Las Vegas, Nevada

OK.  Firstly, if you're expecting our antics in Sin City to read like the screenplay for a sequel to "Fear And Loathing In Last Vegas", you've probably come to the wrong place.  We weren't in Vegas very long and the main reason we went was to meet up with my Mum and Dad, who flew over and joined us for a while on our epic roadtrip.  It was the best place to start a busy ten days in which we would cover four different states together, including most of southern California.  Also they'd never been, and everyone should see Vegas at least once.

That's not to say we didn't have fun; my family is hardly the conservative, teetotal type.  All I'm saying is think more "National Lampoon's Vacation" than "The Hangover".  I didn't even get arrested this time!

Also, I know Sharon and I had just got engaged but contrary to popular belief, we didn't go to Vegas specifically to get married at a seedy motel by a middle-aged man dressed as fat Elvis!

We decided we would stay at a proper RV resort while in Vegas.  As you probably know by now, our usual strategy around cities is to find somewhere on the outskirts that will let us stay for free, but there are some cities where street camping doesn't seem particularly safe, and Vegas is definitely one of them.

We ended up at an RV park right next to Circus Circus at the top of the strip.  I was surprised to find one so central but I guess it makes sense.  Many RVers are of the, shall we say, "mature" generation, and they love nothing more than to streamline the kids' inheritances a bit on the slots!

We got settled and then went to meet my parents at their hotel in the evening.  They were right in the thick of it, about a block down from the Bellagio, with an awesome view of the strip.  When we caught up with them, we cracked open a bottle of bubbly or two as this was the first time they'd seen us since we got engaged.

What with work the previous day and a 14 hour flight, they'd been up about 24 hours at this point, so I half-expected them to be ready to flake out, but they were up for going out and getting something to eat.  So now you know where I get my healthy appetite from!

We went to the nearby Harley Davidson restaurant and wasted no time getting them acclimatised to the American way of life by ordering a huge mixed grill each.

We ate, drank and caught up for a while and then called it a night.

The next morning, we all met up and basically toured the most well-known hotspots on the strip, starting at the south end near Mandalay Bay and Luxor.  You can't fail to be impressed by the scale and lavishness of the hotels.

We refuelled with some Mexican food, beer and cocktails in New York New York before continuing north towards Paris and the Bellagio.

The Bellagio is one of the classiest hotels on the strip and my personal favourite.  You can't really miss it; the 8-acre lake outside its front entrance is a dead giveaway, especially when it erupts into a mesmerising show of water, music and light once every half hour or so.

Sharon and I stayed here once before, a few years ago, and the rooms are pure luxury.  The last time we were there, we wandered into the high rollers' bar by accident in the casino.  The bartender took one look at us and before I'd said a single word to him, he leaned towards me and discretely said "You do realise the drinks in here start at $20 for a bottle of water sir?".  One day when I'm a billionaire, I'll go back there and order Jäegerbombs and pork scratchings all night just to make a point.

Just past the lobby they have an entire botanical garden inside the hotel with various kinds of flora, water features and gazebos arranged meticulously to fill the conservatory.

They also have the World's largest chocolate fountain, 27 feet tall and circulating over two tons of melted chocolate every day.

Once I'd coerced Sharon away from the patisserie and it's many designer chocolates, we carried on towards the Venetian.  This place provides some more solid evidence that most of the architecture on the Las Vegas strip was conceived down the pub by a group of rich blokes with self-restraint issues, after one too many Johnny Walker Blues and presumably with no sensible women around to tell them how insane they were.

"Let's put a full-size canal... Inside the hotel... With gondolas!  And professional gondoliers singing opera to the guests!"

That fake sky you see up above even darkens as the sun sets outside.

Our feet couldn't take much more by this point so we all headed back to base for a while to get ready for the evening.  Sharon and I jumped in the jacuzzi for a while at the RV park, which I guess shatters any lingering impression you may have had about us "roughing it" out here.

We met up again in the evening and headed for the Mandalay Bay, where we saw Cirque Du Soleil live, courtesy of my Mum.  I'd thoroughly recommend this to anyone; it's about two hours of pure stimulation for your eyes and ears.

Each show is based on a theme and we saw the Michael Jackson one, which apparently focuses more on the music than the acrobatics that Cirque is usually known for.  I was still blown away by what was happening on stage and above us though.  The choreography seems to defy the laws of physics and the perfect synchronisation and symmetry of the acrobats makes the stage hypnotic to watch.

The show also makes amazing use of light and optical illusions.  I wouldn't want to ruin the surprise for anyone by describing anything specific, so just check it out if you can.

After the show we went our separate ways once again and got some rest, ready for an epic drive to the Grand Canyon the following day.

So that's about it for our jaunt to Vegas this time round.  Things we missed that I'm keen to do on a future trip would be: the light show at Old Vegas; a big UFC fight at the MGM Grand; and firing off a few rounds at "Battlefield Vegas", where they offer various packages, from "Al Capone" to "Call Of Duty", to let you sample different weapons.

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Bryce Canyon, Utah

Bryce Canyon is only about 75 miles north east of Zion, but it's at a much higher elevation, so the relatively short trip between the two offers a world of difference in terms of landscape, colour and weather.

As soon as we got out of Zion we had a long, steep climb to contend with.  Fortunately some time ago, someone had had the bright idea of digging a tunnel to mitigate what would otherwise have been an impossible journey over the top of a huge mountain.  It was not a particularly wide tunnel though.  In fact when the park staff saw us coming, they had to radio the other end and stop any other traffic coming through so that we could just drive down the middle, something they apparently have to do for any large vehicle.

After a couple of miles of chanting "Please don't break down now", "Please don't break down now", we emerged with relief at the other end of the tunnel and from there it was a fairly short excursion to Bryce.  On the way, the increasingly large patches of snow on the ground hinted at how dramatically the climate was changing compared to the desert-like conditions of southern Zion.

It was early November by now and night-time temperatures were expected to be sub-zero every night.  Fortunately, we're equipped with a fairly powerful gas furnace which would keep us nice and toasty.  Well, it would if it hadn't chosen this exact moment, as we prepared to experience the coldest temperatures since Alaska, to break.

I'm not even going to bore you with the details any more.  From now on, just assume that every time I start the engine or switch anything on inside the RV, it breaks.  On the upside, every time something's broken I've fixed and upgraded it, so whoever buys this thing from us at the end of our trip is basically going to be getting a brand new RV!

We survived the cold nights fairly comfortably to be honest.  It doesn't take too long to heat up a relatively small space just by using the oven, and Sharon often says that I radiate heat anyway (possibly a subtle way of telling me I'm full of hot air), so we were OK.

It doesn't take too long to see what Bryce has to offer, but that doesn't detract from how impressive it is.  The main attraction is Bryce Canyon itself, which is not so much a canyon as a huge natural amphitheatre filled with orange sandstone monoliths, formed over tens of millions of years by frost weathering and sedimentary erosion.

I love the dusting of snow you can see on the peaks and cliffsides.  It feels like a rare and unique thing to see such vivid orange and white next to each other like that in nature.

We walked the Navajo Trail down into the canyon and saw the area from a completely different perspective.

 

It felt like a short way down, but I nearly keeled over on the way back up.  We were at an elevation of about 8000ft here and the air felt much thinner.  I stopped for a while and pondered whether it was normal to be able to feel my pulse in my teeth and see all the blood vessels in my own eyeballs.

We walked back to the RV and when my vision had come back, we set off on the 18 mile scenic drive towards Rainbow Point, the highest point in Bryce at just over 9100ft.

On a good day you can see well over 50 miles to Arizona from here.  From nearby Yovimpa Point it's even possible to see the north rim of the Grand Canyon.

All in all, we were pleasantly surprised by Bryce.  It seems to be one of the lesser known scenic attractions in the USA, but I'll never forget standing at the edge of the rim and looking out at the natural skyscrapers of that vast, sandstone city.

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Zion National Park, Utah

After we left Death Valley, we ended up stranded in the desert for a while when gale force winds suddenly materialised from nowhere and sand-blasted us continually for about two whole days.  Fortunately this was Nevada so even in the middle of the desert, with about 200 miles in every direction to the nearest town, there was a casino.  Even more fortunately, it had an RV park.

So for a couple of days, we rode out the storm in the bar of the casino and paid for our drinks with winnings from the video poker machines.  They even tried to kill me at one point by serving me some raw chicken.  These places will try anything to get rid of the winners!

When the storm eventually relented, we started heading east again.  We were teased by the bright lights of Vegas but didn't stop.  We would eventually double back and spend some time there but for now, we had our sights set on Zion.

Zion is a national park in southern Utah, characterised by a maze of plunging red sandstone canyons surrounded by lofty plateaus and mesas.  The east and west sides of the canyon are defined by the Virgin River which etches its way along the canyon floor, culminating in the "Narrows", a tight gorge with 3000ft canyon walls either side.

Zion is a Mecca for hikers and climbers because of its many challenging trails and cliff faces.  If you asked what I do for fun, hiking and climbing would probably not be the first two words on the list, but I did have an ulterior motive for our visit to this particular location.  I'd decided it was where I was going to propose to Sharon!

It was actually one of a few locations I had in mind to finally pop the question (you don't work in I.T. for nine years without learning the importance of having a backup plan!).  My first choice had been Alaska, with the Northern Lights as a backdrop.  We did see them briefly when we were there, but it wasn't as spectacular a show as I know they're capable of.  Also, at the time I was holding out for the stunning scenery of Denali National Park rather than the city park just outside Fairbanks where we were camping at the time, so I decided to hold off.

Unfortunately, that's when we started having mechanical problems with the RV and ended up spending the next couple of weeks in and out of various garages.  By the time we got out of there, the weather had turned and we barely got a glimpse of the Aurora again.  I think our clearest skies (and therefore best chance to see the Northern Lights) happened when we were parked up at Walmart in Fairbanks.  I'm not the most romantic soul in the world, but even I couldn't bring myself to drop to one knee in a puddle of engine oil under the flickering, fluorescent mood-lighting of a supermarket car park, surrounded by other abandoned RVs, our only witness a local semi-hobo living out of his car with some very suspicious stains on his clothes.

So fast forward a couple of months and my second option, Zion, was looking like the best one.  As I said, Zion is full of hiking trails and one of the most well-known is the 2 1/2 mile walk to Angel's Landing, the peak of a 1500ft tall rock formation in the north of the park.

My research told me that it was a strenuous hike but that the summit provides spectacular, humbling views of Zion and if you go early enough, you get to watch the sun rise over the canyon.  I figured that moment of exhilaration as we reached the top of the world and saw the sun peek into the canyon and start to bathe it in sunlight would be the perfect time.  And fortunately this time, I had the weather on my side when we arrived, with clear skies all around.

By 5:05am on the day of the hike, I'd already completed arguably the most difficult task of the day as I managed to gently stir Sharon from her slumber without incurring her wrath and losing an arm or something.  Anticipating the heat that would come when the sun eventually rose, I left the RV wearing shorts and a T shirt and immediately spun on my heels and went back inside to put some jeans on and an extra shirt.  I'm the kind of person who only wears a coat for about two weeks of the year back home but even to me, it was bloody freezing!

We jumped on the park shuttle and left it at the "Grotto" drop-off point.  The first section of the Angels Landing trail follows the Virgin River, slowly gaining elevation in sandy terrain.  We eventually left the river behind and started to tackle a mile-long series of broad switchbacks.  Nothing overly challenging at this point, but we were already at a fairly high elevation and the thinning air did take us by surprise a bit.  Each stop we made to take photos was a welcome chance to catch our breath!

We seemed to have the whole park to ourselves, apart from one guy who glided effortlessly past us up the ascent sporting nothing but a brown cloth robe and sandals, looking like an extra from "Crouching Tiger,  Hidden Dragon".

The next leg of the walk took us through "Refrigerator Canyon", named for its welcome shades and cool breezes.  It was heating up a bit now so this stretch was refreshing, plus it was relatively flat so a good chance to regroup and prepare for what was to come next.

A little beyond the two mile mark we came to a set of 21 tighter, steeper switchbacks named "Walter's Wiggles", after Zion's first (and evidently fairly sadistic) superintendent who engineered the trail in 1926.

After Walter's Wiggles we arrived at Scout Lookout, a relatively flat clearing where we could pause to eat some breakfast.

At this point, there's only about half a mile left to the summit, but it's this final half mile that makes the trail so infamous.  Essentially you have to haul yourself up a steep, narrow ridge using the chains intermittently anchored along the route.  If not for the chains, you'd have no clue which way to go as there are no discernible paths and very few footholds in the rock itself.  Several people have fallen to their deaths in recent years trying to traverse this last section.

We went as far as we could up this portion of the trail, reaching a small peak a few hundred yards from the true summit.  Our footwear was struggling to keep its grip on the rocks by this point and I think if we went any further, we might have made it up OK but would probably have struggled to get back down again, so we agreed that we would stop there.

Fortunately we'd made it far enough to enjoy an amazing view of the canyon below.  We sat for a while looking out over the park and felt justified in our decision not to go any further when we looked down and saw a few other people reach the start of the section we'd just climbed and turn back, thinking better of it.  Our Shaolin Monk friend from earlier soon put us back in our place though as he passed us again in the opposite direction, coming down from the summit - in bare feet!

We stayed put and I waited for the sun to start rising and then presented the ring, getting down on one knee as carefully as I could to avoid pulling us both over the cliff edge to fall to some kind of ironic Shakespearean doom.

Her response to the big question?  Well technically her first words were "Don't drop the ring!!" but fortunately, this was followed swiftly by "Yes"!

We sat and watched the view a while longer before heading back the way we came to our campsite.  Predictably, as soon as we got to the bottom, we instantly regretted not making it all the way to the top, but I guess this way we can go back one day, reminisce and maybe finally conquer it.

We spent about another day in Zion, much of which was taken up with spreading the news via Skype, Facebook, etc.  We did do another short walk the following day but by that point, Sharon had slipped into some kind of diamond-induced trance gazing into the ring, so in the interest of public safety on the trails we made it a short one and just chilled out for a while before moving on!

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