At over 19,300 feet, Cotopaxi is very high. It’s the second highest peak in Ecuador (after Chimborazo). It is the third highest active volcano on the planet. Because of its proximity to the equator and the equatorial bulge caused by the spin of the earth, its peak is nearly 6,000 feet further from the center of the Earth than than the center of the earth is from the highest point on Mount Everest. ...

We skipped breakfast today because we were headed out to an all-day walking food tour of Quito. Breakfast is included with our room, and it’s probably a nice spread, but we decided to get a little extra sleep this morning. We ate late last night and really overdid it and we will probably be eating early and often on the food tour this morning, so eating breakfast would have been a mistake. Instead, we just met in the lobby of the hotel and then grabbed an Uber to take us to the center of the old town where we would start our walking tour of the city. ...

This is going to be an interesting trip. We bought our airplane tickets just two days ago. We drove home late Monday evening after camping in Canyonlands. Wednesday around noon Brett said he found cheap tickets to Quito this week and we had 2 hours to decide if we were going. We have talked about visiting Ecuador for years. Our only choice was to say yes. So we bought tickets Wednesday afternoon to fly out at the crack of dawn Friday morning. We drove to Salt Lake Thursday after work and started planning the trip that night. We figured out a good outline of what we wanted to do and see, booked the first few hotels and activities, and went to bed sometime after midnight. About 4 hours later we were driving to the airport. I think that’s a record turnaround for us. ...

One of my favorite national parks is Canyonlands National Park. The confluence of the Green and Colorado Rivers is the center of the park, dividing it into three distinct and disconnected districts. To the north of the Colorado and east of the Green lies the most visited district of the park: Island in the Sky. To the west of the Green and the north of the Colorado lies The Maze, which is one of the most remote places in the lower 48 states. To the south and east of the Colorado river lies The Needles. It’s not as easy to access as Island in the Sky, with its paved roads and close proximity to Moab. It’s not nearly as remote as The Maze, which takes a full day of technical driving to reach. ...

This morning we got the bad news that none of our geo-fenced lottery permits had come through. It wasn’t too surprising, but it meant we had no plans for the day. Should we just call it and drive home? Should we try to find some other feature to explore? We opted to visit one of the other amazing places inside Vermilion Cliffs National Monument that Mark had heard about. None of us knew anything about it other than it’s usually pretty crowded because it’s supposed to be pretty awesome. I have never hiked Coyote Buttes at all. I haven’t seen The Wave in person. But I can’t imagine it’s any better than what we experienced at White Pocket. This place was amazing and we had it completely to ourselves. There were a couple people there when we arrived, but they all left before we walked out to the formations. It doesn’t get better than that. ...

Mother’s Day weekend is a great weekend to go camping. Nobody else is doing it. We decided to head east to Kanab, Utah with some of our friends from Orem. It never turns out how we thought we wanted it to, but sometimes it turns out great. This was one of those times. When we decided to move to Southern Utah, I thought we would probably visit Zion National Park all the time. It’s been 18 months and we haven’t been even once. We actually visited Zion more often when we lived hundreds of miles away. That may seem pretty pathetic until you realize we are surrounded by magical places that we haven’t ever seen. One of those places is Vermillion Cliffs National Monument. ...

Another Sweet Marriott Suite Driving into Amman was an interesting experience. It’s a big city. It’s a modern city with skyscrapers. All the buildings are white and/or glass. We wound around the city until we arrived at the Marriott Amman. It’s a very nice hotel, but there are very few properties that can compare favorably to where we stayed last night (the Al Manara in Aqaba). That was really something. The staff here in Amman were extremely generous. Not only did they upgrade us to a suite, but they also provided a gift card to eat free at one of the on-site restaurants. We went to the sports bar and had a reall good hamburger before heading off to bed. ...

There are three main ways to drive between Aqaba and Amman. When we drove from Amman to Aqaba a few days ago, we took the center route (highway 35). Today, on our way back from Aqaba to Amman, we decided to take the western route (highway 65) along the shores of the Dead Sea. I think the eastern route (highway 15) may actually be the “fastest” way, but it didn’t look very interesting, so we never took it. ...

As we drove into Aqaba after a long day in Wadi Rum, we saw a Safeway. We tend to visit grocery stores to buy drinks and snacks and it was pretty exciting to see a name like Safeway. Al Manara When planning this trip, we knew the stay in Aqaba needed to be a nice respite from camping in the desert of Wadi Rum. So we booked the ultra luxurious Al Manara by Marriott. It turned out to be even swankier than we anticipated. It was super nice and we got upgraded to a huge suite overlooking the bay. It’s the type of place that put a hand-written note, addressed to me, in our room before we got to it. And there was a big plate of really fancy sweets. I may have decided I love macaroons after that. Such a fun thing to have when you first walk in. ...