On Tuesday this week, Nancy and I drove from Mesa to Flagstaff, Arizona, with our grandchildren Savannah and Ian. Our goal was the Lowell Observatory (elevation 7,000 feet) located under the snow-covered San Francisco Peaks. It's almost another 5,000 feet to that mountain's summit, and no we didn't attempt the climb.

We spent Tuesday afternoon touring the Lowell Observatory grounds which included the dome above housing the 24-inch Clark refractor telescope. We were taken inside to see the instrumentation, but since it was daylight, there was nothing to see through the telescope. The observatory is more than a 100 years old and the telescopes are no longer used to conduct research.

We stayed in the local Hampton Inn Tuesday night, and the kids had more fun swimming than anything else. They had the indoor pool all to themselves.

We returned the next day driving back to Mesa through the Oak Creek Canyon and Sedona. That was an experience! The rather narrow, two-lane, winding canyon road descends about 4,000 feet into the canyon with numerous switchbacks. The scenery was wonderful, and we all had a good time. On Thursday, we packed up and headed back to Huntsville. But that's a story for another time.