Kenzi traveled like her usual champ self. She hit her 13th state on this trip. Kye was less thrilled. He's become a big homebody in recent years. He still made the journey though without too much grief. Diabetes was managed just fine throughout the trip. The day we had to run down to Phoenix to pick up a bike she ran a little low and had to pick her numbers up before giving meds, but not a big deal. The importance of home testing blood sugar is what makes diabetic dogs able to really live totally normal lives after diagnosis. Too often I see people who have a dog diagnosed with diabetes and they think it's the end of all things fun and they sweat about every piece of food and every bit of exercise and worry constantly and it's just not necessary. Monitor their sugar and keep living your lives.

Things mostly went as planned except one day. We had a 4 mile hike slated around Escalante Utah which ended up being an 8 mile hike at 95 degrees out. Poor Kye wasn't happy with that, neither were us humans. It put us off our schedule and we opted to cut the next day's hike in Moab so Kye could recover. Outside of that...pretty pictures.

Arizona





















Utah









What we hiked 8 miles to see











Colorado























Overall, a good trip. Way too many miles packed into so few days. Would rather just go to a place and spend the time seeing that place and not attempting to see a little of all places. everyone is happy to be back home.

Now that looks like a great trip, but I'm with you I'd much rather take more time to see more of one place.  Trying to see the US in a 50 day 50 state trip is stupid (and I know folks who have tried it! tourists!!), you get home and remember nothing of what you're seen. The shot where Kye<?> is looking at something in the trees is good! Hey mom, dad, can I please, please!!!????

Colorado - way too many houses in those pictures!  I'd have expected that in Utah with the resident population there.  Hope someone does something with that Elks lodge before it comes down!  It distresses me to see old building just gradually crumble!

Kenzi is the red dog, Kye is the white. Colorado was beautiful in parts (eastern CO from Colorado Springs to Limon is terribly ugly). I used to vacation there as a kid when there were far less people and it was much nicer back then. There were way too many people, the roads were horrible, and no one would drive the speed limit as in we were constantly stuck behind a CO driver running 5-10 under. Understandable in the mountains or pulling a trailer but not understandable out in the flats in a little car. Lost count of how many we had to pass trying to get from Del Norte to Poncha Springs. If we make the run back to CO we will either stick more near the Telluride/Ouray area or go north more.

Utah is a lot of reservation. On the reservations they just live in campers and tiny hovels crammed here and there. In Utah though it's pretty easy to stay on roads that run through national or state parks where people don't get to live and can't muddy up the pictures as much. I don't see us ever returning to Utah unless it's to go to Moab to run the bike trails or do some rock crawling. Outside of a few places it wasn't that pretty of a state that we ran through and gas prices were nuts. We didn't go into any national parks other than the Grand Canyon which did limit us on seeing the pretty side of Utah, but it was going to be too costly at $35/park when they won't let the dogs out. If the national parks were more dog friendly (and cheaper) we might would have appreciated this state a little more.

I think the next trip though we will go straight north into the Dakotas and then over toward the Tetons. Kenzi hasn't been up that way and that would pick her up some more states. Not that she cares, lol, but there's something to being able to say my dog has been to more states than a lot people I know.

So you were right near me.... del norte is 1 town over. And obviously you were stuck behind tourists. Locals are the ones driving about 75, the 1 lane really fast road scares people. Seriously 160 during tourist season runs about 15mph slower then the speed limit. If one more person says "slow down and enjoy the scenery" i may shoot out one of their tires.... tourists dont understand people need to get places. Did you stop at the ufo watchtower?

The front range is the most boring drive on the planet. I would go to the creede/lake city area if you want no people around. That and come during fall hunting season after most people leave for the summer.

So the grand canyon is cheaper then the sand dunes. Never would have guessed.

Beautiful pics

Grand Canyon was really cheap the day we went because their internet was down and they apparently can't take cash without internet. Looked at our green bucks like they were rocks and didn't have enough fingers to count on.

We would much rather have done the trip the end of September or October but a wedding for brother-in-law dictated the timing for us. We gave him a pretty hard time over that. Who plans a wedding in Arizona for July? The wedding did at least go well despite it being hot. All the natives there were complaining about their 40% humidity, meanwhile our thermometer at home is reading 95 degrees and 72% humidity. So it was at least a dry heat for us.

We did not stop at the UFO watchtower. Didn't know it was there, though UFO stuff isn't really our forte. The smoke was so bad when we were going across the front range we couldn't even see it. We went to Garden of the Gods and couldn't tell which mountain was Pike's Peak because the smoke was covering the tops so heavily. This was a theme for much of the trip. Haze on everything.

Wow. Gorgeous pictures. Did you camp or hotel it?

Hotels and cabins. Too hot to tent camp and due to hail storm and the cost of plexiglass I couldn't get my camper ready in time. Original plan was to take the camper though.