The Road to Yuma

Geocaching is an activity that our family enjoys doing. When out rucking, driving or any time we are someplace new my wife will pull out her phone and see if there are any geocaches around us.

We knew we'd be visiting her parents in Arizona this summer, so when she received a notice that one of her trackables had been dropped off at a Travel Bug Hotel we were intrigued.

A three hour drive to drop off a piece of plastic and metal seemed a bit crazy without a few other stops. But, we knew we had to do it.

Pulling up the handy Roadtrippers app, I found a few other destinations and we headed out for the day.

My in-laws had rented a van for the week and since they could only drive it, I found myself as the navigator.

Our first stop was The Painted Rock Petroglyph Site located twelve miles off of Highway 8 near Gila Bend, Arizona.

I think the over 110 degree temperatures messed with my in-laws Tom-Tom unit because we soon found ourselves on dirt roads going through the desert.

I've got a good sense of direction and had no idea where it was trying to bring us.

The final straw was when in the middle of nowhere it told us to turn left and this is what we were looking at.

After that, I declared that I was only going to be using Google Maps because I didn't trust the unit.

After a little re-routing we made it to the petroglyph site and it was amazing.

Some might call it a pile of rocks, but these rocks were covered with paintings older than most of us can imagine.

I have never seen so many petroglyphs in my life so this stop meant a lot to me.

Since we were out of the car, I took some time to walk around and snap photos before me or my camera melted.

We loaded back in the van and of course Laura had found a nearby geocache so we jumped out and climbed up a short hill to find the hidden ammo box under a pile of rocks. I left a trackable I brought with me as it seemed a fitting spot for it.

There was a simple twelve mile trek back to the highway or there was an option to take a sweeping arch through the dessert and pick the highway up further down the road.

Of course, I chose the option that didn't have us going where we had already been. Where is the fun ever in that?

It ended up being longer and more remote than I had expected, but it was beautiful to be the only one on the road for mile after mile with the only signs of civilization being long abandoned.

My friend Aliza recently moved out of Yuma and suggest we go to Tacos Mi Rancho for lunch and as soon as we pulled in the parking lot, I knew I was going to like it.

One of those places that you'd drive by without a second thought, but you'd be missing out on to die for carnitas, tacos and great Mexican food.

I'll never forget Emily ordering "something with shrimp" and then being given a bowl of shimp soup on a 113 degree day. It tasted great, but we both assume the cooks must have been wondering who the silly gringa was ordering soup on such a hot day.

With full bellies we set off to visit The Peanut Patch (it was closed until October) and The Muffler Man (not as big as we hoped) before leaving Yuma.

As we jumped back on the highway, we stopped at the one spot that had brought us here.

Nestled between the road, the river and the RV park we found our Travel Bug Hotel that we had come across the country to find. We dropped a few off and pick up a few to bring with us.

It was a long, hot and giggle filled day and worth every minute of it.

Here is how I shared it on Snapchat.

[video youtube="jQ40eKr7ZWc"][/video]