AA vacation, Day 4, Part 1

This morning we woke up and planned to travel to the Grand Canyon. When we checked out of the Best Western, Jim was in line to hand in the keys and more than a few people were expressing their dissatisfaction with their stay at the hotel. In fact, when Jim was next in line to be helped, the manager said to Jim, "I'm helping her," (referring to another woman) and walked away. The friggin' manager. I'm so glad we weren't the only ones disappointed. I've told Jim to never book us at a Best Western again; especially in the Grand Canyon. I did, of course, fill out the comment card to express my dissatisfaction and I mentioned that Stefan (see previous post) was quite helpful. I don't care if it gets thrown away, at least I filled it out. Unfortunately, neither one of us did a good job of researching the Skywalk. Jim usually does the research but I was the one that wanted to do it. Come to find out the Skywalk is not at the South Rim; this is the place that most people go to see the Grand Canyon. In order to get to the Skywalk, we would have had to drive 70 miles south to Flagstaff then drive West then drive up North; all told it would have been over 200 miles from where we were.

We did spend some time at the GC and it is so breathtaking. One interesting statistic I read was that over 250 people either fall or are rescured from the GC each year. There is even a book I came across that has stories of people who have fallen to their demise or who have had to be rescued; that's the whole book. Also, according to one of the guides, a few years ago a man climbed one of the rock formations (in Sedona) and when he got to the top he could not figure out how to get down. He called 911 and when told how much it would cost for a helicopter rescue (over $3,000) he managed to find his way down.

We just got through checking into the resort in Scottsdale; it's called the Fairmont Scottsdale Princess resort. This is where we will be staying for the next week during the conference. There are 651 furnished guest rooms, 72 villas and 119 newly renovated casitas. This is what we are staying; a mini suite in a casita. Each casita has 4 mini suites. We were supposed to have a regular room but at the check in counter we were told (again) our room wasn't quite ready. So we were given a mini suite at no extra cost. The resort has bunnies, birds and other little critters literally all over the place. I'm definitely going to spend some time feeding them. No signs not to so I'll be feeding away. It's fun for me. I've also told Jim that we WILL go swimming this week. It's a really cool place. I've taken plenty of pics. It's a huge property and a great place for a world conference. If you'd like to see pics of the resort, I've included a link below. And it's a dry 109 degrees right now with a hot breeze blowing; but no sweat.

http://www.fairmont.com/scottsdale/

Now we are off to find some of our church people and do something.

More later,

paul