From Death Valley to Sin City

It has now been over three months since we came back to Finland and as the weather outside is cold and wintery, it is great to look back on the trip and remember all of the amazing things that we did. We haven't updated our blog as often as we would have liked because of all the distractions of the real life but we'll, read I'll since Liisa's been a lot more active than I have, try to be more active from now on.

Day 32 / 10/04/2012 / Yermo, CA - [Death Valley: Badwater - Artist's Drive - Artist's Palette - Furnace Creek - Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes - Mosaic Canyon - Zabriskie Point] - Las Vegas, NV

On Thursday we headed to Death Valley. It was a couple hour drive from the camp site and it would have been good to start the day early but as the previous day was a long day, we didn't manage to hit the road until noon. We entered Death Valley from the south and our first stop was Badwater, the lowest place in North America. Unlike the other national parks we visited, Death Valley didn't have any gates where you could pay for entrance. Instead you had to go to a visitor center and nobody seemed to monitor it either.













After Badwater our next stop was Artist's Palette which showed some cool colors that nature had "painted" on the rock. Before the palette we stopped by and climbed a big hill, which wasn't too easy in the scorching desert, and enjoyed some amazing views.







We tried to fight of the heat by eating some ice cream from a general store at Furnace Creek. We also bought the last ingredients that I needed for my vision. I had been thinking of how to remember my boss and my colleagues who were in Helsinki enjoying the rainiest month in a hundred years. I decided to send them a picture from Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes which you can see below.







From the dunes we hurried forward as the sun was getting dangerously close to the horizon. A friend of mine had recommended Mosaic Canyon, which is a dry waterfall. It was a very nice place and well worth the visit even though we had to use a very questionable road to get there. Liisa had to get out of the car several time to move huge rocks out of the way.







When we got out of the canyon, the sun was almost down so it was time to head for Las Vegas. There is a lot of attractions in the northern part of Death Valley which would have certainly been worth visiting. When we got to Las Vegas, Markku had already checked in to our hotel room, which was a really cool mini suite in MGM Grand. If you are driving to Las Vegas we strongly recommend that you arrive there after nightfall because it is something amazing to suddenly see a sea of light appearing from the darkness.




After getting our luggage to the room and eating a little something, it was time to hit the casino. We had a lot of fun gambling and going around the resort and didn't make it to our room until 5 am.

Day 33 / 10/05/2012 / Las Vegas, NV

After our first night in Vegas we decided it was better to stay on the Strip instead of staying for a couple of nights in a hotel near the airport, so we extended our stay at MGM after considering a couple of other options. We decided to go for a lunch to Diego's, a mexican restaurant at MGM. We went there because we got a $75 gift voucher from the hotel. The food was good but the service was really slow even though there weren't that many customers.




After lunch we went for a walk on the Strip. Our first stop was the M&M's store which was an interesting stop. They have build a whole a whole world around the brand, with little slot machines, poker chips, pens, movies, clothes, and games, the candies are almost irrelevant. After continuing our stroll on the Strip we encountered a lot of people selling tickets to all kinds of shows and plays. If we would have had about $400 extra each, we could have taken a helicopter ride to the Grand Canyon. Something worth considering on the next trip.




We started to feel like gambling so we began our casino tour that lasted for the rest of the day and night. We walked around the Strip and played for a while in every casino that seemed interesting.

Day 34 / 10/06/2012 / Las Vegas, NV [Stratosphere Tower & Circue du Soleil KÀ]

After changing our room in the morning to a smaller one for the last two nights, it was time to continue exploring the Strip and all of the casinos. First we stopped at the Coca-Cola store to enjoy some sodas from around the world. We can recommend the plate of sodas there, you get small cups of different sodas from everywhere in the world. There are some delicious ones as well as some that we don't understand how people can drink them.




From the Coca-Cola store we went for a very healthy lunch to Fatburger and continued from there to once again gamble in a few casinos before taking the Monorail to the Stratosphere where we went to the Stratosphere Tower to enjoy the view. The Monorail is a very convenient way to move from one end of the Strip to the other end.










The main event for the day was a Cirque Du Soleil show KÀ which was amazing. It mixed martial arts with acrobatics and the performers were incredibly talented. I definitely will go and see another Cirque Du Soleil performance. The evening continued as the previous ones, meaning gambling. Liisa tried Blackjack for the first time and managed to win about $75 and I sat down to a Texas hold'em table which wasn't a proper one but a casino version where you played against the house like in Blackjack.

Day 35 / 10/07/2012 / Las Vegas, NV

Our third day in Vegas included eating crepes at the Paris casino, watching the fountain show in front of the Bellagio and of course more gambling. It was also Markku's last day in the States and he decided to go see one more show, Penn and Teller. Me and Liisa decided to go to Hooters casino to get some hot wings. We were too late for the wings but I managed to find a real Texas hold'em table and was able to double my money after gambling for a couple of hours.













Day 36 / 10/08/2012 / Las Vegas, NV

After gambling for four nights, we were really tired and decided to extend our stay for one more night. We stayed in the hotel room just watching TV, sleeping, and eating junk food.

Day 37 / 10/09/2012 / Las Vegas, NV - Kingman, AZ - Seligman, AZ - Flagstaff, AZ

Before leaving Las Vegas we wanted to see the famous Las Vegas sign. We looked at the map and decided to walk there, not a good idea. It was surprisingly far and it was freaking hot. We didn't visit all the casinos that we would've wanted, like Luxor, Excalibur, and Mandalay Bay, which were located at the other end of the Strip. There is a train going between these casinos that you can use if you're moving around them.




We drove out of the city through the Strip which was a nice way to leave the city. At this point we had been traveling for 6000 miles and had about 4000 to go. We took the route 93 as we headed west and enjoyed the beautiful sceneries along the way. After checking the KOA campground in Kingman we decided to go all the way to Flagstaff. Although it wasn't much better, it made do and we slept once again on the front seats of our trusty Toyota Camry.













-Riku
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Hit the road, Jack - first two days

Day 1 / Helsinki - Newark, NJ - Garfield, NJ - Westbrook, CT - West Greenwich, RI

After working our asses off during spring and summer, we are finally on the road. After a very cold plane ride over the Atlantic, we arrived to Newark International Airport. Because of Liisa's spinal disc herniation I had the pleasure of carrying both of our big backpacks and my small backpack to Hertz car rental, luckily Liisa was able to pull the small airplane bag on wheels. One of the Customs and Border Protection officers called me a sherpa and tried to make Liisa take one of the bags from me.

Unfortunately Hertz didn't have an American car for us so we had to settle for a 2012 Toyota Camry. Although the car isn't American made, which would have been better for the theme of our trip, it's a nice car. A little too nice, it took me almost ten minutes just to find a way to lower the car seat and I didn't find the hand break until at the end of the day, who would have tought that you don't operate the HAND break with your hand but with your foot.

The beginning of the trip could have started off a little better. We, meaning me, managed to drive through a toll station without taking the toll ticket. At the next toll station there was a guy who wanted the ticket, so instead of paying $2.50 we had to pay $12.55. Not a big mistake but it gave us a little bit of unscheduled excitement. Instead of buying all our camping gear in New Jersey like we had planned, we decided, after having problems finding the stores, to just drive to our motel and go to an outdoor store in Massachusetts or Rhode Island. The neighborhoods where the stores were supposed to be at, seemed sketchy too.

Being tired of the long trip so far we made another mistake, we didn't check the route that my phone's GPS gave us. We meant to drive north of New York to avoid the traffic in the city but of course the GPS guided us over the George Washington Bridge and straight to Manhattan. Luckily the traffic wasn't too bad and it was really nice driving over the bridge and seeing the New York skyline.




The rest of the drive went well and it was interesting to see how the locals drove. Everybody was speeding and passing other cars like on a race track, no wonder that almost every car had at least one dent. We should've kept the drive a little shorter for the first day as I had problems staying focused for the last hour. Though it was probably because of our stop at Denny's for our first diner experience. Fortunately the motel was just next to the Interstate which we were driving.

Day 2 / West Greenwich, RI - Providence, RI - North Truro, MA [Cape Cod Light] - Provincetown, MA - Hyannis, MA

The Best Western West Greenwich was a good place to stay especially as it was quite cheap. After waking up and having breakfast, we headed for the road and drove to Providence which was only a 20 minute drive away. The city seemed like a really nice place but as it was raining really hard we couldn't spend too much time there. Still we, read Liisa, managed to do a little bit of shopping. Maybe I'll find something at the next mall.

Next stop was Cape Cod Light, a lighthouse in Truro. The lighthouse, and Cape Cod overall, is a really interesting area. We could probably spend a whole week here, if we had time, and we can recommend Cape Cod for everybody. This is an area with lots of beautiful sceneries and interesting places, a lot of great looking buildings and a small town feel to it. A nice place for relaxing.

After spending a little longer in the lighthouse and in Provincetown than planned in the morning, we had to hurry up to our accommodation in Hyannis. Our original plan was to camp in Truro but the weather forecast said there would be a thunder storm in the area so we decided to play it safe and book an indoor accommodation. Here in Hyannis we're staying at Seacoast Inn which have had really great reviews in Tripadvisor and you can easily see why. The service is great here, when we checked in the man in the front desk asked us for our plans for the next day and promised to get us driving instructions for all of the places we wanted to visit. They also recommended a restaurant where to eat, Spanky's Clam Shack, which seemed like a great restaurant but unfortunately they had closed already when we managed to get there. We also found a tent for our next night, we'll be spending it on a campground.

Today's objective is to find sleeping bags and pads and do more sightseeing.
-Riku

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad