El Paso, TX

Originally we had planned to stop at the Petrified Forest and Painted Desert after the Grand Canyon. Due to the government shutdown, those plans were thwarted, so we directly moved on to El Paso, TX, with plans to return to the Grand Canyon and Petrified Forest in the future.

My sister, V, lives in El Paso and as it was only about 3.5 hours off our route we made a stop here to visit. I’ll take advantage of any opportunity to get to see her, as seeing some of my family is often too far and few between for my liking. She has just recently gotten engaged so it was a great opportunity to celebrate with her and her fiancé, A! My Dad was even able to fly in short notice and A’s parents were also in town.

We all went to Cattleman’s Steakhouse the first evening to congratulate V & A on their engagement, driving the Scenic Drive and stopping at the viewpoint on the way.

One morning we went out for a nice brunch. 

Here are my sister’s dogs and cat. Cuties!

She also has two horses. We were on our way to meet her at the farm one morning, but instead ended up with this.

Well at least the tires lasted this long. We knew it would be time to get new ones once we got to Denver, so it had to be done just a little bit early.

We had a BBQ at A’s house one evening. I love this picture!

Of course we had to head over to Famous Dave’s one night. When you have a large group of people you can’t beat the tasty and large variety you get on their “trash can lid” dinners!

Another evening V and I pulled out all the stops on some awesome German cooking.

It was a great visit and sad to say goodbye. At least we may not have so long to wait; with the holidays coming up we may see some of them again soon.