Hey guys! Quick post about our day yesterday. We went to the town of Big Pine for breakfast because we had seen an adorable looking country kitchen there the day before. We asked our very nice waitress about Death Valley, and she gave us a motherly warning about the danger, and that it's called "death" valley for a reason. So after breakfast we filled up the gas tank, topped off the coolant, filled our water bottles, and cautiously headed south listening to Elijah's new Death Valley playlist. As we entered the park at a 4000 ft elevation, the same as in big pine, I was shocked that the temperature didn't instantly jump to 100 degrees. I was also surprised at how mountainous the terrain was. I always thought of the desert as just flat sand for as far as you could see, but as we drove in, there were hills all around that varied from red rock, to dirt with small green plants, to bare sand. It was absolutely beautiful. Our next shocker was the first time we tried to get out of the car to take a picture and I almost fell over. The wind was blowing at an amazingly high speed, which made it hard to take many pictures. We drove down from 4000 feet to 1000 feet uncomfortably fast, and then jumped back up and back down. The car was not happy. Finally we drove into a tiny little country town in the middle of the park that had a sign that read "elevation: sea level". I took a picture. Until this point it had only been in the 80s, so we figured it would be safe to get out and have lunch at the little saloon. When we got back to the car, the thermometer read 108 degrees. Surprisingly it didn't feel unbearably hot, but nonetheless we were ready to get out of there. It was a pretty eerie place because it was beautiful, but at the same time uncomfortable, seeing the huge expanse of desert with no one to save you if things went wrong. We hurried on, only stopping at the visitors center for some souvenirs, of course.
Once safely out of Death Valley, we set off for Las Vegas! It has been a very surreal feeling this whole trip to tell people things like "oh yeah we went to Yosemite, then Death Valley, then Vegas, then Grand Canyon." Very strange. Anyways, we stayed at the same hostel chain that we stayed at in San Fran, and got our room for $34. We went out last night to see the strip, and went to the section with Paris, NY, and Caesar's Palace. We saw Elvis, a ninja, and hello kitty, and more show girls than I ever care to see again. Apparently, girls really do get up on poker tables and dance around in their underwear at casinos. I had always hoped that was just a Hollywood exagguration. Guess not. We decided that the strip was a little too expensive for us, so we headed back to our area for the casinos with 99 cent margaritas. Its a strange town, but we had fun and are now ready for the Grand Canyon. We saw a sign for Dunkin Donets last night for the first time in weeks, and so we are headed there now to get my fix.
We will try to post after the Grand Canyon on the way to Zion if we can find service. Hopefully, we will be at the bottom of the canyon at this time tomorrow!
Until next time,
Laura
No comments:
Post a Comment