Las Vegas - Grand Canyon

  Tusayan, Arizona, United States
Saturday, July 12, 2008

12 July, from Las Vega$ to Grand Canyon

 30°C/86°F sunny in the morning, later 30°C/86°F but clowdy with rain

About half past six we woke up and quietly packed our bags. At 07.00 we took the time to enjoy our breakfast of Treasure Island. It took us about an hour and then we were on the road again.

Hoover Dam

At half past nine we arrived at Hoover dam.It seemes not so large  from a distance, but as we approached it, it got bigger and bigger and proved to be a impressive piece of work! For $7 we parked our car in the first parking we encountered. This turned out not to be necessary. If we had wanted to spent more time on Hoover dam, and for example had taken an excursion, it would be a good solution where the car wouldn't be in the sun, but as we just stopped for a short walk to the dam, we better had driven just at the real beginning of the dam where there is, on the left side, a small parking place for free. But seeing the dam itself is spectacular, therefore worth to park, either short or long. Especially the enormous altitude which you can feel in your nerves when you look down from the top. We walked around for half an hour before we drove further. 

Route 66

About half past eleven we came by a town called Kingsman. At this point we leave the highway and turn on to Route 66. Route 66 follows the same route as the highway but it is nevertheless a bit more nostalgic and a very nice route to drive. A nice spot on the route is a shop called Hackberry store, where we arrived after driving for about 15 minutes on Route 66. The shop is located in nowhere and is entirely filled with old carstuff and things beyond your imagination. Both in and outside, all kinds of memories from past times lie, hang or stand in the form of a car, photograph, clothing, all kinds of stuff that was once left behind by people we will never know. We took the time to look around and wanted to buy some icecoffee. My patience and expirationdate of the icecoffee were heavily put to the test because the customer before me and the lady of the shop took their time to share personal and no need to know rubbish about themselves with each other, other then this agravation, this shop is worth a visit! 

Hackberry store

We continued Route 66 and arrive at 15.00 in Tusayan. We checked in and because it is, however, warm but also very rainy weather with thunders over the canyon, we decide to relax a little in our room at the Quality Inn & Suites. We have a large room, but the bed which is supposed to be a king size, made itself small by looking like a queen size. To be sure I contact the reception if they are certain that this room has a king size bed. This bed has the size wich we have got used to as a Queen size, but according to the hotel it is really a king-size?!.

We go to the local steakhouse and must admit that although the steak is okay the ambiance is a little less. It is very busy, noisy and the tables appear very close to each other.

After eating we went to the Imax theatre beside the hotel. Here we watch for $12,50 pp the film about the Grand Canyon, and that was the money entirely worth, beautiful views of the Canyon packed into a tale about the discovery of the Canyon! Forget the tale and only enjoy the views!
At our room we watched a less impressive but nice film and close the day with a wine....or two ;-) 

We drove a large distance today: 294 miles.