The Leone
Family Adventure

March 30 — Day 1

The Great Departure

Every great adventure begins with someone loading the Sprinter at an unreasonable hour. Jay took the wheel and barely left it for the next nine days — the unsung hero of the trip. The kids settled in immediately, locked onto YouTube, and proceeded to watch what can only be described as the entirety of the internet. By day two they had genuinely run out of new videos to watch. The van became its own little world at 70mph.

March 30 — Night 1

Paso Robles & The Allegretto

The first night set the tone for the whole trip. The Leones checked into the Allegretto Vineyard Resort — a sun-drenched Italian villa dropped into the wine country of Paso Robles. Mosaic courtyards, vineyard views, art and antiques around every corner, including a massive ancient Sequoia cross-section that stopped everyone in their tracks. Dana walked in and immediately felt at home. This was her place.

First order of business: dinner at The Taste Craft Eatery — a Guy Fieri favorite. The family committed fully, ordering every single one of his picks off the menu. Results were… mixed. Some were hits. Some were considerably less impressive. But that's the Guy Fieri experience — you order the whole menu and sort it out later.

Then a winery visit where the kids kept themselves occupied playing Crazy Eights in the corner so the adults could actually enjoy their wine. Back at the resort: pool, hot tub, the kind of evening that makes you forget tomorrow is a 9-hour drive. It was perfect.

March 31 – April 1 — Days 2–3

Sedona

Nobody told the Leones that driving into Sedona would feel like crossing into another dimension. One minute you're on a regular Arizona highway, squinting at scrubby desert, and then the road bends and suddenly — red rock formations the size of office buildings, glowing in the afternoon light like they've been on fire for ten million years. Everyone went quiet. Even the kids. Jay almost missed a turn.

The town itself was a delight — charming streets, good energy, the kind of place where every other store sells crystals and the other half sells more crystals. That first evening they found a great little brewery, had an excellent dinner, and stepped out into the night ready to explore. At which point they discovered Sedona's one significant flaw: it goes to bed at 8pm. Every crystal store — and there were dozens — dark. Locked. Dana cupped her hands against the glass of at least three of them. The geodes weren't going anywhere. Tomorrow.

The hike the next morning will go down in Leone family history as the moment they learned a crucial truth about their children: they hate hiking. To be clear, West Fork Trail is not a hike so much as a pleasant nature walk with some very photogenic creek crossings. It is the kind of trail that gets described as "easy" in guidebooks, the kind grandparents do. The Leone kids complained approximately from the first step. There were, to be fair, some genuinely spectacular bugs along the way — the kind that make everyone huddle together and stare — which produced a brief ceasefire. But the moment those bugs moved on, so did the grievances.

The real triumph came after, when the crystal stores opened and Dana was finally unleashed. Everyone left with rocks. The kids, who had spent the morning complaining about a walk, were now enthusiastic geologists. Sedona has that effect. The family could have used another two days here — there's more of it to love than one short stop allows. They'll be back. The crystals will be waiting.

April 1 — Day 3

Buckeye

Gigi isn't technically family. But she has been there since the day Dana was born, best friend to Dana's mom for longer than most people have been alive — and at 93 years old, she is very much the real thing. She lives in a beautiful home in a 55+ community in Buckeye, Arizona, and when the Leones pulled up, dinner was already in the oven. Of course it was. That's Gigi.

They ate, caught up, laughed, and then Gigi — with the energy of someone a full generation younger — insisted on showing them the clubhouse. Gym, restaurant, pools. Truly impressive setup. There was just one small complication: 55+ communities do not love children. This became clear when a fellow resident — call her the Clubhouse Karen — spotted the tour in progress and informed Phyllis, loudly, that kids were not allowed in here. The pools were empty. It was evening. No matter. The Leones were escorted out.

Which turned out to be fine, because the outdoor restaurant patio was honestly better anyway. The adults settled in for evening cocktails and actual conversation while the kids, left to their own devices, invented a game called Capture the Rock and then graduated to giant Jenga. Nobody questioned the rules of Capture the Rock. It seemed to work.

Back at Gigi's house, they played Yahtzee. It was supposed to be a relaxing wind-down. Instead it was a full commitment — the kind of game that keeps going just long enough that you realize you're too tired to stop and too invested to quit. They basically passed out mid-round. A perfect night's sleep followed. Jay and Dana were up early the next morning for a sunrise hike up the giant staircase right in the community — a beautiful climb with wide views over the Phoenix suburbs glowing in the morning light. Coffee after. Photos taken. Bags packed. Then on to the Grand Canyon.

It was a short stop but the right one. Gigi is 93 and you would never guess it. Seeing her was the whole point.

April 2 — Day 4

The Grand Canyon

There's nothing that can prepare you for the Grand Canyon — and yet it still manages to be exactly what you expected and nothing like it at the same time. A giant, ancient, windy hole in the earth with a river threading through the bottom. Magnificent. Terrifying. Real.

The most memorable part? The edge. The wind was whipping that day, adding a whole new dimension. Jay is happy to report that all three Leone kids have a perfectly healthy sense of mortality — they wanted absolutely nothing to do with the rim. Meanwhile, other visitors were dangling their feet over the edge for Instagram. A gust of wind away from a very different kind of story.

April 3–5 — Days 5–7

Zion — The Favorite

Zion hit differently from everything that came before it. The canyon walls — red and white and impossibly tall — the Virgin River threading through the valley floor, the charming town of Springdale right at the gate with its good restaurants, clean streets, and shops that actually stayed open past 8pm. From the moment they arrived, everyone felt it. This was the one.

And then came the audible. The Leones had been moving fast — barely a full day anywhere, windows down, Sprinter in drive, next stop, go. By the time they reached Zion, the math of what came next had started to feel insane: drive four hours to Capitol Reef, sleep, then eleven and a half hours straight to Pismo Beach. Jay looked at the map. Dana looked at Jay. The kids looked unconscious. They called it. Capitol Reef was out. One more night in Zion.

The small problem: no hotel. The search began in earnest — calls to every property in Springdale, calls to friends who might know someone near Las Vegas as a fallback, the whole operation. It was Easter weekend, spring break, and every room in the area had been booked since February. And then, somehow: a Best Western with availability. Not the fanciest room they'd ever slept in. It didn't matter. It had beds, it had a pool, and it was right there. The kids were in the water within twenty minutes of check-in.

With a real base of operations established, the family did two more hikes — which, to be clear, the kids still complained about, but with slightly less conviction now that they knew how the day would end. The second hike had real climbing involved, some narrow and precarious pathways, the kind of trail that demands full attention. Everyone rose to it. Along the way, someone started a game: find the coolest rock and find the rock that looks most like a heart. This was, it turned out, the secret to hiking with children. Give them a mission. The complaints evaporated. Pockets filled with rocks. Vinny found a geode — a real one — and has been promised it will be cracked open when they get home.

Crystal shopping followed, naturally. Multiple stores, serious deliberation, everyone left with something. The town of Springdale delivered on every front — great food, the Whiptail Grill for dinner with those canyon walls glowing gold behind it, the kids piling into an old wagon outside Hoodoos General Store like they'd been waiting their whole lives to do exactly that.

The last morning was Easter Sunday. Someone had packed bunny ears — nobody is taking credit for this but everyone is glad they did. The whole family wore them on the morning walk along the trail. Other hikers stopped. People laughed. Strangers wished them Happy Easter. One man said it was the best thing he'd seen all week. The Leones brought a little bit of something extra to Zion that morning, and the mountain gave it right back. They'll go back. That's already decided.

April 6–7 — Days 8–9

Pismo Beach — Dana's Place

Nobody in the Leone family had ever been to Pismo Beach. This turns out to have been a significant oversight. Because Pismo Beach is exactly what a beach is supposed to be — wide, flat, the sand going on forever in both directions, the water actually warm enough to enjoy, the weather the kind of sunny and perfect that feels like it was arranged specifically for you. Dana stepped onto the sand and visibly exhaled. This is the one. The inland mountains were beautiful. This was home.

And for the kids — perhaps most importantly — no hiking required. Just beach. Shells to collect, holes to dig, waves to watch, sand to sit in. No trail, no elevation gain, no parental optimism about how it's "not that far." The Leone children were finally, completely, entirely on board with the day's agenda. Jay noted this with quiet satisfaction.

The town itself was a gem — small, walkable, great food, fun shops, the kind of place that takes about twenty minutes to walk end to end and somehow still has everything you need. One day was clearly not going to be enough. Another audible was called. Two nights. Which meant that Tuesday — the second day — landed on Dana's birthday, and she got to spend it exactly where she wanted to be. Not bad planning for something that wasn't planned at all.

One evening they discovered the billiard hall downtown — a massive, old-school room that looked like it might have been a theater in a previous life, now packed with pool tables, other games, a serious beer selection, and good food. The whole family went. Air hockey was played. Pool was played. New friends were made — that part of the evening is Dana's story to tell, and she tells it well. The kind of night that happens when you stop planning and just walk through an interesting-looking door.

The hotel was right on the beach with a balcony overlooking the ocean. They slept with the doors open and let the sound of the waves do the rest. Jay and Dana were up early for a long beach walk while the kids — true to form — remained horizontal. The afternoon was beach and shopping. Dana did yoga on the sand, which was lovely, and even recruited the kids briefly, which was ambitious.

And then there was the chair. The food on this trip had been, by any measure, exceptional. Plentiful. Perhaps aggressively plentiful. Nine days of breweries and sliders and Grand Canyon cafeterias and Zion restaurants will, it turns out, take a toll. The Tommy Bahama beach chair never saw it coming. Jay sat down. The chair made a decision. It was over quickly. Almost as quickly as the chair gave way, so did Dana's bladder due to a fit of laughter. Needless to say, Jay is going on a diet. Dana is going to need new yoga pants. The chair is gone but not forgotten.

Day nine. Nine days, three states, twenty-five hundred miles, one Sprinter van, five Leones, and more memories than any of them will ever fully be able to count. The drive home was an easy five hours. Everyone slept. The van rolled back into El Dorado Hills, and just like that — it was over. Until next time.