Ever since I was a teen I have had a core group of friends that went on a roadtrip or two every year. Initially, it was started to check off every Major League Baseball stadium in the country. That was expanded to other sports, from NASCAR to hockey, and to include national parks and other, sometimes bizarre, points of interest. Some people were subbed in and out for others over the years- myself included, and the schedules for work and life have become more of a priority for everyone the older we get. Still, nothing beats riding across the country watching the world go by out the window. Christmas break allowed my brother, my girlfriend, and myself to fly out to Las Vegas for a week and meet up with my best friend who lives in St. Louis. From there, we drove out east to Meteor Crater, Canyon Diablo, Horseshoe Bend, Monument Valley, Four Corners, and the Grand Canyon. And of course spent a little time in the casinos. This was my second time visiting Sin City, the first was during the Spring Break of 2012, which was also paired with flying out to Portland to cover the VCU vs. Indiana matchup in the round of 32 of the NCAA tournament. The beautiful landscapes and natural wonders we saw out west are something that I will never forget. Canyon Diablo, one of the lesser known stops on the trip, is a ghost town in Arizona that holds the remains of a boomtown spurred by the construction of the transcontinental railroad. The biggest unexpected highlight of the journey was coming across a tour of some 193 million year old dinosaur tracks in the Kayenta formation of Arizona. Had it not been for a winter sunset over the Grand Canyon, seeing the footprints, fossils, and eggs of dinosaurs like dilophosaurus, t-rex, and velociraptors easily would have been my favorite part.