Day 4 & 5: Viva Las Vegas!

Day 4 & 5: We have found some warm weather in Nevada. I would not describe it as HOT, but it is nice to be able to put away the winter clothing. We have arrived at the Valley of Fire State Park. The valley derives its name from the red sandstone formations and the stark beauty of the Mojave Desert. We were able to view Ancient trees a 3,000 year-old Indian petroglyph. This place was wild to witness after spending the last few days driving through white snow. All of a sudden, as we passed over a small mountain pass, dropped into the valley floor and everything changes. The temp. rose to 12 degrees, vegetation became lush, snow vanished and cactus appeared. The park is about 40miles outside of Vegas so we took one afternoon to drive to the Vegas strip. It was bit of a shock to all of us as we have just left a very peaceful and quaint area at our camp site (only about 4 campers) and arriving in the glitz of Vegas!@! We first arrived to take the kids to the Circus Circus Hotel as we read that there is a free Circus happening. It must be noted that this hotel is at the beginning of the strip and appears to be one of the older hotels. In order to find your way to the Circus, you have to of course walk through the casino. We found the place to be very tacky with souvenir shops and were turned off by the smoke floating around. When we finally arrived at the “circus”, we notice that there are maybe 12 people seated watching one trapeze/swing performer. However, nobody was watching the show….they were all occupied with something else. As was the performer as she did not seem to enthused about the performance. Combine this with the smell of smoke, the loud noise of the casino and the tacky souvenir shops……..we left to walk the strip. Unfortunately, it began to rain very hard, so we drove the strip. We left as the lights started to set on Vegas and we were all very pleased to get back to our peaceful camp setting. We had a great camp site that we chose to stay for 2 nights. I was able to get a good hour run in as the kids & Carrie went exploring on a hike. The kids enjoyed exploring along the rocks and discovering new treasures. We decided to pull out sooner than we would of liked due to a thunderstorm coming in. The camp host told us that a few weeks ago, the campsite area flooded and it demolished a few roads. He mentioned that flash floods are known to happen in this part of the dessert. At first we thought he was pulling our leg as we knew our family was loud….but then we figured who is going to complain as there was really no one around for miles. Needless to say, we moved on out and headed to California on Route 66.