Back in January two friends (Brad and Stefan) and I went on a road trip to the Southwest. We had originally planned to go to Peru and then road trip the Carretera Austral in Chile. It was going to be a legendary trip. We thought we were planning right around the reopening of many places, but we jumped the gun and the UK strain had other ideas for us. With a last-minute cancellation, 2 friends backed out and it turned into just the three of us hitting the open road.
White Sands National Park
Behind the vintage look of all these trip photos was an idea of unplugging and staying off of my phone as much as possible during the trip. In order to do that I bought a bunch of disposable cameras and left my phone in the car for our excursions whenever possible. While it was nice to unplug and be more present during the trip it was also fun to wait for the photos to come back and to laugh over how they turned out! The major of this post will be the sharing of my favorites of those photos and a couple of travel stories!
Day 3 (1/11/21) – Alamagordo, NM to Casa Grande, AZ
“Hiked in Organ Pipes National Monument [on the] Pine Tree Loop. about 5 miles round trip. Along the trail, Sam spotted a dead deer right off the trail. It was a big buck! 8-point and it was a Mule Deer. [It] ended up being a mile up the trail. The deer hadn’t been fed on at all. It was crazy! Super fresh. So we did the loop, ate our Clif bars at the top and finished at the car. Saw some guys emptying trash, so I mentioned the deer and he referenced me to a phone number for the camp host. He took my info and contacted the authorities. I got called back a few times and ultimately it was determined that the deer had been killed by a young cougar. Which is crazy considering how fresh it looked. May have happened near when we were up there. All we saw was a small wound on its side and leg.”
To add a little more detail to that journal excerpt, I believe is was a park ranger or some other type of park authority that contacted us several times. Brad was trying to give him directions to where we had found the deer and that took about two different calls. Then we hadn’t heard anything for a while and when we did get a call back it was with the conclusion the authority had drawn after skinning the deer. When he skinned it he was able to see evidence of bite marks, scratches, and contusions that likely lead to some internal bleeding and ultimately killed it. Perhaps the the deer had gotten away from the cougar, but not before a big tussle causing the contusions. Then the internal bleeding from the attack finally got the best of it after it had made it away from the cougar and that’s when we found it dead under a tree? No matter what the case, we were happy to see that it was form nature being nature and not from poachers. It’s still crazy to think how little evidence we saw of an injury besides a scratch and a little blood, but all the damage was internal and hiding under the hair.
Saguaro National Park
Hiking up to Wasson Peak and taking in the many views along the way!
Airbnb camper set up 
Outside of Grand Canyon National Park
Never having been to the Grand Canyon before it was an awesome experience that definitely lived up to the hype. Its so crazy to see just how huge it is. At some points it just feels like you are starring at a picture because you cant comprehend it. Its got me thinking about a return trip to hike down into the canyon.
We made it all the way out to California and Death Valley National Park before turning back to head home. I want to give a special thanks to Brad’s Grandpa and Grandma who took us to Outback Steakhouse in Nevada and also to my Aunt and Uncle in Arizona who gave us multiple meals and a place to stay for two nights. Also thanks to Uncle John for sharing some Army stories from the cold war era that gave us chills!