Martinjmpr
Wiffleball Batter
Just got back from my long awaited trip to Vegas for Thanksgiving weekend. We left early on the 23rd (Tuesday) for Flagstaff as my wife had never seen the Grand Canyon before and I thought it would be a good stop.
The original plan had been to head straight West on I-70 to Moab and then South on US 191/163 through the scenic Red Rock country of Utah and Monument Valley before crossing the Navajo Reservation and descending into Flagstaff from the North. Unfortunately, the unpredictible Western weather kicked in the weekend before leaving the Colorado mountains slick and slow, so I opted for the longer, but safer, route down I-25 through Albuquerque. The down side to this route, besides the fact that it is LONG (about 125 miles farther than the more direct I-70/US191/163/160/89 route) it is also extremely boring. It doesn't even really start to get interesting until about Gallup, NM and by the time we reached Gallup, it was getting dark already.
We got into the motel late, had a quick dinner and collapsed, exhausted, shortly thereafter.
Next morning we got up ready to see the Grand Canyon, only to note that the weather forecasted was decidedly gloomy: Overcast, snowy and cold. Nevertheless, we pushed on.
I hadn't been to the Canyon since July of 1987, and I can't remember if we took US 180 through the San Francisco mountains or not, but it was gorgeous! We rolled into Valle and the weather remained decent, with patches of blue sky peeking through the clouds. However, the closer we got to the Canyon, the heavier and lower the clouds were. By the time we paid our fee at the entrance, it was snowing lightly.
My biggest worry was that the canyon would be "socked in" with fog and we wouldn't be able to see anything but clouds. However, I needn't have worried. Although it was snowing by the time we parked and got up to the first view of the South Rim, visibility was good across the canyon.
Actually, the low clouds added a kind of "mystic" look to the canyon.
As you can see, there were enough breaks in the clouds to let intermittent shafts of sunlight reach the canyon, which added a dramatic element to an already dramatic landscape.
Liz was impressed!
We stopped at almost every turnout on the South Rim, all the way to the Canyon View tower.
We also saw some rather emphatic warning signs like this one:
Overall, it was great seeing the canyon like this - like most people, I had only seen the canyon in Summer so it was very interesting to see what it was like in the snow.
Of course, I was also happy to have 4wd available when I saw the condition of the roads inside the park. This was typical of the road that runs along the South rim.
Initially I had thought that maybe we'd spend a couple of hours there but we ended up being at the South Rim for almost 4 hours! We finally left because we knew we had to make it to Vegas, over 250 miles away, by that night.
As for Vegas, it was, well, Vegas.
I have family there and we spent Thanksgiving day with them. Next day we went to the Hoover Dam where we discovered (after waiting in traffic and in line for hours) that the day after thanksgiving is the busiest day of the year at Hoover Dam! We took a tour of the dam and then got some great shots of the new Tillman-O'Callaghan bridge, which is itself a pretty amazing engineering feat.
Originally I had planned to add a day at Death Valley into this trip, but ultimately decided to cancel it. Although I can drive for hours and be OK with it, the wife is definitely not a "road trip" person and the prospect of adding a full day of driving to a schedule already full of driving was not an attractive one to her (I think we all know the saying that goes "If Momma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy" ) I'll get back to Death Valley one of these days, but most likely by myself.
All in all, a good trip. My first really long trip in the 4runner and it performed well. MPG was disappointing at an average of about 17, but that was mostly because I was pushing the 75mph speed limit as much as I could, just to try to shorten the driving time. If I was by myself I'd have kept it around 65.
The original plan had been to head straight West on I-70 to Moab and then South on US 191/163 through the scenic Red Rock country of Utah and Monument Valley before crossing the Navajo Reservation and descending into Flagstaff from the North. Unfortunately, the unpredictible Western weather kicked in the weekend before leaving the Colorado mountains slick and slow, so I opted for the longer, but safer, route down I-25 through Albuquerque. The down side to this route, besides the fact that it is LONG (about 125 miles farther than the more direct I-70/US191/163/160/89 route) it is also extremely boring. It doesn't even really start to get interesting until about Gallup, NM and by the time we reached Gallup, it was getting dark already.
We got into the motel late, had a quick dinner and collapsed, exhausted, shortly thereafter.
Next morning we got up ready to see the Grand Canyon, only to note that the weather forecasted was decidedly gloomy: Overcast, snowy and cold. Nevertheless, we pushed on.
I hadn't been to the Canyon since July of 1987, and I can't remember if we took US 180 through the San Francisco mountains or not, but it was gorgeous! We rolled into Valle and the weather remained decent, with patches of blue sky peeking through the clouds. However, the closer we got to the Canyon, the heavier and lower the clouds were. By the time we paid our fee at the entrance, it was snowing lightly.
My biggest worry was that the canyon would be "socked in" with fog and we wouldn't be able to see anything but clouds. However, I needn't have worried. Although it was snowing by the time we parked and got up to the first view of the South Rim, visibility was good across the canyon.
Actually, the low clouds added a kind of "mystic" look to the canyon.
As you can see, there were enough breaks in the clouds to let intermittent shafts of sunlight reach the canyon, which added a dramatic element to an already dramatic landscape.
Liz was impressed!
We stopped at almost every turnout on the South Rim, all the way to the Canyon View tower.
We also saw some rather emphatic warning signs like this one:
Overall, it was great seeing the canyon like this - like most people, I had only seen the canyon in Summer so it was very interesting to see what it was like in the snow.
Of course, I was also happy to have 4wd available when I saw the condition of the roads inside the park. This was typical of the road that runs along the South rim.
Initially I had thought that maybe we'd spend a couple of hours there but we ended up being at the South Rim for almost 4 hours! We finally left because we knew we had to make it to Vegas, over 250 miles away, by that night.
As for Vegas, it was, well, Vegas.
I have family there and we spent Thanksgiving day with them. Next day we went to the Hoover Dam where we discovered (after waiting in traffic and in line for hours) that the day after thanksgiving is the busiest day of the year at Hoover Dam! We took a tour of the dam and then got some great shots of the new Tillman-O'Callaghan bridge, which is itself a pretty amazing engineering feat. Originally I had planned to add a day at Death Valley into this trip, but ultimately decided to cancel it. Although I can drive for hours and be OK with it, the wife is definitely not a "road trip" person and the prospect of adding a full day of driving to a schedule already full of driving was not an attractive one to her (I think we all know the saying that goes "If Momma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy"
) I'll get back to Death Valley one of these days, but most likely by myself. All in all, a good trip. My first really long trip in the 4runner and it performed well. MPG was disappointing at an average of about 17, but that was mostly because I was pushing the 75mph speed limit as much as I could, just to try to shorten the driving time. If I was by myself I'd have kept it around 65.
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