viva las vegas...

The last two weeks have flown by. The trip was full of great campsites and happy days. Here’s a bit of a summary of how it all went down.

We picked up Kate at Portland Airport and spent another night at Dusty’s house drinking some fine duty free gin catching up on all the gossip from Kate.

The next day we headed down to Corvallis in frigid conditions. We woke to snow at Chris’s flat, packed the van and started the massive drive south headed for Yosemite National Park in California. It took a full day of driving to get there but it was totally worth it. The weather improved steadily as we drove south and since we left Oregon we haven’t seen rain (or snow) since.

The rock climbing scene at Yosemite is massive. The park is essentially a huge granite valley carved out by glaciers years ago. What’s left now are massive vertical walls perfect for climbing with a forest full of giant sequoia trees at the bottom. Some of the routes up the rock typically take 3 days to ascend. So, of course we had to give climbing at Yosemite a nudge.

Unfortunately we didn’t have the necessary gear to really get into the climbing here but at last we gave it a go.

We did an awesome day hike up to the top of the cliffs to where Yosemite Falls plunges over the edge. The views from the top were fantastic…

Upon leaving Yosemite we got a phone call from Jono, another kiwi, saying that he didn’t need to go back to work on the boat for another month or so. He promptly booked a fight to Las Vegas for the next morning and we met him there on route to the Grand Canyon.

Our first day at the Canyon was full of denials and setbacks. We went in with a plan of obtaining a permit to go on a 3 day hike from the canyon rim, down to the river and back starting that afternoon. Unfortunately other people had the same idea and we had to wait 2 days before we could get a permit to start walking. So we had 2 days to fill in at the Canyon. The first day we (attempted) to go on a day hike on some of the tourist trails along the top of the rim. But of course, luck was working against us and after taking a 15 minute bus ride to the trailhead we were informed that the trail we hoped to do was closed for maintenance. So we just ended up walking back to the village along the rim which was still very nice, just not what we had hoped for. We finished the day with red wine and home made pizza at a perfect view point on the canyon rim watching the sun go down.

Later that evening, after a few more red wines, Chris instigated a van aided tree removal technique as a method for firewood collection. Jacqui voiced her dissaprovement of the method but things proceeded along nonetheless. The tree removal part of the process worked well, however when towing the felled lumber back towards the campfire Chris managed to negotiate the front wheel of the van over a nasty little tree stump and spectacularly blow out the tyre. The boys camp went into a state of vocal profantity yelling, while in the girls camp there was a definite smell of “I told you so” in the air. Karma is a bitch sometimes... Good fun though.

The following day was declared a rest day and it turned out to be a great chance to catch up on odd jobs and most importantly throw a lick of paint onto our roof cargo box. Now it is much more within the boundaries expected of Team Xtreme!

The hiking within the Grand Canyon was awesome. The trails up and down are very well worn and are walked on by thousands of people and mules each year.

(Spot us on the ridge line)

We were lucky in that the weather at this time of year is warm, but not too hot and all the Cactus’s are in flower.

Quite spectacular. We spent two nights at the base of the Canyon which allowed a day of exploring off the track and away from all the other people. We headed for a small tributary and made our way upstream through an awesome wee canyon swimming all day and just enjoying the place. A great day for sure.

After leaving the Canyon we headed back towards Las Vegas en’ route for a big night out on the town in Vegas. We stopped at a lakeside campsite on the way to cook dinner and spend the night, which happened to be the best choice we’d made all day. It was Luc’s dream campsite. We had flat ground, a fire pit, lakeside, sunset views and best of all 2 local girls and a guy were also camping there. One of the girls came over to us, wearing an ‘itsie bitsie teenie weenie yellow polka dot bikini’ and invited us to come join them and help them drink their beer, and they had a beer bong. Perfect!

The next night in vegas was a fun night too. We managed to get a room big enough for all 5 of us at the swanky Stratosphere hotel & casino for $40 (only a little bit more expensive than the grand canyon permit – go figure). After a sun drenched afternoon at the pool and spa we got stuck into another bottle of gin and headed out for a buffet dinner. After eating camping type food for 2 weeks it was hard not to gorge ourselves with all the food on offer. So we did, and we paid the price. We left the restaurant bloated and with less gin effects in our viens feeling a little sorry for ourselves… Still though we managed to check out most of the big name casinos and have a fun time.

Kate, you need to put some more vegas photo's on here. I didn't get your last set of photos off Chris.

And then it was back to California to drop Kate in Reno and Chris & Jono in Sacremento. Jacs and I are now on our way east to do some more climbing before catching up with Helmo in Colorado.