The stars are brightly shining. It is the night of the dear saviors birth.

O’Holy night.

I had a hard time trying to figure out what to share with everyone for this Christmas eve. We didn’t get to take our yearly road trip to see the luminaries this year. This is a tradition of ours every year.

The holiday event was scheduled for December 3^rd I believe. Just wasn’t in our plans this year. They say everything happens for a reason, guess we were meant to stay home this Christmas. I can still share with you all the last visit we took. It’s such a beautiful site to see. Much better in person though. I tried my best to capture some of it through my photos.

The drive to the ruins is also beautiful. We left the city during the daylight even though this is a night time event. We wanted to explore the ruins in the daylight.

The desert scenery, the stones in all sizes, shapes and colors, so pretty, everything. Imagine how long this structure has stood the test of time. This is what I will always remember Arizona being about, having been born and raised here my whole life, this is Arizona to me. This is why is so hard to see so many changes happening here. I will try to stay away from that subject and instead only share the pretty with you in this post, I have to be careful about that, all writers do. Sometimes we can’t help but share too much. I lust love this state and I can’t stand seeing what’s happening to it.

Before we got to the event first we stopped off at the old church in town.

Besh Ba Gowah has this event every year. These are the ruins from the ancient Salado people. They occupied the site nearly 800 years ago. We got to the ruins when daylight was still around but sunset was coming soon.

And slowly, like sleep taking over, the sun drifted away. The light started to change colors, like a switch was being turned down ever so slowly. The magic hour is what it’s call, all you artists and photographers out there know exactly what I am writing about with that statement. When God turns down the lights to prepare us all to rest, letting us all know that tomorrow the sun will come up another day to shine it’s rays on beautiful images all over again, and until then remember the beauty from the day before with how the light touches everything before night comes.

There are thousands of luminaries at this event, 4,000 of them. They use candles to light each bag. Several volunteers light all the candles by hand, all before the sunset. There is another Luminary event in this state but this one at Besh Ba Gowah is the best one I have experienced. I like that they use real candles not electric lights like the other place here in our state that has luminaries that charge over $30 per person to see their event.

Besh Ba Gowah is a free event. When you have a family of four that can save a lot of money. Also this event helps out people in need with food donations and helps support small businesses and Native American artists. The event has food vendors and local Native Americans selling their art. You can support this free event by buying items at the event and bringing food to donate. These are all reasons why I would always recommend this one over the other one that is in the city of Phoenix.

It was getting really dark and it was getting late. It’s hard to see when it gets dark at the ruins. There is one area around the ruins where there is a huge drop off and hole in the ground. Best to always go early to be safe. Lots of rocks to stumble around in the dark if you are not careful. Even with 4,000 luminaries, it’s still dark in most areas. Plus it gets super crowded the longer you are there.

We had to drive back to the city about an hour away and it was starting to rain. My husband asked me if I wanted to head up to Our Little Red House which was probably an hour away from where we were at. I told him NO WAY. The back roads from where we were are high up in the cliffs.

The back roads to our place in the middle of no where involves some pretty serious cliffs. It goes from desert to pine. Up high on some of the cliffs there is snow. Not a lot of traffic or homes on the back roads. Not a place to be when a storm blows in. It is dark and scary and secluded. You don’t want to break down up in the high country during a Winter storm. You can drive hours and hours here in Arizona and not see a living soul in that time, just huge open spaces everywhere. We have our truck packed for emergencies all the time and we have 4 wheel drive , plus snow tires but still…no thank you. I did not want to take a drive to the cabin up north using that route late at night with a storm blowing in. Of course my husband was teasing, but he does love adventures, maybe not.

We headed back to the city and once home stayed inside all cozy and warm thinking about another amazing Christmas adventure to store in our memory bank. Merry Christmas everyone. Stay warm, stay healthy and may God bless you all on this Christmas eve.

Truly He taught us to love one another. His law is love and His gospel is peace.

O Holy night.