Day 28 Salt Lake City Utah to Las Vegas Nevada

admin — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 17:25:41 +0000

Salt Lake city is a nice looking city. There are mountains (currently covered in snow) both West and East of the city. Even in the centre of capitalism there are no houses built on the mountains, so its a great view.

We went into the city centre to view the Morman temples in Temple Square.

Morman temple Salt Lake City

We headed South on the I-15 towards Arizona and Nevada. It was cold in Salt lake City, but gradually got warmer as we got further south. By the time we reached Arizona, it was warm, and we had left the snow on the mountains. We had a great drive on the I-15 through Virgin River canyon.

Virgin River Canyon Arizona

The it was into Nevada, and we got our first views of Las Vegas covered in haze. The it was time to hit the peak hour traffice (5pm) driving into Las Vegas. 6 lanes all crawling along.

Day 2 Needles California to Gallup New Mexico

admin — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 16:24:50 +0000

We left Needles a bit late, after stopping at the Post Office so Judy could post a parcel. We headed east again, into Arizona on the I-40. We crossed the Colorado River, and stopped for fuel at Kingman ($3.59 a gallon). Further east to Flagstaff, where we got a fuel bottle for our stove.

Between Kingman and Flagstaff there was some old snow still laying about. We spent a fair bit of the day at above 1800 metres altitude.

East of Flagstaff we stopped at Meteor Crater. This is a very recent crater, only 50,000 years old, and much deeper that the meteorite crater we visited at Wolf Creek.

Meteor Crater Arizona

It was then off to Winslow Arizona, which is famous for being in the lyrics of the Eagles song “Take It Easy”.

: Greg standin’ on a corner in Winslow, Arizona

Judy with the flat-bed Ford, on the corner in Winslow Arizona (or, if you prefer ... It's a girl, my Lord, near a flatbed Ford ...)

Here are the relevant lyrics:

Well, I’m a standing on a corner
in Winslow Arizona
It’s such a fine sight to see
It’s a girl, my Lord, in a flatbed
Ford slowin’ down to take a look at me

And here are The Eagles singing it:

The souvenir shop on the opposite corner had a poster in the window advertising an Eagles gig in Winslow, some time in 1975

For dinner we drove into the centre of Gallup, and ate at a little Mexican Dinner called Jerry’s. Great food, great atmosphere and as ‘whitefolk’ we were definitely in the minority. We used Trip Advisor to find out about restaurants in Gallup and Jerry’s was at the top of the list. It’s located in a side street just back from the main street, and we would never have found it by ourselves. I think we’ll be using Trip Advisor a lot from now on, to find places we might not have found otherwise. We do have an old Lonely Planet guide (1999) with us, but the internet is much better for current information.

USA Road Trip » Arizona

Day 28 Salt Lake City Utah to Las Vegas Nevada

Day 2 Needles California to Gallup New Mexico