No one in our family had ever been to Oklahoma before and we weren’t really sure what to visit that wouldn’t be overly time consuming. Shannon did some research and found the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge in southwest Oklahoma.
That is exactly where we headed after our tour of AT&T Stadium. We hadn’t seen mountains like this in a few days and also were able to see some bison up close!!
After leaving the refuge, we made the 3.5-hour drive to Amarillo where we spent the night.
Just west of Amarillo, is the Cadillac Ranch. Shannon and I had been there with her parents 14 years ago. We enjoyed taking the boys there this time!
We all enjoyed spray-painting the Cadillacs!!
On the way to Albuquerque, we took some short detours to drive through a couple small towns on the historic Route 66.
We continued West on Interstate 40 and quickly found ourselves in New Mexico and the Mountain Time Zone!
It was only a couple more hours west and we found were in Albuquerque, which was our destination for the night. Our first stop was at Petroglyph National Monument.
We enjoyed the short and slightly strenuous hike to see the Native Petroglyphs (carvings/pictures in rocks)!
The 94-degree temperature made the hike a little extra challenging, and we are all thankful for the air conditioning of Panda Express for dinner! Haha!
We finished off the day by walking the streets of Old Town Albuquerque!
The following day would see yet another new state for the boys – Arizona!
As I was looking at the route between Albuquerque and Flagstaff, I noticed Petrified Rocks National Park just sitting there right beside the highway. We decided to add it to our agenda for the day!
After a quick stop at the visitor center, we made our way to the entrance station and purchased our America the Beautiful pass. This will allow us access to all National Parks for one year!
The road through the park was 28 miles long and we made several stops along the way. Our first stop was to see the Painted Desert!
Next up was the Newspaper Rock to see some more Petroglyphs!
One of our favorite stops at the park was the Blue Mesa Trail. This one-mile loop trail allowed us to get up close with some of the petrified wood! The mountains surrounding the trail were beautiful as well!
Our next post will include our time at Sedona and Grand Canyon National Park!!!
Ramsey Party of Five 
Nice to see the smiles on your merry band of travelers. Someday I will share about our time in Albuquerque. Let’s just say trying to find historic area after dark was not happening and only a few blocks away. We did find on return !!!!
stay safe and enjoy 🚘❣️
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I’m looking forward to that story! 😅
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