a toast to posts

At the start of 2015, Justin and I made a resolution to travel to 5 new states this year. We got to go on a trip to Washington in January, when we visited our friends in Seattle. Two weekends ago, the two of us had the opportunity to travel to Arizona! We found extremely cheap roundtrip tickets to Phoenix and decided to book it on a whim. We definitely didn’t know what to expect, but it was such a nice getaway (despite the 115+ degree weather)!

After we flew into Phoenix, we drove straight to Sedona. There was still a good amount of sun left so we decided to go on a short hike. We found a random trail off the road and decided to tackle as much as we could before the sun set. We couldn’t finish but it was definitely a good workout and there were some amazing views!

At night, we drove out and found a little area to pull over and do some stargazing. I’ve never seen that many stars in my life – in the 15-20 minutes we were there, I saw 5 shooting stars. We also saw the Milky Way for the first time, which was an absolutely amazing experience. I’ve never camped out too far from the city so it was really my first time experiencing “true” darkness – honestly, it’s a little scary and I thought a murderer would come at us with a chainsaw. But we were fine and the night sky was unlike anything I’ve ever seen before!

The next day, we woke up at 5am and set out for a hike on the Devil’s Bridge Trail! It was a nice 2-hour hike and the views were GORGEOUS. We took some amazing pictures and it was definitely a thrill going out to the ledge. I would definitely recommend this trail, as it wasn’t too difficult but is still a great workout.

After a little rest, we did the Cathedral Rock hike. Cathedral Rock is one of Sedona’s most iconic landmarks and we were told it couldn’t be missed. It was a nice 3.5 hour hike – we started out at a different start point than most people & also stopped to swim in the creek for a little bit. THIS HIKE WAS HARD – at several points we had to get on our hands & knees and climb up. The view was actually alright and nothing new – I thought the Devil’s Bridge Trail had cooler views, but whatevs, it was an extremely awesome workout! According to my Fitbit, I burned over 1,200 calories haha J After the hike, we drove straight to Phoenix! Didn’t do much at all there – it was scorching and we were exhausted.

The next day, we just went to a Musical Instrument museum (apparently that’s the #1 thing to do on TripAdvisor in Phoenix??) and it was surprisingly pretty interesting! We also went to one of the best brunch places of my life – I highly recommend Postino for their bruschettas and scones. We also visited Amy’s Baking Company that was featured in Kitchen Nightmares, which is a whole other story but we actually met Amy and Samy!

Overall, it was a great trip to Arizona. I don’t know if I’d go back to Phoenix or Scottsdale for fun, but I definitely want to check out Antelope Canyon, as well as go back to Sedona to tackle some more hikes. 2 states down, 3 more to go! We’ll hit New Orleans, Louisiana in a couple weeks so stay tuned!