Travelougue - part 1

I won't say I have traveled a lot in my life, but enough to be able to tell a few stories without being repetitive. Call it the recency effect that I think some real travelling has happened to me only after coming to the U.S. I say that because back in Bangalore I planned only one of the trips I made...rest all happened because someone else was going. And mostly I didn't even know where exactly I was going. All that mattered was that I had time and someone was going :)


Not like I have become a real traveler after coming here. My idea of a real traveler is someone who travels with a purpose, who is a wanderer but with a reason. Travel for him or her does not mean a vacation or going to see a new place, but to really know the culture and people in those places. He/she is a seeker of enriching experiences.


My (our) travels in the U.S. have been more of explorations. We always left home with a tacit consent that we will take what we get. Which is why I never thought of writing about any place I visited. They were all more like matters of chance (well almost).


I was in Mexico when it hit me that I need to cause all these chances for myself. Even though it was our honeymoon and we had landed in may be one of the prettiest places on earth...but it was all by chance. We just saw a package that met our requirements, we checked the resort ratings and booked it. A month later we packed our bags n landed there...without a clue of what lies ahead. I would call it pure luck that we landed in heaven. And because it was our honeymoon I did not mind the whole lotta pampering, relaxation and whiling away. We did go out and see "Chichen Itza" but again that was planned after we reached the resort. Before getting there we did not even know if we'll be able to do something like that. 


And there it struck me...that we could have missed all this if luck hadn't been on our side. In fact we did not get all that lucky and missed a few must do things in the city - all of which I found out later courtesy travel channel. And then I decided that we will, as much as possible avoid travelling without a plan. With our limited time and money we cannot afford to waste all these opportunities.


Phew...I take too long to come to the point. All I wanted to say was that our latest trip was awesome. Awesome because I really took the time and pain to plan it to the T. We were out for some 11 days, traveled across four states and did some pretty amazing things which I'm sure will stay in our memories for the rest of our lives. And just in case they don't, I have this blog to fall back on! :)


We started with Vegas -> Grand Canyon, AZ -> Page, AZ -> Zion, UT -> Vegas, NV -> San Diego, CA -> Los Angeles, CA -> Vegas


There were of course multiple stops in between each major destination which I will mention in my post. It took me a whole lot of time to plan the first half of the trip as we had certain constraints. We had only 3.5 days, we had to start from Vegas and our desired activities could only be done at certain times. We couldn't really stick to our schedules all the time which did disrupt our plan a bit, but it also brought us some pleasant surprises. 


Also I have to commend Facebook, Tripadvisor and many other personal blogs which helped me maximize on this opportunity. I am so glad for all the user generated content available on everything related to travel that sitting here I felt like I had already been to all of those places. So much that I got a little skeptical about my ability to enjoy my travel anymore! But to my surprise, knowing so much didn't take away from the experience (or the surprise quotient) of really being in those places - breathing that air, soaking in that sun and soooo much more. Reading things from all those sources only helped me be better prepared and save time on the trivial things and really have a lot of fun! 


Part of the reason I'm writing this post is also that someone someday might benefit from my experience just as I did from what others shared!


Because this is getting too long, I will break this post into 3 parts and tell you the rest of the story in the next two. Till then ciao! :D