Our objective in the Vegas area was to avoid gambling away our life savings, hence our speedy departure to lands northeast of Henderson, away from the bright lights, out to the sticks where we are comfortable. The Valley of Fire is Nevada's oldest and largest state park. It derives its name from red sandstone formations formed from great shifting sand dunes 150 million years ago. Ancestral Puebloans' presence has been dated from about 350 BCE to 1150 CE. They ultimately moved on from the Valley when faced with a 24 year drought.
After long, lonely roads, we arrived. People with Vegas for a destination don't typically have the Valley on their agenda.
Our federal pass was no good at this state park. We bit for the 10 buck entrance fee.
An overcast day but the shades still helped.
The sandstone was weathered by wind and water into bizarre shapes, with oodles of holes and cutouts.
The caption for this one just has to be "peek-a-boo". No imagination.
Path at the visitor center leading way back.
A great visitor center chockablock full of history of the geology, people as well as flora and fauna through the ages.
We continued east through the Valley in order to avoid backtracking, but primariily to visit a museum north of the Valley, in Overton, but after that to head south through the entire Lake Mead National Recreation Area and to Hoover Dam. For the first time we saw motorcycles out in force, singly and in both small and large groups. Perhaps more motorcycles than cars. That didn't keep most stretches of road from looking like this.
Turn right to Lake Mead or.....
...left to Overton.
When Hoover Dam was built in 1930-35 it resulted in flooding of vast number of ancient Native American sites. Participants in that WPA stalwart, the Civilian Conservation Corps were called upon to assist archeologists to save what they could. This museum was built by the CCC in 1935 to house choice items from among those rescued.
A pit house reconstructed by the CCC.
The museum
This sign was hand carved in 1935.
Wonderful exhibits. All this to see for a $5.00 pp entrance fee.
Desert Reptile with a human head! Now Norm's nightmares begin.
Pam in her new T-shirt
When the ruins (these are a reconstruction) were found on the Valley the media sensationalized the find as being the lost city of a lost people. Reaearch proved both flights of imagination wrong, but the name stuck.
A nearby sign says to not climb on the pueblos but nothing about not goiing inside. Norm looked inside and decided to leave it at that.
More narcissistic imagery, sans shades this time.
This is a slab with real petroglyphs on it, removed from its original sight and highlighted with paint to make the designs more visible. A nearby sign admonishes those who did this and says its a no-no.
Park Entrance to Lake Mead Rec Area after we backtracked from Overton. Our parks pass was once again good to go. Yay to Uncle Sam.
Lake Mead is at 25% of capacity. It hasn't been full for 15 years. Driving north to south was a sad sight of miles of bare earth where water should have been, with occasional patches of wet stuff. Sounds familiar.
Lake Mead Visitor Center
In its heyday.
Closer to Hoover Dam - more water is apparent.
Guard entrance to the Dam. At least we weren't trying to get into Croatia.
Interesting art deco statues - winged men that look more like they were designed for Mussollini.
The water intakes - pretty soon won't be.
Fancy flooring at the monument
Fun things to look at in the gift shop
Passed the Hoover Dam Lodge advertising a free 16oz Coke. Based on McDonald's prices, that's worth a measely $1
After the dam we took the short hop to the historic section nearby Boulder City.
There's that guy with the wings again. Considering that Hoover Dam was originally named Boulder Dam, there was supposed to be a close tie in between the city and dam. But changing the city name to Hoover City would have been uncomfortably close to "Hooverville", which was the name given to encampments of the poor and homeless that sprang up during the depression.
We like the 50's style signs
Driving away from Boulder City we realized that, temptation or not, we had to see some of the Vegas hooplah - bright lights. But just recycling the somewhat sterile usual suspects on the Strip for the umpteenth time seemed a bore - the Venetians, the Bellagios, the Caesar's - all the same under the skin. So we went away from the Strip to the side streets - the Vegas of old, from the '50's and '60's. There, since 1995, a four block section of Fremont Street, home to has-been, decaying casinos was reimagined as "The Fremont Experience". The four blocks have been capped by an arched cover termed " Viva Vision" (the biggest big screen on the planet) from which emenates dazzling light shows. Multiple Zip lines run overhead the length of the four blocks. All of the neon signs from the old days - the huge cowboy sign at the Pioneer, the cowgirl highstepping in front of Glitter Gulch - are there as though time has stood still. There's Binion's, still very much alive. And there is sound, sound, sound. There is lots of tacky stuff - women in various states of (un)dress, available for photos, Chippendale types for the ladies. Music and a general sense of barely controlled riffraff. At the end of two hours, we were duly and fully buzzed. Right on!
Love all the neon. The whole area is covered with an ongoing light show and music. There are people zip-lining above us, half-naked women - and men - gyrating to the music and others hoping to attract attention to make a buck or two.
The "Golden Goose" and "Glitter Gulch" never really went away.
Howdy, sucker
Pam had to be held back from this caballero. She's a pushover for cowboy boots and neck scarves.
Well, now.
The band sang a pumped up version of "Do the Time Warp" in Halloween costumes
The only two normal people there? "Eclectic" only hints at the crowd we were part of.
Now it was Pam's turn to hold Norm back. Whoa, big boy!
Hi-yo palomino, AWAY!!
We drove 194 miles today.
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