On-route Death Valley

---

This morning we left the Grand Canyon on route to Death Valley back via Hoover Dam and Las Vegas. It was so cold in the morning that when we got into the car the water in Shannon’s pump bottle had frozen solid. The internet told us that the overnight low would have been somewhere between -13 degrees C and -7 degrees C.

We had originally planned to stay inside Death Valley itself at a place called Stovepipe Wells, but we had been told by my cousin/aunty/uncle that went through a few months prior that the place was in the middle of nowhere and gets so hot over summer that they close down and put up a sign “Gone Fishing”.

So we stayed in Beatty, which was still in Nevada (which has different gambling laws to California). We stayed at the stagecoach casino hotel and had a feed of steak, potato and baby carrots. I think next time I should ask for my steak to be medium. Medium-well-done was probably tough enough to bounce off the table but it was still good to get some real food as so far we have pretty much been living off bagels and bread with the odd gorging at a restaurant every now and then. As good as the bagels are over here, you do start to get sick of them.

Since we didn’t do any gambling at all in Vegas (!!) we couldn’t leave Nevada without doing any at all. So over a free beer (Casinos offer all sorts of things to get you in there) we tried our luck at poker. Shannon went first and had his dollar note was instantly gobbled up by the machine without letting him even play - his thanks for his money was given with the text “Game Over”. Good start - I thought I would try my luck too.

I spent $3 before giving up, Amanda put in a single $1 note she was given for Vegas and got 2 full houses with no effort at all. Along with an evil laugh and rubbing her fingers together with wide eyes, I think the addiction was starting to kick in. She did however manage to walk away with $5 profit in the end, taking one of the $1 casino tokens as a souvenir.

Sleep.

---