WIW: American Southwest road trip

We just got back from a 13 day, 4100 mile road trip through the American Southwest. The weather forecasts were from 25 to 88. Actuals temps ranged from 27 to 90. We didn’t plan to do laundry, so my wheelie duffle weighed a ton.

WIW: Most of the time I wore hiking pants, a tee, hiking shoes and some kind of jacket. I took a couple of fleece shirts, a fleece hoodie, a utility jacket, a nanopuff, and a rain jacket. I took a few extra clothes in case we wanted to dress up just a little, for dinner. But we never did that. We looked fine, hopefully. I took one pair of Salomon hiking shoes, Adidas sneakers, and a pair of Teva sandals. I wish I had taken another pair hiking shoes instead of the sandals. I was sick of the Salomons by the time we got home.

What we saw: The American Southwest is gorgeous. We went to Tucson, Guadalupe Mountains, Santa Fe, Grand Canyon, Petrified Forest, and visited family in Texas. We went on a bicycle tour at the Grand Canyon, and even while riding, I wore fleece and a nanopuff. The south rim is at 7000 feet in elevation, and it was chilly.
1-3 Outfits
4 Grand Canyon NP
5 Saguaro NP
6 Roadrunner in our hotel parking lot in Tucson. We spent some time there, waiting for our windshield to be replaced.
7 Wild turkeys in Carlsbad NP
8 I nearly stepped on these rattlesnakes near Kingman, AZ. Lucky for me they didn’t bite me. Otherwise, our trip would have ended before it really started.
9 Cadillac Ranch near Amarillo, TX
10 Slug Bug Ranch near Cadillac Ranch. My husband loaned me his jacket because mine was packed.
11 Petrified log

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Nordstrom

Patagonia Nano Puff Hooded Water Resistant Jacket

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5 years ago

Karie

(website)

Veteran

Looks like you had a great trip!

Anonymous

Love the southwest-that sky is so blue-and the cars are funny! Glad you didn't step on the rattler :0
Outfit 2 is my favorite and love the blue puffer

Jaime

What a fantastic trip and great photos! I have never been in that area, except vicariously through road trip movies. Thank you for sharing!

Joy

What a great trip. I used to have relatives in Amarillo. Did you see the canyon near there? You look fabulous. The rattle snakes are just coming out of hibernation here. There are warnings to watch out for them.

rachylou

Sweet trip!

I have to start thinking about this year’s camping trip wardrobe. Mother is going to let my brother come. She’s going to show us where to spread her ashes, lol.

Bonnie

Love your photos. We moved from Tucson in December so I know that area well. You are perfectly dressed for the southwest!

Jane

Amazing photos, super to see. That’s a lot of miles. The colours are stunning.

Good outfits, I like your t shirt collection.

4 years ago

kkards

goods like a great trip....the photos are a reminder of the incredible depth of the US, how big it is, and how different the geography is from place to place...

love your tee collection...and nicely done packing for such a tempature range...

Windchime

Hi, green jacket twin!

We’re planning a Grand Canyon visit for August (super excited). Seeing your outfits is helpful as I’m thinking about what to pack.

Great pics; almost stepping on those rattlesnakes would have taken a year off my life.

Angie

Fashion Stylist

Fun trip and fab pics, Janet. Glad you had a great time. Nice to see white pants make it into your travel capsule

JAileen

Karie, thank you. It was a very successful trip.

Suntiger, thank you. I took an outfit picture every day. I had bought several new pairs of hiking pants, but they’re all grey except for one, so the daily outfits weren’t that interesting to me.

Shevia, thank you. I hope you get to visit sometime.

Joy, thank you. Do you mean Palo Duro Canyon? We didn’t go there. I wanted to go to the Petrified Forest, and we couldn’t do both, unfortunately.

Rachylou, that’s hilarious! Visiting family in Texas, we got in a discussion about the whereabouts of my FIL’s ashes. No one seems to know where they are...

Bonnie, Tucson was my favorite. I loved Saguaro NP. We didn’t visit the western unit due to our windshield mishap. But then we got to see the roadrunner.

Jane, thank you. The Southwest is amazing. Everywhere has geology, but it’s in plain view in the Southwest. The Petrified Forest was interesting because there is evidence sitting right in front of us that giant trees used to grow there. Now there is practically no vegetation at all, much less trees.

Kkards, thank you. I took so many pictures, mostly on my phone, so I could easily email a picture of the day to my mother and a text to a handful of friends.

Windchime, thank you. I love that green jacket. I can wear a fleece shirt under it, and it breaks the wind fairly well. I hope you have a wonderful time at the Grand Canyon. We visited on our honeymoon 38 years ago, and it’s 1/2 inch deeper now!

Angie, thank you. I was able to wear the white pants two days without mishap. Some of your magic power seems to have rubbed off!

cjh

Fun and looking fab. Thanks for sharing your photos, except for the snake.

fifthandfinest

Active Member

Thanks for sharing your photos! It looks like a fabulous trip. I saw my first roadrunner in Marfa, TX last year. I was convinced Warner Brothers had made them up (being an ignorant Brit!).

Love the little roadrunner

Sara L.

Fun pictures. I'm glad you had a nice trip.

Cjh, thank you. I didn’t enjoy my close encounter with the snakes (there were two of them!). My husband insisted I take him back and show them to him. That’s why I have some pictures. I really didn’t want to go back.

Fifth, it *was* a great trip. Our windshield was the only bad thing, and that was just annoying, not catastrophic. The rattlesnakes could have been really catastrophic, but luckily weren’t.

Suntiger, he was adorable. I mentioned him to a couple of hotel employees, and they said, “Oh yeah, he comes by every day. We call him Cheeto.”

Sara, thank you. I thought of you when we drove through New Mexico.

Photo 1 really looks like the stylish version of the foundation outfit for any naturalistic adventure, and I like collars with your hair cut.

What was your method of transport? Where did you stay at night? Did you take any pets? I actually woke up in the middle of the night after reading this and thought about how I'd like to do a north, south (east won't be necessary) west trip.

You have great jackets! I also like your hair & all the location pics ... but snakes give me the heebeegeebees!

Cardiff girl

I love your trip pics especially the wild life(I know it’s a style forum and I m supposed to be interested in the clothes but the wildlife is so different to the wildlife here)Thank you for sharing.

Isabel, we drove our Subaru outback, and stayed in hotels. We made our reservations in January, so accommodations in the parks were not available. ** We generally stay in Holiday Inn Expresses. I posted about another road trip we took here:
https://youlookfab.com/welookf.....ng-it-real

Opaline, thank you. I think I wore all of my jackets except the rain jacket. We had a little rain and snow, but while we were driving.

Cardiff girl, thank you. I wanted to show the variety of outfits I needed to make with the huge temperature differences. I think roadrunners and rattlesnakes are kind of a caricature of Southwestern wildlife, but that’s what we saw. We saw other wildlife, such as elk at the Grand Canyon, but I didn’t get a picture of them.

** I talked to a woman at the Grand Canyon with a tiny tiny baby. She said they made their reservations before they knew they were even having a baby!

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