October 2008 - Mighty Colorado

We just had to include a few photos of the "mighty" Colorado River! These photos are in Ehrenberg, AZ.

October 2008 - Hoover Dam

Another revisit! From the Grand Canyon, we traveled to Las Vegas where we stayed for several days. We paid a second visit to the Hoover Dam and we were surprised at how the area had changed since 1998. Henderson, NV has grown to meet Las Vegas. What used to be 10 miles of open desert is now condos, stores, and homes. We visited with Ginger's brother and his wife, Rick and Gail. They showed us around Las Vegas and told us stories of living there as Christians and as a businessman who has put shutters on the homes of many of the stars. We went to Hoover Dam and couldn't believe the change there. They are building a bridge just downstream from the dam which you can see on several of these photos. Soon, you will no longer drive over the dam - a safety precaution since 911. Remember the washer/dryer problem we had back in Colorado? Well, the temporary fix from Colorado stopped working so while we did some sightseeing, we had a new washer/dryer in the motorhome. A humorous sidelight about this is we have been getting some campgrounds which unknown to us making the reservation ahead of time were located close to a noisy highway or train tracks. We have discovered the trains run all night sounding their horns for the cross streets. (In Las Cruces, we noted the trains ran every 20 minutes 24/7) So when I called to make our Las Vegas reservation, I asked each campground: ""Are you next to a noisy highway or train tracks?" The answer to those question at our Las Vegas campground was "No" so I made the reservation. As we pulled into our campground site Monday evening, two huge fighter jets went over so low that we could read the numbers on the underside of the wings. Turns out we camped one mile from Nellis AF Base which is home of the Top Gun Training School and also the home base for the Thunderbirds. We feel like we are back home only these planes are a LOT louder than the A-10s that went over our house to do their practice bombing runs at Indiantown Gap. Yesterday, 4 of the F-16s took off together in formation. Now that was really a noise! Now I'll have 3 questions for campgrounds: Are you near a noisy highway, train tracks, or an airport/airbase? Anyway, here is a photo of one of the planes going over and some photos of Hoover Dam. Hope you enjoy.
Doug and Nada

October 2008 - Grand Canyon

Nada wanted to go back to the Grand Canyon in the worse way and go the whole way to the western edge of the park and also to the north rim. Well, we did go back to the Grand Canyon (because the weather warmed up) but we still haven't been to the North Rim or to Hermit's Rest!
The North Rim was closed for the winter and it had snow - it is 1000 feet higher in elevation that the South Rim. The road from Bright Angel Lodge west to Hermit's Rest was closed as they were putting in a new road bed. So I guess we will need to have another trip to the Grand Canyon in our future! One thing we did do that was out of this world was take the hour long helicopter ride over and down into the canyon. We can't say how much we enjoyed this! It was one of those thing we thought MIGHT be worthwhile but we weren't sure if it really would measure up to our expectations. One has no idea how huge the canyon is, how far it stretches, and how deep it is. We flew the quietest helicopter there is. We flew at 90 MPH and it seemed like we were standing still. They do not fly in the areas of the south and north rim. You fly east to what is called the Marble Canyon section of the Grand Canyon and that is where you dip down into the canyon. We saw where the Little Colorado River joins the Colorado River. It took me back to 1869 and I could almost see John Wesley Powell climbing the walls of the canyon here at the confluence in search of game animals since they had lost most of their provisions in some previous rapids.

In the last photo, we had the joy of seeing Bright Angel Trail where Doug and Josh had hiked part way down into the Canyon back in '02 and our friends Mary Ann, Nate, and Miriam Eagleson had camped last year. Indian Gardens is the lush green area you see about the middle of the photo. I also had to check to see if a favorite Bible verse is still on the wall of Lookout Studio and take another photo of it.