So here we are again. Apologies for our tardiness but we’ve been busy 🙂.

We returned to the Grand Canyon and did indeed manage to walk down some way in to it. You cannot walk down to the Colorado (far too far and approximately 4500ft of descent/ascent) but we did manage to get 1300ft down and back up. It is a very different view from inside the canyon. We also saw more Elk, meandering around like there was nobody there 😄.

The following day we left our peaceful Airbnb in the desert and headed to the bright lights of Las Vegas. On the way we visited the Hoover dam, which we have done before but a very long time ago, and took the tour into the power station. Of all the interesting facts we learnt the one that sticks in our heads is that the dam is 660ft thick, solid concrete, at the bottom. Very difficult to imagine! Really interesting place to go.

We arrived in Vegas that evening, and spent the next day in the mountains, hiking on Mount Charleston ⛰. We had a good hike and then popped in to the local hotel place for some lunch. That is when it happened. First of all Mr Nev Taylor sent us a picture of the door to the Aria hotel (where we were staying)…..then another picture of his legs and what looked very suspiciously like Mr Al Patches legs, lounging by a pool in the sun. At that point was realised it had happened again 😯!!!! They appeared without warning in NYC, and now they appeared without warning in LV. Not only that but they were staying in the connected hotel next door, they had a hire car, they weren’t leaving before Tuesday (as we weren’t), they had NASCAR tickets (as we did) and it was Al’s birthday on the Sunday 🎂.

What followed was a great 2 days, 3 nights, of doing Vegas stuff. This included but was not limited to gambling, eating, drinking, going to the NASCAR race and generally exploring, finding many things that weren’t there 13 years ago when we went. We also visited a Titanic exhibition which has the largest piece of the ship ever recovered, as well as many other things. Very interesting. On the last evening we went up to Freemont Street (old strip) as it is more affordable to gamble at the tables there. We had great fun and……Mr Taylor took the house for $1000 at the roulette table 🥳.

We all left today, Al and Nev heading on for a few days golfing and continuing the gambling (still in Nevada), we heading to the next stop on the trip, La Quinta in California. We all melted as temperatures are still between 35-40 degrees 🥵🌞. Fingers crossed they’ll drop a little soon. More exploring for all tomorrow in our respective locations.