JACOB LAKE,AZ TO LAS VEGAS TO PAHRUMP, NV--Friday May 18th-Monday 21th


Advertisement
United States' flag
North America » United States » Nevada » Las Vegas
June 2nd 2012
Published: June 2nd 2012
Edit Blog Post

Friday, May 18th

Jacob Lake BLM Campground, Arizona It was 65 degrees with a few clouds, but still windy at 9:52 Arizona time. Our staring mileage was 26272



We drove to the small dusty, nothing much of a town, of Fredonia to fill up with gas. Gas is much cheaper in Arizona than in Utah, and the octane is higher for regular gas, which then makes it a double bargain.



We backtracked on highway 89 through Kanab (with a short stop at the library to replenish our supply of books) and then when we reached Mt. Carmel Junction, we turned west on highway 9 into Zion National Park. The place was packed with tourists---large bus loads of them. Because of the old tunnels through solid rock, the buses or any large RV, must be escorted through---$25 a vehicle per trip and traffic is stopped both ways so they can go down the middle of the two lanes---Rosie II just sailed right along through the tunnels in the one car lane slick as can be!!



Everyone should see Zion but for us, after seeing so many red cliffs and canyons, it was not as spectacular as it would have been had we only visited this park. As soon as we left the park border, we were surprised to see a mess of motels, hotels, resorts, restaurants, and sports shops, etc. as well as vacation homes. All were built on the narrow flat land between the canyon walls and then spreading out onto the dry sagebrush covered desert.



Continued to drive west on highway 9 and could see we were driving straight into a storm. The clouds looked really black and ominous. We had picked out a couple of BLM campgrounds on the far side of Interstate 15 and a couple of commercial places in the town of Hurricane, before Interstate 15.



By the time we got to Hurricane, it was late afternoon, the wind was blowing very hard, and the clouds looked ready to dump on us. So, we found the first commercial place we had looked at in our book that had sounded good, and pulled into it. It had tacked the word “resort” to its name so they could charge more. It was still a gravel parking lot with units lined up about 4 feet from each other. It has really amazed us that so many people live year round in places like this.



Saturday, May 19th

Hurricane RV Park, Hurricane, Utah 75 degrees at 10:30 am. Mileage to start is 26386.



Ugly, Ugly place!!! A resort in name only, I guess since it has a swimming pool they can call it that. It is one that belongs to some kind of RV organization and I think you can “time share” from resort to resort. Clearly not our idea of places we want to spend any time at. Hit the freeway only a block away, but, had to go along the frontage road a bit to get on to it and then took off south to Vegas.



Crossed through a corner of Arizona again and then crossed into Nevada. The road went through some dramatic canyons but they were grey in color so they don’t merit “Park” status, I guess. We also crossed the old Spanish Road that we had crossed here and there before. The road went from the Spanish mission in San Antonio to the Spanish mission in San Diego. After crossing the border, we stopped at the Nevada welcome center, only to find that it was closed. We wanted to see if they had any coupons or specials for Vegas.



Continued dropping in elevation and could see from the road several mining operations and then the highway led into the outskirts of Vegas. Found our exit and then maneuvered through taxis, limos, buses and tons and tons of cars to find the Candlewoods Suites, where we had reservations. Just as we were getting ready to turn left at the intersection before the hotel, a fire truck came roaring up behind us, so we had to maneuver into the road to let him by. A few uncomfortable moments, but we learned through the weekend that sirens of trucks and ambulances were commonplace. Checked in and looked around the suite—two bedrooms and kitchen. Brought in a few things and then collapsed into the cool air conditioned room.



About lunch time, we walked a block to the Terrible Casino to check out their buffet. We signed up for “privileged guest” cards which usually gives you some “gift” and discounts. It used to be a roll of coins to play the slots but here we got gimme caps or a mug and then $2 off the buffet. The buffet was just ok, nothing to write home about. We walked back downstairs to the casino level and noticed the strong smell of tobacco smoke. Not a place we would want to linger to play the slots. So, without playing even a nickel, we walked out of the casino. Knowing how we would feel after getting into “comfortable clothes” when we got back to the hotel, we stopped and picked up dinner of sandwiches from a pizza place and headed into the hotel to stay.



Sunday, May 20th

Candlewood Suites, Las Vegas. Sunny and hot, hot, hot outside—was predicting over 100 degrees.



We holed up in our room resting, reading, and sending out blog entries. We got booklets about what was going on in Vegas to see if there were shows we would be interested in seeing. No one was playing here that we would be interested in spending the big bucks for---can see some of the same acts much cheaper in Myrtle Beach or Branson. They didn’t seem to have the old review type shows we used to enjoy anyway. We also brought in our maps and made some travel plans as to routes we wanted to take next.

Waited for it to cool off---rightttt---it doesn’t COOL off, it just isn’t as hot as it is in the full daytime sun. Anyway, we walked to the corner cross street to catch a bus to the strip. It cost us $2 per, but was worth the money as it was quite a hike to get to the “Strip” even though it was “only” ½ mile or so. One of the things we had not realized was that all the casinos/hotels places have HUGE parking decks in back of them. So, you have to walk by blocks and very long blocks of parking decks if you approach walking to the Strip from a parallel street as we would have had to do. It was definitely not at all an interesting walk and not particularly safe looking. We were surprised at the number of out of business/boarded up casinos.

Anyway, got to the Strip after our bus ride, and began to fight through all the hordes of people as we looked for a place where we wanted to eat. It used to be that the casinos would

Friday, May 18th

Jacob Lake BLM Campground, Arizona It was 65 degrees with a few clouds, but still windy at 9:52 Arizona time. Our staring mileage was 26272

We drove to the small dusty, nothing much of a town, of Fredonia to fill up with gas. Gas is much cheaper in Arizona than in Utah, and the octane is higher for regular gas, which then makes it a double bargain.

We backtracked on highway 89 through Kanab (with a short stop at the library to replenish our supply of books) and then when we reached Mt. Carmel Junction, we turned west on highway 9 into Zion National Park. The place was packed with tourists---large bus loads of them. Because of the old tunnels through solid rock, the buses or any large RV, must be escorted through---$25 a vehicle per trip and traffic is stopped both ways so they can go down the middle of the two lanes---Rosie II just sailed right along through the tunnels in the one car lane slick as can be!!

Everyone should see Zion but for us, after seeing so many red cliffs and canyons, it was not as spectacular as it would have been had we only visited this park. As soon as we left the park border, we were surprised to see a mess of motels, hotels, resorts, restaurants, and sports shops, etc. as well as vacation homes. All were built on the narrow flat land between the canyon walls and then spreading out onto the dry sagebrush covered desert.

Continued to drive west on highway 9 and could see we were driving straight into a storm. The clouds looked really black and ominous. We had picked out a couple of BLM campgrounds on the far side of Interstate 15 and a couple of commercial places in the town of Hurricane, before Interstate 15.

By the time we got to Hurricane, it was late afternoon, the wind was blowing very hard, and the clouds looked ready to dump on us. So, we found the first commercial place we had looked at in our book that had sounded good, and pulled into it. It had tacked the word “resort” to its name so they could charge more. It was still a gravel parking lot with units lined up about 4 feet from each other. It has really amazed us that so many people live year round in places like this.

Saturday, May 19th

Hurricane RV Park, Hurricane, Utah 75 degrees at 10:30 am. Mileage to start is 26386.

Ugly, Ugly place!!! A resort in name only, I guess since it has a swimming pool they can call it that. It is one that belongs to some kind of RV organization and I think you can “time share” from resort to resort. Clearly not our idea of places we want to spend any time at. Hit the freeway only a block away, but, had to go along the frontage road a bit to get on to it and then took off south to Vegas.

Crossed through a corner of Arizona again and then crossed into Nevada. The road went through some dramatic canyons but they were grey in color so they don’t merit “Park” status, I guess. We also crossed the old Spanish Road that we had crossed here and there before. The road went from the Spanish mission in San Antonio to the Spanish mission in San Diego. After crossing the border, we stopped at the Nevada welcome center, only to find that it was closed. We wanted to see if they had any coupons or specials for Vegas.

Continued dropping in elevation and could see from the road several mining operations and then the highway led into the outskirts of Vegas. Found our exit and then maneuvered through taxis, limos, buses and tons and tons of cars to find the Candlewoods Suites, where we had reservations. Just as we were getting ready to turn left at the intersection before the hotel, a fire truck came roaring up behind us, so we had to maneuver into the road to let him by. A few uncomfortable moments, but we learned through the weekend that sirens of trucks and ambulances were common place. Checked in and looked around the suite—two bedrooms and kitchen. Brought in a few things and then collapsed into the cool air conditioned room.

About lunch time, we walked a block to the Terrible Casino to check out their buffet. We signed up for “privileged guest” cards which usually gives you some “gift” and discounts. It used to be a roll of coins to play the slots but here we got gimme caps or a mug and then $2 off the buffet. The buffet was just ok, nothing to write home about. We walked back downstairs to the casino level and noticed the strong smell of tobacco smoke. Not a place we would want to linger to play the slots. So, without playing even a nickel, we walked out of the casino. Knowing how we would feel after getting into “comfortable clothes” when we got back to the hotel, we stopped and picked up dinner of sandwiches from a pizza place and headed into the hotel to stay.

Sunday, May 20th

Candlewood Suites, Las Vegas. Sunny and hot, hot, hot outside—was predicting put on a great buffet spread for a cheap price to get people into their casino, but it isn’t that way anymore. We finally spotted the old Flamingo Casino and made our way to it and their buffet. Again, the buffet was only so, so---better than the lunch one but still just ok. The desserts looked really, really good but their taste did not live up to their looks. We did enjoy watching the birds and huge koi through the glass window next to our table. After dinner, we walked out through the patio area where the birds were kept. Guess their wings are clipped as the patio was open to the sky and there were neither cages nor fences!

We walked back through the casino, again filled with smoke, but controlled better than the Terrible Casino and onto the street. What an experience and I am sorry to say not a very good one. All along the street side were lines of hustlers passing out ad cards for various girly shows and other salacious types of “entertainment”. The homeless were there with their buggies and packs. Then there were charity workers all along the sidewalks close to the buildings asking for donations for the homeless. The sidewalks are too narrow for the size of the crowds and to top it off, construction scaffolding was all over. We walked about three blocks and I had had it. At a big intersection, we sat down on the edge of a fountain and people watched for a bit. We figured there were at least a hundred people that walked across the street at every light change. We also watched the traffic---limos and taxis were whipping around plus small trucks with ad signs on the sides, again mostly “girly” type ads. Finally, we decided we had had enough of Vegas “entertainment” and hailed a cab to take us back to the hotel. We asked our cabbie about the numbers and he said there were about 5,000 cabs and 4,000 limos in Vegas. We think all of them were on the Strip that night!

Valerie was concerned about the crowds and the possibility of having her camera taken plus just the weight of carrying it around, so no pictures were taken of our stay in Vegas.

Monday, May 21st

Candlewood Suites, Las Vegas

Did our laundry as it was free for guests. Posted some more blogs and then checked out about 11:00. We drove the long way around through mostly residential areas to avoid hitting the downtown and that mess of traffic until we came to highway 161. We headed up and over the mountains ringing one side of Las Vegas. Looking back, the city looked very dirty/smoggy, but it is mostly dust and pollutants in the air with NO fog to be had.

As we drove across some more dry, dry desert several signs on the road warned us to watch for wild horses and burros. Later on, the signs warned us to watch for mountain sheep. Pulled into the town of Pahrump and located the Wal-mart as we needed to get an oil change. It was 109 out. Found a Chinese restaurant and bought enough take out for both lunch and dinner. Drove about 5 miles out of town to an RV Park we had made reservations at as knew we had to have an electric hook-up to run out air conditioner constantly. Found our spot that had shade, grass, and a nice view of the man-made small lake/pond.

Advertisement



Tot: 0.816s; Tpl: 0.014s; cc: 11; qc: 53; dbt: 0.346s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1; ; mem: 1.2mb