58th Stop - Mesa / Tempe, AZ

Blog Post #69 - Written May 11, 2026

Stay: October 6-15, 2025

We woke up early(ish) and packed up for a longer drive.  We found our second scorpion while raising the stabilizers on the trailer. But then we were on our way to Tempe, AZ to visit Gary's parents on their mission. 

The kids were beyond excited to visit their grandparents. We took over their house with a bunch of stuff from the trailer, since the trailer was going to the shop for some repairs and maintenance.  Luckily, Kim and Sheri had a couple of spare rooms for us.

We loved joining Grandma and Grandpa on their morning walks.  Grandpa loved showing off all the pretty flowering cacti. 


Their neighborhood had a park with a basketball court, soccer field in a sinkhole, and a fun little playground that the kids often found friends to play with at.  




After our walks, Kim and Sheri would go off to the mission office and we'd do school and play in the morning, then go off on our adventures.  We did visit them at the Mission Office several times for lunch or to see all the good work they were doing; it was fun to meet the other senior couples and hear how much the Mission President and his wife loved Kim and Sheri. They're pretty amazing :)

We checked out some fun parks in the area.  It may have been fall, but it was still splash pad season in Arizona, so we found a few of them.  The kids amazed me at their dexterity and adventurous spirit.  They found this massive climbing tower that was probably 40-50 ft tall.  Z+Q climbed all the way to the top.  D also found a fun wobbly net that she practiced her balancing.



We met up with a few friends in the area too.  Chelsea and I grew up together in CA. We met up at a another park/splash pad to catch up.

We also met up with my old Young Women's leader, Kristie, and her littles.  I couldn't believe how big her kids were getting!  Unfortunately, our pictures got lost on my phone which died a couple weeks after this adventure :(

We had dinner with some good friends, Peter and Ellen, from Ohio. Their kids were adorable! We sure missed hanging out with them.

Gary and I took advantage of having babysitters and went on our first date in 6 months! We went to the Mesa Temple.  It was wonderful to be able to go together again.

The Tempe/Mesa area was a neat place to explore.  We checked out the Science Center in Tempe.  It was on the smaller side, but they had some neat exhibits.  My favorite was pyramid of mini sculpture heads.  



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We also went down to Coon Bluff to find the Salt River wild horses.  Our first hike was beautiful, but we didn't find any horses.  We did find a cool cliff trail that we hiked along.



We started to drive back into town and saw a bunch of people down by the Salt River.  We veered off the road, hoping to get a glance at some horses. And did we find them!  There were at least a dozen wild horses crossing the river, chewing up the grasses.  They were amazing! Their faces are rounder and their bodies are smaller than domesticated/bred horses. They mostly stayed in the river, where we could watch them without disturbing them.  But just as we were leaving, a couple of horses ran up to our bank and into the grasses next to us.  It was a beautiful place and an awesome experience!







We had a massive rainstorm one night.  The soccer field in the neighborhood was completely flooded, so the neighborhood kids used it as swimming hole.  D really enjoyed the puddles in the back yard.

We spent some of that rainy day doing school and puzzles that Grandma Farnsworth had given us of the National Parks.  The kids are puzzle fiends, so of course, they did all 16 of them.  By themselves haha.

One of Gary's favoriate BBQ restaurants is Rudy's, which he had found on a business trip in Texas. He was excited to learn there was a Rudy's just a few mile from his parent's house, so we made a quick trip to Rudy's to celebrate a fun time with Grandparents and Q's birthday... for like the 4th time haha.



Our final celebration was an epic dance party as Gary and I packed up.  I will never cease to be amazed at how much our stuff can travel throughout a house during a week.  Hopefully, we didn't forget anything.  Thanks again Grandma and Grandpa!!








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