Lake Mead & Hoover Dam

Vegas is so bright it lights the hills in the distance from behind. From about 40 miles away too. Eventually We arrived in the dark at a Lake Mead view point 1 hr away from LV. 5am . Snatch 90 mins before driving across  a Dam with no people on it The car was inspected by state uniforms to make sure we had no explosives

Mead water level was low

An overflow tunnel I think

Looking upstream ie behind the damn (above) again very low

Water collects here above. Main motorway up high

Looking on the low side

Looking down the damn edge

Then we crawled into Excalibur for early 9am check in

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Tucson to Las Vegas thru the night

Set off at nine pm for 7 to 8 hr drive. Advantages of night driving. No traffic. Save on accommodation cost. Go further  with kids asleep instead of kids getting bored. Cooler.

Buying clothes for upcoming winter. Thrift shop. 

Next stop Excalibur

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Tucson - pizza and sunset

Tonights beautiful sunset.. overlooking the Arizona desert from the 'cactus forest' just outside Tuscon. Still 38c at 9pm. 

Esme and Rowan hace been very happy to have some downtime

This is Annette, who is a part time teacher as well as everything else..

The kids are all thoroughly enjoying some rough- housing with Nate

Driving across town to a bookshop. Its 5 degrees hotter than Thailand

Pizza by the slice

Let the kids have a go will you Sarah! 

Afterwards

Then sunset ten miles out of town. Alcohol banned. Broken beer bottles everywhere.and cans. Shame. We packed some out

EEarly photobomb from Rowan

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Tucson - taking it easy

Eventually we arrived at 10.30pm after getting lost a few metres from 222 north Martin street Tuscon. After waking the kids up and finding 8 year old Nates lego stash, then realising Scooby the dog was going to be ok with them we chatted till midnight with Mike and his wife Annette before collapsing into restful sleep. 

Next morning Oomph. Rowan lands on me to wake up. He starts pointing at Nates top shelf of toys. Its 6.20am. No you cant not now. Eventually he goes back to sleep. 

Then later its pancakes for breakfast and I take the car to get fixed. Yesterday we stopped and the radiator overflow was boiling whilst stationery because the fan didnt work.

I lived with Mike in San Francisco in 1989 when I was a security guard for the summer. He works now for Arizona State University. Last time we met was Athens GA in 1992.

Bicycle spare bits

Mexican of course. We are 30 miles from the border

Ten minute wait for train to come thru

Thrift shop purchase just to take apart

Getting on well

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Santa Barbara to Tucson

We all slept relatively well on the deck in Santa Barbara last night and woke up to a beautiful clear sky this morning. Esme and Rowan spent a lovely hour with Fitz the 1 year old, with Rowan patiently and lovingly reading a book to him (huh?! When did that happen?!)

So then the driving began..A drive of some nine hours.. on a good day with a strongtail wind.. 12 hours later after food and drink and children stops we are very nearly there.

It is so hot here - stay out of central california in August!! Im pretty sure that we could fry an egg on the road and probably cook just about everything else from either the heat inside this little car of ours or from the heat outside! We drove through Phoenix at 7pm tonight and it was 92f outside. Felt like about 92c!

But the drive has been pleasant; hours and hours if white sand desert; interspersed with various bits of vegetation and mountainous areas. To have left the car for any more than five minutes would have been foolish.

I'm sure that those of you that live in hot countries deal with this sort of heat all the time but to us it was a bit of a shock:)

584 miles

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