Because we went hot air ballooning this morning, we had to get up at 4am. Yes, FOUR IN THE MORNING. Ugh. We packed our stuff, Lauren is still sick, and then got into vans taking us there by 4.45. The sun started rising just after 5 and by the time we got to the place where the balloons were taking off from, it was sunny and stinking hot already. The balloons were HUGE, about 10 storeys I think the guide said and because they have to use fire to make the balloon rise, it seemed even hotter. Once the balloon was inflated, our balloon man made three people get into the basket so that he could stand everything up without it flying off. But he misjudged something and the basket (with the three people still in it) went flying onto its side, so they were all lying on top of each other. It was super unsettling to watch, to be honest.
However the ride was easy, a little scary, but nice. It’s a weird feeling just floating in the air. We got an amazing view of Phoenix and passed over a shooting range where we could hear the shots even from where we were.
The ride was about an hour or so and when we were back on the ground we got given a champagne breakfast. Obviously he thought we were all over 21. Rookie.
After that we headed to the general store for some water and waited for the coach to pick us up and take us to Sedona. Once we got there it was hot, but more like an Adelaide summer – so, hot but with a nice warm breeze. It’s a small desert town but it’s actually really beautiful, and apparently lots of celebs think so too. We got lunch then headed off on a Jeep tour through the mountains and cowboy area. I thought the ride would be so fun and really fast, but our guide was a girl and while the other jeeps seemed to be doing fun stuff and going fast, our lady went fast for like 10 seconds and for the rest of the drive she was super slow. Not happy! We had a group pic with the whole tour at an old cowboy house and then headed back to the coach.
We then had a fair drive to the Grand Canyon so Andy decided to make us do a quiz. He played different songs and we had to say which shows they were the theme song of. Since he only seemed to have 80s songs (with a few exceptions) in the quiz, Lauren and I did pretty bad. We DID, however, know the hills and the full house soundtracks, score!
We stopped on the way to our accommodation to take a look at the canyon and it is HUUUUUUGE. I seriously thought the Grand Canyon was two cliffs with a hole in the middle but boy, was I wrong. It’s quite a sight and helicoptering over it tomorrow will be really amazing.
We’re staying in little cabins that join onto the cabin next door at the canyon, and our accommodation is epic because we are literally staying right on the rim. There’s nothing else around though, so we have to make our own fun.
After dinner we had a room party where we all went to one room and had some drinks with everyone. Lauren still wasn’t feeling well, so I went over with some of the other girls. Everything was going fine until about 11pm when two security guards showed up. A couple of us youngies weren’t drinking by then but he was still coming around asking for I.Ds, so when he stepped outside for a moment, we ran into the toilet and jumped out the window (which is about the size of a regular toilet window and really high up). It was pretty funny but we got away fine, one girl decided not to jump, however, and got fined by the copper. Poor thing. But Mum, please don’t get mad or worried by this story! It’s funny and something I’ll always remember from this Contiki. In fact Andy even thanked us for jumping out the window because he could have been in heeeeeeeeeeeeeaps of trouble. So really, we were doing the right thing J
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