Vegas Baby!

We made the 6 and a half hour drive south through the desert to Las Vegas. The drive was pretty spectacular, especially when we drove through Arizona the Grand Canyon State. Unfortunately we did not have time to see the Canyon, but the scenery from the road was impressive. Lots of mountains, plains, desert and Cacti. We arrived in Vegas at 6.30 pm and it was 110 degrees Fahrenheit (43 degrees C). It's quite a sight as you drive in, especially on the strip. It's not quite the size of a New York or San Francisco but it's still huge, especially considering that it's pretty much just huge Hotels and Casinos. One minute you are in the desert, the next you are in a whole new world of lights and attractions. We stayed at the New York, New York Hotel and Casino right on the strip opposite the famous MGM Grand. We spent our first night looking round the casino we were staying in, Ruth had a bit of a flutter and ended up a dollar up on the night. She was pleased as punch! We ate at midnight and had a few beers and rums to get into the Vegas spirit. The next day we went for an all you can eat buffet at the MGM. Crikey I've never seen as much variety and amount of food. We had breakfast, lunch and dessert roled into one. We were pretty full so spent the majority of the baking hot day in the hotel pool. Daytime is not the time to be outside in Vegas in the summer. I had a plan for the evening and a full schedule worked out taking in all the free shows and the big casinos. Growing up in Wombwell in Barnsley my pals and I had always jokingly named our local Town as Vegas when we were going for a drink on a Friday night. Well tonight we were doing Vegas for real, it felt a little surreal. We got the vegas spirit going early and headed up the strip. The plan was not going to be easy. We walked up the strip stopping at the different attractions but it was SOOO HOT!!! We were almost done in within an hour and had to frequently head into the casinos for the air conditioning. It was a hot wind which was worst than no wind. Our eyes were so dry but we soldiered on and saw some great shows. Fantastic fountain displays at the Belagio, Greek Gods at Ceaser's Palace, Volcano eruptions at Mirage and then we got to the big Treasure Island Show. Half naked Sirens fighting half naked Pirates (great). Unfortunately the show malfunctioned 5 minutes in so the crowd left a little disillusioned. It was my turn to have a flutter on the roulette and black jack. I ended up a dollar down so between us we broke even which I can imagine doesn't happen all that often in Vegas. It was a great experience but two nights was enough for us.
(Unfortunately no photos due to our camera breaking.)

The Flying Allstars

The Wing Chun Master

Park City

We reached Ben, Eliza and Baby Grayson in Park City by evening. Ben is a good friend from home, who now lives in Park City as a ski instructor with his lovely wife Eliza and very cute little boy, Grayson. It was great to finally arrive. We caught up over a few beers. Eliza warned us drinks have a '2 for one' effect out there if you're not used to it, as you're at such a high altitude. It definitely felt that way. Our visit worked out to be great timing as it was Ben's birthday the next day. It was fantastic after hearing a lot about the place to finally see it. During the 3 days that we were there they packed in loads of fun things to do. Riding the Dear Valley (the resort where they work) Chair lifts to the top of the mountains. It had amazing views of the area. We rode the Alpine Coaster down the mountain at Park City Ski resort, that was brilliant, they were individual little carts that went flying down the mountain on tracks. We also went to the Olympic Park, where the US ski team are based and train. We road the zip wire down the mountain and then watched the ski jumpers practice their moves by skiing down steep slopes and then carry out multiple twists and flips before landing in a swimming pool, it was fantastic. One of the areas most famous residents is Robert Redferd. He owns an area of the mountains which he named Sundance. The place is stunningly beautiful. It is very natural, even the ski runs are not groomed during the winter season. There is a lodge and restaurant area set at the foot of one of the most beautiful mountains we have seen. Robert Redferd himself can often be seen there. Ben and Eliza took us there on Sunday. We saw bottle blowers working and explored the grounds. There was icy cold water running down from the mountains despite the extremely hot air temperature, it was very refreshing to paddle in. There was a fantastic selection of film photographs. My (John) favourite actor was Paul Newman and I was in my element in the bar at Sundance as it displayed photographs from the film, Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid/ Redferd's and Newman's classic movie. The film was the inspiration for the name of the area.
It was a brilliant 3 days and we look forward to coming back again one day to see them, in winter next time so Ben can get us past the 'Snow Plough'. No doubt in a few years Grayson will be tearing up the slopes.

Driving to Park City (Salt Lake City)

We were excited to start our 12 hour road trip out to visit Ben, Eliza and Baby Grayson in Park City, Utah. We decided to get a few hours in after our day in San Francisco to take the pressure off the next day. We managed 4 hours before stopping at 11pm at a motel in Reno. It was quite a sight to see by night, it was lit up like a smaller Vegas. Already we felt the temperature noticeably creeping up.
The next day we set off early, pleased to be making good progress. By 11am the temperature reached 110°F. Thank goodness for air con. We were admiring the views of bare desert land when the car started to beep and a light on the dashboard lit up. It was the transmission over heating. The car then started to screech and slow to little more then a crawl. Taking out the phone to call the hire company we realised we were totally out of phone signal. Oh no! We continued slowly and cautiously in the hope of reaching civilisation before we completely conked out. Finally we came upon a truck stop/casino. The lady in the Casino couldn't have been kinder when we went in to get some change for the phone. Fortunately we were able to reach the car company and they told us that we just had to let the car cool for a while and it would be fine. We did as we were advised and it was fine. We kept to a steady speed and took lots of breaks.

San Francisco

If Santa Cruz was home of the buskers, then San Francisco was home of the crazies. It was a great city. We walked for miles, through the city and along the water front. We were hoping to visit Alcatraz but it was booked up for weeks. We did the next best thing and took a ferry under the Golden Gate bridge, down to the Bay bridge and circled Alcatraz “The Rock” whilst listening to a recorded cometary of it's history. At the same time every afternoon the fog comes in, which gave both island and bridges a mystical look.

Santa Cruz

Santa Cruz had a really nice vibe, there seemed to be more buskers than anyone else in the main street. The beaches were lovely with roasting hot, soft sand. We were constantly on surf standby with our boards in case the swell arrived, unfortunately it didn't but we enjoyed swimming and watching the dolphins coming in and rounding up the fish.