Our Arizona Mini Vacation: The Meteor Crater

On our last day in Arizona we woke up in our hotel room, packed up the car and got on the road. It was another long day of driving ahead of us and we wanted to get home well before dinnertime. We did have one last stop on our itinerary, though, which was the meteor crater in Northern Arizona. Once Matt saw it was right along our route he was pretty much insistent we stop. And while a meteor crater isn't really my thing, I'm all about supporting Matt's love of space and learning some new stuff myself along the way.

So basically some 50,000 years ago, this meteor measuring 150 feet wide crashed into the Earth leaving behind a crater almost one mile wide and 550 feet deep. Pretty impressive. It's also the best preserved meteorite impact site on Earth, which is cool. They offer tours around the crater, but as usual, with our two-year-old tagging along, we decided to just breeze through the museum, then check out the crater ourselves and end with a quick stop at the gift shop.

 Walking up the stairs to get to the highest viewing point and the view out from the crater

Checking out the crater

A chunk of the meteor

Overall, the meteor crater was cool to see and I'm glad we went. It was another one of those natural wonders, though, that if you didn't stop and really think about what you were looking at the amazing-ness of it would be lost. I mean, a fiery ball fell from the sky and crashed into the Earth leaving behind a crater that could fit some 20 football fields. Crazy.

From there we hit up the gift shop where Ethan picked out a rock souvenir, Matt bought his own geode to crack open and I, of course, got a smooched penny. Everyone was happy. :) And then it was back to I-40 for us! Another 5 or so hours on the road and our 950+ mile roadtrip was complete. To say we were happy to be out of the car at that point would definitely be an understatement, but all that driving was totally worth it for the amazing sites we got to see. Sites unlike anything I'd ever seen before, and sites that I will keep with me for the rest of my life.