United States

7 June: Sequoia National Park

We left our motel in Fresno and drove into King Canyons and Sequoia National Park to see some massive sequoia trees. We started in Grant Grove where we saw the Fallen Monarch, a huge sequoia which fell at least a couple of hundred years ago, through which we walked as if in a tunnel. The sequoia tree takes hundreds, maybe thousands of years to decompose in these forests and they can live to the ripe old age of 2500 - 3000 years old !!! These huge giants have only been growing in these groves in the Sierra Nevada for 4500 years -  that's only 2 tree generations - but what stories they could tell...!!! We also saw the General Grant sequoia which has the largest base, measuring 12.3m in diameter - what a monster! The largest tree in the world, in terms of volume, is the General Sherman which we went to see next in the Giant Forest. Here's a bit of trivia that caught our attention: if the trunk of the General Sherman was full of petrol, it would hold enough fuel for an average car to drive a mind boggling 360 times around the world!

After a look around the Sequoia Museum we drove through the Tunnel Log, a fallen sequoia with a tunnel carved through it. We were lucky to see lots of wild deer on the roadside.

We left these majestic trees, where the temperature was roughly 10 degrees and drove south on the long loop road towards Death Valley. Unfortunately no road exists out of the east side of Sequoia National Park; what could potentially be a 150km drive, turns into a 550km loop... We stopped for the night in a motel in Ridgecrest, a town built around a huge naval base situated in the middle of the desert.

Gaelle and the giant sequoias	Driving under the tunnel log	Wild deer in Sequoia National Park

8 June: Death Valley

The Sat Nav estimated a 4 hour drive from Ridgecrest to Death Valley, but we were pleasantly surprised to make it in just over an hour and a half!! Honest, we didn't break the 55 mph speed limit... well not by much! We were met with a stunning change of climate in less than 24 hours: yesterday we were in our fleeces, goretex jackets and gloves in a humid forest surrounded by giant sequoias and today we found ourselves in a barren desert with a temperature of 35 degrees centigrade!!!

We were lucky to be able to check-in early into our room at the Stovepipe Wells Village, before heading north in Death Valley to Ubehebe Crater. The crater is an impressive circular hole in the ground, measuring a mile in diameter and 500 feet deep. We were nearly knocked off our feet by the unbelievably strong thermal winds on the edge of the crater!

Next we drove to Scotty's castle, a huge Spanish type hacienda build in the 1920's in the middle of the desert by an American millionaire called Johnson. It's like a mirage in the middle of the desert! It came into being when the milliionaire came to visit his factitious gold mine investment. He was swindled into investing funds by the smooth talking Scotty, who later became his lifelong friend. It's amusing to walk around the huge home and see the grave of the famous Scotty.

We then walked part off the way up the magnificent Titus canyon, a canyon carved out by water, before heading back to the hotel for a refreshing swim in the pool. The hotel dates back to 1927 and it's the oldest in Death Valley. All the buildings are made from wood and are old American-style ranch buildings. It's very picturesque, almost quaint!

Ubehebe Crater	Scotty's castle in the middle of the desert	Mesquite Flat sand dunes, opposite our hotel

9 June: Death Valley

We had a lie-in this morning before heading out in the car to the south side of Death Valley. We started in Badwater, a dried up salty lake on the valley's floor, 86 metres below sea level. To our surprise, the lake wasn't completely dried up; there was still a small area of shallow, hot, salty water. Not many animals have been able to adapt to such extreme conditions, except one type of fish, pupfish. We walked a few hundred metres out across the dried salt bed, but the morning temperatures reverberating off the white salty surface were already hard to endure.

Next stop was at the Natural Bridge. After a 15 minute walk up a canyon, thankfully partially shady, we were rewarded with a view of a big stone arch over the canyon. Then a quick photo stop at Devil's Golf Course, the dry salty bed of the valley which looks very much like a glacier covered with small rocks and stones, before driving along the unpaved Artists Palette road. The rock colours in this part of the valley are spectacular, golden yellows, oranges, ochre, reds, copper greens, salty whites and browns. The gravel road was deserted and we felt like we were really in the middle of nowhere. We couldn't help thinking that this wasn't a good time to break down...! We stopped off for a photo opportunity at Zabriskie Point and then drove along the unpaved Twenty Mule Team Canyon.

The temperature was really beginning to rise at this point, so we took shelter under some palm trees in Furnace Creek to eat our picnic lunch. The max at Fernace creek today was an official 102 degrees Fahrenheit: that's  39 degrees centigrade!  After that we visited the Borax Museum to learn a bit about the borax miners that settled in Death Valley in the 1920's for a few years. We then walked around the ruins of the nearby borax works. It's not surprising that the works only stayed open for 5 years, considering the terrible desert heat in which the employees had to work and the huge distances and rugged terrain over which the borax had to be transported by twenty mule teams to the nearest railway. What a huge amount of effort for soap suds!

We'd had our dose of the desert heat by 4pm and headed back to the hotel to the swimming pool. Bliss! We returned to the hotel's friendly diner for dinner and even treated ourselves to some Californian Cabernet Sauvignon!

Badwater	Natural Bridge	The view from Zabraskie Point
Zabriskie Point	Us driving through Twenty Mule Team Canyon	The carriages fill of water and borax that a twenty mule team would pull

10 June: Bye bye Death Valley, hello Las Vegas!

We walked up Mosaic Canyon first thing this morning before the heat got too much. The canyon is spectacular: it's narrow and it's walls are made of a mixture of light coloured marble-like rock and mosaic-like bedrock. Afterwards we went to see the historic Stovepipe well, after which our hotel was named. As sand kept accumulating in the desert, a stovepipe was used to indicate the position of the extremely precious commodity, the well. Unfortunately today one can no longer get water from the well as the pioneers once did, as it's been captured.

At around 10am we began our drive to Las Vegas, stopping off briefly at Rhyolite, a ghost town on the way. Rhyolite was a gold mining town established in the early 1900's, with a population of nearly 10000 people in it's peak. Sadly all that remains today are a few ruins, including remnants of the old railway station, a three-story bank and a bottle house. It's hard to believe that such a big town was so quickly built in the desert during the gold rush and then so quickly abandoned.

We were met with amazing, even unbelievable sites as we drove to our hotel in Las Vegas: a merry-go-round hanging off the top of a thirty floor building, a huge roller coaster between hotels, the statue of Liberty, a huge fairy castle  hotel (the Excalibur) and finally the Sphinx and the giant pyramid of our hotel, the Luxor. Walking into our hotel was like changing planet: it's huge, like a self sufficient town! The ground floor is where the casino is situated, full of coloured and flashing lights. There are also restaurants, bars and boutiques all around. We had room number 10102, on the 10th floor in the east side of the pyramid. The lifts go up the angled corners of the pyramid, so you can feel them moving inwards as well as upwards! From the sloping window in our room we have a lovely view of the ferric Excalibur hotel.

We took the monorail to the hotel next door, then walked down The Strip, in search of discounted show tickets. It's like being in a film, everything is bigger than life and fun! The views of the town are great! The MGM hotel with its huge gold lion, New York New York hotel with the statue of Liberty and the bustling stores on the street. We purchased tickets for Mystère, a show by the famous Cirque du Soleil at Treasure Island hotel for 7pm. It was fantastic! The circus performers were really top class, the chorography was brillant and the costumes really amazing. It was thrilling from beginning to end: there was so much going on at once, with the moving stage floors and the numerous artists dancing and performing original and awe-inspiring circus acts to music. Gaelle, in particular, dreams of becoming a circus artist when she grows up!

A walk up Mosaic Canyon	The General Store in Stovepipe Wells	Joshua Trees in Death Valley
Our hotel in Vegas: the Luxor Hotel with it's huge Sphinx and pyramid	The Excalibur hotel, next to Luxor	New York New York hotel with its roller coaster, Statue of Liberty and mini Empire States Building

11 June: Las Vegas

We drove the car up the Strip to Paris for a look around some more of the exgravagant hotels. The Paris Hotel is dominated by its half scale Eiffel Tower and Arche de Triophe. Inside Parisian streets have been recreated, complete with paved streets, Parisian cafés and boulangeries! Next we walked up to the Venetian to see the copies of the canals of Venice, complete with gondolas, plus a facade of Saint Mark's Square. Shops sell Murano glass, Venetian carneval masks, italian ice-creams, etc. No wonder American's don't feel the need to travel to Europe, they can just come to Vegas!!

We also had a look around the Ballagio with its designer boutiques before returning to our hotel for a late lunch. In the afternoon we went to the Premium Outlet Centre for a spot of shopping. The girls spent a few dollars in Gap and Tommy Hilfiger. The prices were unbeatable! When we returned to the hotel we headed straight to the pool for a refreshing swim. Unfortunately we only had half an hour as the pool closes early, 2 hours before sunset. One can't help noticing that facilities in the hotels are  orientated to encourage guests to spend as much time as possible in the casinos, for example the pool closes at 7pm, no free Internet is available (a ridiculous $13.99 per day is charged!), no fridge or coffee making facilities are available in the rooms, drinks are cheaper with a player card, etc.

In the evening we went to the Excalibur hotel to see a medieval dinner show, Tournament of the Kings. The show had kings on horseback, knights in armour, beautiful maidens and acrobats who enacted scenes from King Arthur's time. A "medieval" dinner was served without cultery. Needless to say the girls thoroughly enjoyed themselves, they could eat with their fingers and the performance was exciting!

Paris in Las Vegas!	Venice in Las Vegas!	The fountain outside the Cesar Hotel

12 June: Las Vegas to the Grand Canyon

In the morning we had a last look around Las Vegas. We saw a couple of lions in the Cat House at the MGM hotel and the movie style Rainforest Cafe, complete with elephants, snakes, alligators and snakes. We also had a look in the Nork York New York hotel, which is impressive from the outside, but there's not much to see inside. After a fast food lunch we took a taxi from the hotel to the Cruise America pick up office. It took 3 hours to pick up our campervan... Despite requesting, it was impossible to make an appointment for the pickup, everyone has to arrive at 13:00 and wait. They could do with a few lessons in customer service and time management... We have a 25 foot long 5 berth RV, but it's an old model, so a bit battered and the engine guzzles up unleaded fuel... We had a 250 mile drive to Grand Canyon Village that afternoon and we unfortunately couldn't get going until after 4pm...

The first obstacle on the way was the Hoover Dam: first a security check to ensure that we didn't have any explosives hidden in the campervan, then a long wait to cross the dam. It generates electricity for pretty much the whole of California, so they're pretty paranoid about potential sabotage attacks... When we hit a 75mph stretch of motorway in Arizona, our RV could only manage 60mph... The drive was long, 5 hours in total and we arrived at Trailer Village, a campground in the park, at 9:15pm. Everything was closed, but fortunately a sign on the reception door indicated our plot for the night.

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