22.4.2012 – 22.4.2012  39 °C

We deliberately started early today as we knew the temp in Death Valley was going to be in the high 30s and potentially hit 40 deg. The landscape slowly became drier and drier the more easterly we drove until we hit the edge of the park. Death Valley is renowned for being the lowest point on earth and being a scorching hot desert. It lived up to both expectations today and blew us away in many other ways.

Firstly, the valley is just that, a valley between two pretty large mountain ranges (one of the ranges has mountains up to 11000 feet). For some reason, I had always pictured Death Valley to be a flat barren wasteland covered in bleached bones (you know cow skull style)… for those who haven’t been here.. it is nothing like that! The valley basin is a flat dry wasteland, covered in salt minus the bleached bones. Unlike my mental image of DV, it is quite a narrow valley and is surrounded by some very spectacular mountains.

The mountains here must contain all sorts of minerals because the colours that can be seen in the mountains are amazing! At one part of the park (Artists Pallete), the colours were incredible… greens, reds, pinks, yellows, ochres, greys, whites… pretty much any colour in the spectrum and you could see it in these few rock formations!

The lowest point in Nth America (Bad water) was unsurprisingly, quite an anti-climax! By the time we got there it was pushing 39 deg and a salt flat doesn’t quite do it for me! After taking the obligatory couple of shots we jumped back into the aircond-ed comfort and continued to drive.

We did have lunch in the park under the shade of some trees in Furnace Ck (guess where it got its name from??) Lunch wasn’t a pleasant endeavour because even with great shade it was probably 35 deg.. so after a more liquid lunch than solid we decided to quit the beauty (and heat) of DV and drive further into Nevada to sin city, Las Vegas.

I’m guessing that everyone has a similar reaction when they first see LV. For us, we drove down the mountain range and could see this large city spread out in the valley below that is quite low rise except for one little area which we immediately recognised as the ‘strip’. The houses are very uniform (ochre painted brick houses) that are all lined up in rows… New suburb style! The ‘strip’ is probably the complete opposite.. my first reaction was ‘wow, how cool is this place!’ and I think that pretty much sums it up… It reminds me of Surfer’s Paradise on steroids!

After the stressful and time consuming process of checking into our hotel (Paris) we hit the swimming pool before going for a wander across the street to see the Bellagio fountains. After an exy and annoyingly slow drink in the Bellagio we were ready for a bite to eat and a bit of a gamble so we went further down the strip looking for some better value eats and a gambling hall! We found what we were looking for by the name of Billies Saloon and Gambling hall and had another drink, a bar side gamble (there are pokies built into the bars here in Vegas!! J) before we had some Chinese for tea.

We fell into bed late that night after M did well on the chockie wheel at Paris. First night in Vegas we’re ahead!!

Song of the Day– America, Horse with no name