Date: Tue, 29 Nov 94 11:53:16 PST
To: vacationers
Subject: My trip to the Grand Canyon "Rocks & Erosion Tour '94"
Status: RO


I've been roaming around the large, lumpy badlands of America since March
19th and I just returned Sunday.  Went to Las Vegas, then to the Grand
Canyon, then to monument valley, then to the arches national park then to
salt lake, then to Reno then back to the bay.  It's your basic
"Rocks and Erosion Tour, '94"  :)
I have close to 200 photos of rocks, basically.  What was I thinking?!?!
:)

Well, I was shooting in B&W (TMAX 100) and color (EKTAR 100) and now I need
to find a really professional shop around here to trust my photos to.
Normally I just take my photos to Costco, but they can't do the TMAX and
I'm not sure they do such a hot job anyway.  (They are cheap, though)

Well, the hour and a quarter of video I shot isn't all rocks.  There's some
trees and insects and even a plant.  :)  Oh, and there's water, too.

Lugging two cameras and a camcorder around for miles at 7500 feet up is
NOT the easiest thing to do, let me say.  Plus, the sandstorm at the Grand
Canyon didn't help my camcorder a whole lot.  Interesting squeaking sounds. :(
I'd walk about 10 feet, get something in my eyes, stand around in pain, then
walk another 10 feet, get something in my eyes, stand around in pain, then etc.

Anyway, I stayed at the fabulous MGM grand Hotel in Vegas.  Largest combined
Hotel/Casino/Wizard of OZ theme park in the world.  (Of course, if you're like
me, you probably can't even THINK of any other Hotel/Casino/Wizard of OZ theme
parks, but I guess I haven't traveled all that much).
I just kept hoping there wouldn't be a fire.

Also stayed at the Luxor Pyramid, which is a huge dark glass pyramid shaped
hotel.  It has several searchlights on top pointing straight into the sky which
act as a beacon to attract gamblers as well as attracting a year's supply of
bugs and bats.  The elevators also run up the sides of the hotel at 39 degree
angles, so you wind up holding on to the railing tightly and kind of swaying
down the hallway after you get out.  They also have a sort of Egyptian theme
park in the middle of their pyramid.  I'm sure it's the largest
Hotel/Casio/Egyptian theme park in the world, but then again, maybe it isn't.
:)
(as an anecdote, for the most expensive place we stayed in ($139/night) we
slept the worst because you couldn't open your dark glass window and it was
stuffy because you had to depend on the centralized air trickle)

Also saw the Hoover Dam.  Impressive engineering acomplishment.
Impressive control over nature.  Also impressive traffic.  They are building
a parking garage next to the Dam apparently for the express purpose of backing
up traffic on the Highway for miles around.  Took hours just to GET to the
dam and we parked quite a ways away and took the shutttle.  There is no
place to park on or near the dam, (until they finish the garage, anwyay)
in case you were thinking of driving there anytime soon.
Since we were there, we took the dam tour through the middle.  It was pretty
interesting, too.  Lots of big stuff.  Big pipes, big generators, big cement
blocks and big people trying to stuff into the elevator with you.

The Grand Canyon was, well, bigger.  Over 200 miles long, 10 miles across, and
a mile deep.  Went early in the morning to catch some tours and it was
just above freezing out.   Brrrrr.  Then it started to get warmer and windier
later in the day while trying to take more tours.  Eventually the wind came up
and the aforementioned sand and chunks of gravel did too.
No, I didn't hike to the bottom or ride on burros to the bottom do anything
at all involving the bottom of the canyon.  :)
Okay, I looked at it.  But only briefly as it required standing on the
gravelly, windy edge.
As a note, the water at the Grand Canyon is actually very good (especially
compared to the water on the rest of the trip which had that yummy reservoir
taste, mmmmm.) since it was pumped up from natural springs on the North side.

We saw the Hopi monument, which was some pueblos built in a big cave on the
side of a cliff.  This was cool, even though we couldn't get very close.
I'm not sure we would have wanted to anyway because it would have required
hiking back up a cliff and if you'll recall my earlier griping about the
altitude and having too many cameras, you'll understand why that's not so fun.
(also it was getting late and adding darkness with no flashlights to the mix
is really asking for trouble)

The next stop on the erosion tour was to see Monument valley, which had lots
of rocks.  Apparently they were red.  There was lots of sand and heat, too.
Oh, and the rocks were sticking up out of the sand in lots of interesting
mesas.  There really isn't a whole lot to say about this area.
Wait for the pictures (or catch the movie! ;)


(can anybody tell that the vacationer was starting to get tired? :)


Then we saw a bunch of desert, and visited the Arches national park.
(Oh, and I forgot the indian craft stands.  Lots and lots of indian crafts
stands.)  The arches were really cool.  Enormous sandstone arches spanning
rock fins.  More erosion at work, erodes the mountains into large fins
and the middles fall out leaving arches.  One hopes that nature doesn't decide
to burp and have a middle fall out creating a beautiful and glorious arch
right on top of your head while you are standing around underneath.

Then came the exciting trek through soldier summit (pass).  This pass is at
8500 feet which doesn't seem like much of a pass, in my humble opinion.
Especially since while going up it, it started raining.  Then the rain turned
to snow.  Hard, white out snow.  Then the snow started to stick.  To the road.
To several inches on the road.  And still going UP.  
Don't you ever reach the top of that thing?! 

There isn't much to say about Provo.  Big mountains sitting right next to the
town.  Quite impressive when the sky clears enough to see them.

Went and smelled the Great Salt Lake.  Mmmmmm.  Odoriferous.  Had a hard time
>finding< the lake, actually.  Not too many roads go near it.
(see aforementioned odoriferousness :)
Saw antelope island.  Didn't see any antelopes on the island but some buffalo
which were so far away they could have been cows, or possibly volkswagons,
but the signs said they were buffalo and I have no reason to doubt it.

Back in Salt Lake City, saw America's first department store (ZCMI),
saw the temple square and the Mormon tabernacle and met and shook hands with
several young female members of the pleasant Mormon recruiting force. :)

Then headed off to Reno.  Saw the salt flats on the way, which were still
covered with water and tire ruts from people who thought the salt flats
were more solid than they actually were at this time in the season.

At Reno I managed to win over $7 (woooo) while I was talking to a girl from
Canada and not paying attention to what I was gambling.  The moment I started
paying attention and trying to "beat the system" I lost all my winnings. :/
Except for $2 which I kept to pay me back for the two I spent in Vegas.
(Yes, as you can tell, I'm Mr. Gambler)

After that it was back to Mountain View and collapsed, exhausted.  :)

Tune in next week for:
Dave's exciting adventure to New Jersey!
(Yes, no kidding, HP is sending me there (New Jersey- armpit of the US) for
a week on business.)

Oh, and in case you were wondering why I went->  I needed a vacation.  :)