Honeymoon Road Trip Part 3 (Days 10-13)

Day 10 (Wednesday, November 7): 

We started out the day in Marina, CA lazy- watching some TV, checking e-mails... not doing much. It was actually pretty nice to just veg out for a little while that morning. We met up with Zeke's friend at the Coast Guard base in Monterrey, CA for lunch. We went out to a great burger place, and then headed back to the base.

 Zeke's friend had to finish up some stuff at work, so we went and checked out the sea lions who hang out at the base.

There was one sea lion sitting really close to the fence, and Zeke wanted to see what sea lion fur feels like, so he very gently touched the sea lion's back...

And it got super mad. Like, indignant. He kept honking (honking? Is that the sound sea lions make? Cuz it sounds like it.) loudly at Zeke and me. The sea lion wasn't scared... it stayed on the rock where it was sitting, close to the fence... it was just really really angry! So funny.

HH and the angry sea lion

After our sea lion adventure, Zeke's friend took us for a drive on Highway 1. It was such a pretty drive!

We spent the evening hanging out and catching up with Zeke's friend in Marina, and stayed another night there.

Day 11 (Thursday, November 8): 

We headed out from Marina towards the Grand Canyon.

It was a pretty long drive, and we didn't make it all the way to the Grand Canyon. We stopped in Barstow for the night, ready to get some rest for a busy day!

Day 12 (Friday, November 9):

We started out early from Barstow toward the Grand Canyon. The weather was pretty cloudy and cold. We made it to the Grand Canyon just as it started to sleet. Zeke and I had planned on camping somewhere around the Grand Canyon, but the threat of a foot of snow that night changed our plans! We did get to see some beautiful canyon, though!

It was pretty grand.

The coming snow and the cold weather kept us traveling, but we did spend the night in our tent! We tented behind a hotel (random, I know), in Tuba City.


Day 13 (Saturday, November 10):

We got our tent site torn down and everything packed up in almost record time. We're getting good. The plan for the day was to get to the Moab Desert and Natural Bridges National Park. Getting gas, we met a man from Canada who suggested that we drive a slightly different route to see the Valley of the Gods. Hey, we're up for an adventure!

The Valley of the Gods was so beautiful!

Definitely a good tip from the Canadian guy.

After driving through the Valley of the Gods, we took a super curvy, very high gravel road (no guard rails!) to get all the way to Natural Bridges. 

The road we took

And we got some beautiful views

It wasn't far at all to Natural Bridges. The state park has three bridges. A Natural Bridge is created by a flowing stream of water cutting through the rock, making a "bridge."

We took a hiking trail down toward the first bridge. It was a really cool trail along bare rock, with a couple of ladders leading toward the bridge.

If we had enough time, and if it wasn't so cold, I think we would have hiked all the trails. I totally suggest it. Our next stop was Arches National Park, but it was getting pretty dark before we reached it, so we stopped for the night in Monticello, Utah.

Click here for Days 14-18!