Cannonville, UT

The trip began with a car ride to Providence, followed by a bus ride to Stratford, CT, then a limousine ride (with my grandnieces) to Penn Station the next day, followed by a 15 hour train ride (in a leaky Amtrak train) to North Carolina. We spent a day on Eric's farm, then drove down to Atlanta and crashed at a friend's house. Eric took the girls to the aquarium the next day; I did this painting of the garden.

We drove to Memphis and I took the girls to the zoo (Eric visited Graceland). We then drove like madmen to Arizona. A friend of Eric's drove to the Canyon and stayed with us for the next two days. On July 24th, my 60th birthday, they were nice enough to drop me off at the Grand Canyon where did these two paintings, then took the bus back to the RV park in Tusayan. Important note if you are planning this sort of trip: stock up on everything, food drink, toilet paper, the works, before you reach one of these destinations. The prices are hella crazy on everything. On the other hand, the Park Service runs shuttle buses to all the major sites and towns on the South Rim. Since there is generally a 45 minute wait to get your car into the Park, the bus is well worth it.

It was about this time the RV began belching black smoke whenever it went uphill. We later figured out this was due to the altitude, but at the time thought it was a bad fuel injector. We limped into Bryce Canyon, but Eric wanted to check into the RV camp before proceeding. We headed towards Cannonville, only too late realizing this involved a thousand foot descent, so we blew off Bryce Canyon National Park (waahhh!). About then I realized I wasn't going to get much painting done, and that if I wanted anything to show for the trip I would need to make my own opportunities.

Much the same happened in Moab. We drove to Arches where Eric expressed his disappointment that you could no longer drive right up to one of the arches, chip off a piece for a souvenir, and leave. Since the ten mile drive to the first arch contained some of the most extraordinary scenery I have ever seen in my life, I had to disagree with him. Can't wait to go back, in spring or fall this time. Again, I got up early to do this tiny painting, the only chance I got to paint.

Somewhere in Oklahoma Eric announced, "We just had an accident." A large chunk of siding had ripped off the front of the RV. After Moab we headed for Denver. We spent the last 15 miles in low gear at 19 miles an hour, belching smoke the whole way; just as we reached the top the RV gave out a puff of white smoke. "That's not good," Eric said. "We're burning oil." And then we were over the pass and the trip was, literally, downhill all the way. In Denver we stopped off at another friend of Eric's, where an examination of the RV revealed that the entire side of the RV was little more than damp pulp (from a ceiling leak a few years earlier), whole chunks of siding were coming loose, and the rear window had shifted as a result. We decided to cut the trip short and limp back to North Carolina. We spent a week poolside and I painted these [portraits of Abigail and Madison.