Eastern Europe Trip

I’m currently sat on our balcony at the Majestic View lodge in Springdale, Utah, drinking a bottle of Springdale Amber Ale and relaxing having spent the day hiking in Zion National Park… but more of that later, here’s the story so far…

We got up early on Friday morning and caught a taxi to Manchester Airport, where we intended on enjoying a full cooked English breakfast before catching the flight to Chicago and our connection to Las Vegas. The idea was to build up our tolerance for large meals prior to arriving in the States, where we know portion sizes tend to be somewhat on the large size. Only we didn’t have much of an appetite, and the greasy spoon deli in Manchester’s terminal 3 had the effect of turning our stomachs, rather than making them rumble. So we settled for a couple of cereal bars instead. The flight to Chicago was uneventful, providing ample time to catch up on some reading. I read a book Tracy has just finished called “Looking Up” about a guy who suffered a broken back and was paralyzed – the parallels with Tracy’s own experience are marked, though thankfully she is not confined to a wheelchair like the author. I recommend the book for anyone who wants to really understand what someone goes through following such a trauma.

On arriving at Chicago we had the pleasure of passing through US border control and then collecting our bags before passing customs. Despite Tracy having got a letter from her GP about the scaffolding in her back, up until this point the airport metal detectors had failed to notice, so she finally got the chance to brandish the letter to the US customs lady that took her to one side for a thorough going over, after the paranoid American detector went “beep”. The customs lady wasn’t in the slightest bit interested in the letter, though, but she did make allowances for Tracy’s lack of arm movement when frisking her. Convinced she wasn’t a threat to national security she was allowed on her way. Shortly after that we’d dropped our bags off again and we boarding our plane to Las Vegas. By now, Tracy had realised we’d be flying over the Grand Canyon and was getting very excited. That lasted until we got to our seats and opened the window blinds only to find a ruddy great big engine outside completely obscuring any view… she wasn’t best impressed, especially when they started the engines and we realised we would be sat in the noisiest seats possible (and that wasn’t because we were surrounded by loud Americans, although that was also the case!).

Arriving at Las Vegas we grabbed our luggage and headed out to catch the shuttle bus to the collection point for our hire car. We’d booked a convertible as we didn’t want to be cooped up in a tin box for 2 weeks, and when we started chatting to the guy in Hertz, he offered us a Mustang convertible instead of the cheaper Sebring, so we were well chuffed. It’s a big V8, and sounds great, but is actually pretty sluggish and handles like a blancmange. But with the roof down, driving into Vegas on the Strip was pretty special. We both decided at that point, we’d made the right choice of car!






Despite never having driven in America, never having driven a left-hand drive car, and having very little experience of automatics (none, until I drove Tracy’s Mini the other day), I quickly got used to the feel of the car and cruising down the Strip to the hotel. Like most big hotels in Vegas, Bally’s has free parking, so we dropped the car off in the car park and lugged our rather heavy bags through the casino to reception. The scale of these hotels beggars belief, and I’m sure I walked for a mile with my big yellow bag on my back whilst Tracy pulled her wheeled suitcase behind her. It wasn’t long before we were checked in and found our way to our room on the 18th floor… and what a room! King size bed, large bathroom, and a big telly that I managed to ignore the whole time we were there…

Having dropped off our bags and had a quick shower and change it was time to paint the town red. Only having been travelling for 16 hours and been up for considerably longer, the best we could manage was a slight shade of off-white. A beer in a bar on the strip and then back to Bally’s for our evening meal – a Chinese – and we even managed to stay awake long enough to eat it! But not by much…






Saturday

Waking up in the very small hours of the morning is inevitable when we’ve gone back in time 8 hours, so it was no surprise that by 7am we were up, showered and ready to see the sights. Walking through the casino was eerily quiet, with just a few die-hard gamblers at the slots or playing poker… where they get the stamina (and money) from is beyond me. We wandered down the strip to the Venetian, and then through the still-closed shopping mall before stopping for a coffee and croissant. It was at this point that Tracy decided to check how full her cup of coffee was by taking off the lid, then not replacing it properly, before pouring it all over her shorts. Her white shorts. Having made sure she hadn’t scalded herself (good job it was a latte and not an Americano!), we made a hasty exit and caught a cab back to the hotel so she could get changed. Refreshed, and leaving the now cream shorts in the sink to soak, we headed back off out again, only this time to the car.






We’d already walked up and down the strip a couple of times, and made next to no headway. It’s amazing just how far apart the casinos are, despite appearances. Their enormous size makes them look much closer than they really are, so we made the decision to drive up and down a couple of times so we could see them all. And that’s where an open-topped Mustang comes into its own. Cruising past the famous sights under a blazing sun with the roof down, trying our best to look rich and famous… it didn’t work, obviously.






We then went in search of retail therapy - not something Tracy and I are particularly fond of, but she’d been given a shopping list by Katie (Crocs, a kind of trendy sandal) and Carlie (little brown bag). The huge shopping mall we found seemed to be full of shoe shops, but despite our best efforts we failed to find either item on the list, although we did buy me another pair of shoes and a lead to allow us to plug my iPod into the car stereo… Bored with shopping we went back to the hotel for a nap, first stopping at Treasure Island to pick up our tickets for the Cirque du Soleil show we’d booked (Mysteire).

Feeling much worse for attempting to get some sleep, but refreshed from a shower and change of clothes, we headed back out and wandered through Caesars Palace and the Forum Shops (still no crocs or little brown bags) and grabbed a Ben and Jerry’s ice cream before taking our seats for the show. I’d seen a Cirque du Soleil show on trip to Vegas in March, but Tracy hadn’t and anyway, this was a different show. And what a show! It’s really hard to describe these shows, as they’re unlike anything else, but it was fantastic. A mix of gymnastics, ballet, dance, and comedy. Simply stunning. Following the show we had a Vietnamese meal in the restaurant in Treasure Island before heading outside to catch the performance of the “Sirens of TI” which is enacted on pirate ships in the moat surrounding the hotel. It wasn’t a patch on the show we’d just seen, but we can’t complain as it was free… Following that excitement we made our way to the Bellagio where we caught a performance of the famous dancing fountain, that was really quite spectacular. It was only mildly ruined by the “whooping” of an American woman stood just behind us… better get used to that sort of thing, I guess!



And finally to bed, completely exhausted…

Sunday

The day dawned bright and sunny (surprise!) as we checked out of the hotel and squeezed our luggage into the boot of the Mustang (good job we travel ‘light’!). And off we set, heading first to the Hoover dam. By now we’re veterans of negotiating Las Vegas’ traffic and so it posed no problem as we found our way South and via Boulder City to the dam. Here we parked up and grabbed a couple of bottles of water before taking a few photos of this enormous and rather spectacular piece of engineering.






Having satiated our desire for listening to another piped, and very patriotic, American monument’s history, we dropped the hood and headed North, back via Vegas and onto Interstate 15 towards Zion. It didn’t take long for me to suss out the Mustang’s cruise control, and so with my iPod playing a rock selection playlist, and the sun beating down we headed along the desert highway, cool wind in our hair, etc…

We stopped only once, for some more bottled water, and finally arrived at the Majestic Lodge confused by the time. We had 3.30pm, but the hotel had 4.30pm. That’ll be Mountain Time, then. Crossing time zones in a car will take some getting used to! But what a hotel. This place is beautiful, and our room is just fantastic, with furniture hewn from solid logs, including a massive bed. No wonder the Yanks are so large – they have so much space to fill!










Washed and changed, we headed to the bar. Sorry, saloon, in search of a cold beer. We knew that the Majestic Lodge was home to the Zion Canyon Brewing company, so our lips were already wet at the thought of a long, cold, fresh, beer after our drive. Only Utah has this rather peculiar law. It states that alcohol can only be sold with food. And we weren’t hungry. And we know how large the portions are, having so far failed to finish a single meal between us. But, thirst can be a strong motivator, so we ordered a couple of side dishes and a couple of beers. And they were both excellent. After a couple more beers we thought it best to go for a gentle stroll back to our room and try and sober, sorry, freshen up before dinner.

Dinner was a large steak each, washed down with a nice bottle of red wine. And we managed to eat most of them, and drink most of the wine too.

Monday

And so to today...

Once again waking early after a restless night, Tracy went to collect the packed lunch we’d ordered whilst I went onto the Internet to find details of Zion and the park pass we need to buy. With lunch sorted, and our plans in place, we went to breakfast. Already we’re getting fed up (literally!) of eating, but it seemed to be the right thing to do, as we had a long day of hiking ahead. Tracy ordered a small plate of pancakes, and when they came she was relieved to find only 2 of them on her plate. The only problem was, they were both the size of the plate. Which was in turn the size of a large wheel. With a bucket of maple syrup. They made my mushroom and Swiss cheese omelette seem healthy by comparison, which I’m sure it would have been had it not been for the pound of sautéed country potatoes and 2 slices of toast that accompanied it. That, and the fact that it was made with about 2 pounds of cheese. And 3 eggs. And a forest-full of mushrooms. Still, could have been worse. We could have ordered a “large breakfast”…

Stuffed to the gills, we packed the rucksack and caught the shuttle bus into the park. Here we bought our “Interagency Pass” that should get us access to all the National Parks on our trip – all for just $80. We then caught the in-park shuttle bus from the visitor’s centre to Zion Lodge, where we did our first trek up to see the Emerald Pools (which sadly were short of water at this time of year). After this 2.8mile hike, we caught another of the frequent shuttle buses to the end of the road and we then walked the Riverside Trail to the end of the canyon (or at least as far as we could go without wading up the river!), and then a further bus to the Weeping Rock walk.

Rather than me waffle on about how beautiful Zion National Park is, I’ll let a few pictures tell the story…






















Quite beautiful, isn’t it…

After a long day’s hiking we caught the return shuttle bus back to the hotel, and so here I am, catching up on the blog whilst enjoying a beer or two…