Rocking The Vegas
Warning: This portion of the journey contains an excessive amount of rock formation pictures...

Driving literally through these mountains makes you appreciate how much more difficult it would have been to make this journey 200 years ago with only a team of oxen to pull you over these humongous rocks.

Dangerous Curves. Here's hoping we don't run into any more disgruntled mountain goats!

Licorice makes today's 14 hour drive a bit more bearable

More rocks.
But Look again. Can you find the train in this picture? It's the famous Union Pacific!! (How does that song go...I think it's set to the jingle of " 15 Miles On the Erie Canal"...)

See the 365 degree view.

What bend in the road? There's no bend in my road--I can see it streching straight out in front of me-- forever.

That sign says "Xyzzx 3 miles."

Reality check: The sky is seriously BIG.

Huge, really.

We have a tremendously enormous atmosphere.

On the road that never ends! At least there are some curves up ahead!!

CIVILIZATION AT LAST!!! In abrupt contrast with the awesome surroundings, the golden arches remind us that this is still twenty-first century America.

The lights of a neon billboard compete with the setting sun.

The Stratosphere.
"Life Is Good At The Top."

Belive it or not, this is the hotel lobby.

Vegas, baby!
It's 10pm. We do a quick change and hit the strip needing some serious nourishment after traversing the desert.

The next day it's 98 degrees by the time we get up and so we check out the roof-top pool for an early morning dip (before hitting the road again). Back in the car we realize that all the chocolates we bought in Chicago have morphed into one giant chocolate blob. Shucks!