With the rowing season over, Diana and I had time to take a quick vacation. It was only 5 days... more like 4 days... actually when you think about it the trip was really 3 days. We left on Wednesday night and got back on Sunday.
We got into Vegas late Wednesday night and picked up the rental car. After driving around the hotel a few times looking for the self parking (they definitely want people to use the valet) we made it to our room around 11 pm. We took an hour to walk around the casino before going to bed.
Thursday we woke up early to drive north to
Zion National Park in southern Utah. The drive was pretty interesting with the large mountains and very different topography. Never being to that part of the country, I didn't know what to expect and didn't realize that the mountains would be so big. We crossed into mountain time and arrived in Zion before noon. After stopping by the visitor center, we went to the campground to reserve a site, and then headed farther into the park to do some hiking.
The main hike we wanted to do was "Angel's Landing" which is about 5 miles round trip with 1,500 ft of elevation gain up to a peak at just under 6,000 ft. The hike has some pretty steep sections over the first 2 miles but the path is all paved so it isn't technically difficult, but the last 0.5 miles is essentially mild rock climbing. The "trail" has chains to hold on to for support to keep from falling off the 1,000+ ft cliffs. Definitely a must if you go to Zion.
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| Watch your step |
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Diana climbing with the cliffs in the background
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| At the top of Angel's Landing |
After the hike we went to set up camp and went into town for some dinner.
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| Campsite! |
The weather started to turn as we were going to bed that night and we woke several times to very high winds and rain. The rain stopped sometime during the night and everything was so dry that the tent and ground were all dry when we woke up. We broke down camp and started to head out to breakfast when I noticed we had a completely flat tire. That wasn't going to stop us... I changed the tire, we ate breakfast, and went to do one more hike.
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| Changing a tire in the visitor center parking lot |
The rain started back up and we didn't know how long it would take to get the flat fixed so we left a little before noon to head back towards Vegas. A short pit stop at the St. George Walmart took care of the tire and then we were back at the hotel. We took some time to walk around the strip and got some dinner before trying out some blackjack and then going to bed.
Friday started early again and we left to go to the
Hoover Dam. We made the short drive and were some of the first people to the dam visitor's center. To say the dam is massive is an understatement and the fact that it was built in the 1930's is incredible. The water level in Lake Mead was pretty low as seen by the "bath ring" marking the high water level.
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| Upstream side of the Dam |
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Me and the Dam
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| Downstream side of the dam |
We grabbed lunch in
Boulder City, which is the city that developed from all of the workers who built the dam. The area around Lake Mead was very scenic.
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| Lake Mead |
Once back in Vegas, we practiced our blackjack skills in the room and then went out for a night on the strip. It is crazy how big and over the top everything is. You could get lost for days in some of those casinos (the Venitian in particular). We had tickets to Cirque Du Soleil "O" which was very impressive and then found a good $5 table to play some blackjack. Of course, we didn't win big, but we didn't lose too much.
The next day was travelling back to Wisconsin and to the Cassie Pup who had a dog sitter while we were gone. Overall it was a great trip and a nice break from everything. Now bring on the holiday season.
