Death Valley to Vegas - Desert Lovin’

The drive to Death Valley begun uneventful besides the occasional dirt bike area signs that looked like the standard brown recreational signs that allowed such activities on government land. After about 6 hours we reached the outskirts of the valley which were glowing from the sunset and then slowly dimmed pinker and pinker as it receded. There were some winding roads to get into the park, but most weren’t very steep. About halfway through we went to a rest stop/ scenic view point. We took some pictures and used the bathroom. The wall of the bathroom had bullet lumps all over it and the signs had holes through them. We thought that was interesting for government land.

At one point we were driving on a straight and endless looking road. Up ahead we saw some cars stopped and swerving around something. It ran to the other side which we were driving on and as we got closer we realized it was a little fox. I rolled my window down to get a picture. It was sooooo freaking cute. I wanted to take it for my own. I began talking to it in that embarrassing baby voice we all use to speak to our beloved animals and it started walking closer. I got all giddy and talked to it more as I took pictures and it looked freakishly comfortable with us. I got a little freaked out though so we drove away as I proclaimed my love aloud for the little guy. ***Update*** So my Uncle John just called hysterically laughing at me because the below creature is not a fox, but a coyote! Oops! guess he didn't love me and wasn't my soul creature… he just wanted to make me his dinner.

It was night when we reached the campground and the front desk was closed so we just picked a number off the list and tried to setup as quick and simply as possible. We managed to do that effectively. Unfortunately we had to go to the store to get something for dinner and everything in there is extremely expensive. Suffice to say we weren’t very happy about that and to top it all off I once again had zero phone service and had to call my parents on a pay phone. I didn’t even want to buy fire wood because first off it wasn’t cold and second it was $10 for a tiny bag when we're used to getting at least seven good sized quarter logs for $4-6. 

So we didn’t have the best night and ended up going to bed super early. However our neighbors who looked Asian and yet spoke some African sounding language decided to talk at the top of their lungs for hours, not a moment, not a second, without their mouths running. Seriously there was no pause, no time for a breath with these people. I swear the main speaker must have been telling one amazing freaking story. Mind you not only did we go to bed to that, we woke up to it as well at 5am. 

You could probably guess I wasn’t very happy with this place. It seemed like we weren’t having very good luck there and as all people with good instincts know; it is better to get out while your ahead. We decided to just stay that one night, spend a little while at the sand dunes, and my secret weapon to get Finnley to agree with me: head to Vegas. 

That next morning we packed up and headed to the sand dunes for what was intended to be a short hike. On our way there we stopped at this little stream and walked on a wooden pathway through it. It was a peaceful walk because we were the only ones there and it looked desolate, but in a beautiful way. It was like the desolate that is glamorized in literature and movies. As we walked back Finnley decided he should climb the rocky hill on the side of the trail. It looked so funny as he slid down on his feet so fast it looked like he could easily lose control of his footing. I was dying laughing at him. Afterwards we headed over to the sand dunes. 

Taking the advice of a random dune hiker, Finnley decided he should hike them barefoot; (disclaimer: this man also advised he bring backup flip flops). As Finnley always does he needed to hike all the way to the tallest dune because of course. I however am more of a different kind of experiencer, I don’t have to be the best or the tallest or the highest to enjoy something. I’m more like "let’s climb a couple and sit on top of one and ponder at the fact that I’m here". Finnley takes himself to the extreme, he is your standard adrenaline junkie. His fun level is dependent on his heart racing and the thought “hey that could have been really dangerous and hurt me”. As you could imagine our opposing philosophies create the perfect potion for controversy when evaluating any decision on what we should do.

I usually try and be open minded (however not shy of whining and bitching and moaning the whole way) about these things so I at least have the experience and a good story to tell. So I went along with his plan to climb to the highest dune. At first it was really fun. It was weird because just standing there you don’t realize how tall these things are and how hard they actually are to climb. Basically about half way there I had enough. Finnley as he often does however pushed and pushed me. One thing I couldn’t complain about though was the view. It was really beautiful out there. 

Finnley also decided that he needed to roll down the sand dune, it was awesome. I video recorded as he went barreling down in what I imagine to be a dizzying madness and came to a sand splashed stop. It looked really fun, but I didn’t take that bait. He also decided he should run down a sand dune. That one was really funny looking and this was no small sand dune; it was one of the biggest ones. You could just see him start off strong and steady and then get faster and faster until he lost control and fell to his knees. It was so amazing and hilarious. 

When we had the last two largest dunes ahead of us I decided I was so ridiculously done with this hike and just sat on that dune as Finnley ventured off to the two tallest. I took some pictures of him out there; he looked tiny, he was so far away. Something weird we noticed about the dunes was even though he was so far away, we didn’t have to yell to speak to each other. Somehow we were able to talk at a normal level. Walking back Finnley’s feet were bright red. The sand had ground his feet raw. 

We headed to Las Vegas after filling up the tank with their $5/gallon gas. It was supposed to be a fairly short drive so we were looking forward to that. Now this was an iconic drive for us. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas comes to mind, as do many other stories and movies that do Cali to Vegas. It looked as I always imagined, endless roads and desert land. A sight so epically freeing it instantly made Finnley and I ready for anything and everything that could come at us. 

We got to Vegas in the early afternoon and booked a surprisingly cheap room at Planet Hollywood. Finnley stopped at a gas station before we got to the hotel to buy something and when he came out he told me a lovely story. He said when he went to get his money out of his wallet he ended up dumping a pile of sand on the counter. The lady looked at him like "what the hell" and Finnley said “sorry I just came from the desert”. Oh man, he’s so funny. Only something so awkward could happen to him. We got to Planet Hollywood and luckily they let us check in an hour early. 

We were pretty disgusting and felt out of place from camping for the last 4 days so we took a shower first thing. Afterwards we walked around the mall that they have connected to the hotel. Then we found some dinner to eat. We went to Earl of Sandwich and it was pretty tasty. Finnley needed beer so he could have his Hangover moment so we went and got some at the convenience store inside the mall. He slammed a couple in the hotel room before we went out to walk on the street. We watched some cool break dance routine until they started asking for money... lol. Las Vegas was a lot cooler than I expected, but it’s definitely somewhere you need money to really enjoy yourself, otherwise everything is a bit of a tease. However, we enjoyed ourselves to the best of our pockets abilities. 

It was cool we could see the Paris hotel from our room window and the Belaggio fountain show too. We lapped the mall a few more times before it was time to gamble. I had a couple ones on me so we decided that is all we would use and we would just play on the penny machines. I was down a dollar, and Finnley had breezed through two when I looked over and his machines numbers were moving fast. I asked him what happened and he said he won. We ended up winning like 23 bucks. Not to shabby for a penny machine. 

We went to bed around midnight when we were finally tired of all the walking for no reward because we couldn’t buy anything. We woke up fairly early and got some breakfast for $3.95 at a Mexican restaurant inside the mall. I also got my favorite hot chocolate from the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf that was more expensive than the breakfast.. lol. I made Finnley walk around the mall with me one more time, determined to buy something, but unfortunately never found a thing.

The plan was to head to the Grand Canyon from there, but the plan quickly changed when we realized how long of a drive it was. We decided to go to Zion National Park first because it was about half as far. Around 11:00am we checked out and headed to Utah.

On to the next...

California Dreaming : Part Two - Sequoia National Park

The point of going to Sequoia National Park was to see the biggest tree in the world - in the world! The drive from Humboldt was going to be a long one and I actually started the drive for once. It was a calm drive in the beginning probably because we drove part of it the last time we were there. We got to go through parts of the Valley of Giants this time which was nice. It was sunny out for once so it was cool seeing the Redwoods in this kind of weather, much more pleasing to the eyes. 

It was funny we also ended up going to the same rest stop as we did the last time without knowing and getting subs from the subway there again. We thought about stopping by one of the vineyards along the way, but all the lodging was too expensive and it wasn’t long enough of a drive anyway. The last hours of the drive sucked major though because we got stuck in San Francisco traffic and boy what a nightmare. We must have been stuck for at least 2 hours. We ended up stopping in a town right outside of Yosemite for the night to take a much needed shower and a good nights rest before it was time to camp again. 

The next day we headed to Sequoia. It was a longer drive than expected because the campground we were going to was on the complete opposite side than the entrance we came in through. Right when we got there we were stopped by a ranger who explained that they were having a propane leak and we couldn’t go into the park yet. It took about 15 to 30 minutes and we were let in. However, to my great anger they did not provide a map as they usually do upon entrance into National Parks. So we literally drove blind through the park for an hour and a half looking for this campground because of this without the faculty of GPS nor phones. 

When we finally arrived at the campground which was right after some of the scariest mountain roads we have driven on you could imagine the mood I was in. All I wanted was to call my mom and I couldn’t even do that because cell service was nonexistent. I had to use the pay phone which stole my money twice before I finally got through and was only able to leave a message because my mom didn’t pick up. I tried getting over it while we set the tent up. Luckily setup was easy and I was able to talk to my mom soon after. As it turned night we made some dinner and relaxed by the fire before bed. In California we were 3 hours behind normal so we were always going to bed freakishly early. 

The next morning we woke up early and headed towards General Sherman. There is a short stair trail into the forest to get there. Finnley and I wandered around like little forest gnomes for a while and basked in the quiet aloneness because we were the only ones there at the time. These trees were ginormous, but even in person you only realize how ginormous when you see a person stand next to one. It was so amazing being next to something so magical and unique in nature. We took a bunch of pictures and enjoyed our stroll through the giants. 

We went back to camp and had lunch before we relaxed awhile and went into the town of Three Rivers. We stopped by a building that I saw the previous day that looked interesting. It had a unique shape and turned out to be a hippie store. Of course I ended up finding things to buy and spending too much money there. I got an “Om” symbol silver pendant and a cool tunic. Afterwards we went to this candy/Christmas/ice cream store up the road. Finnley got a chocolate turtle at the Christmas store and we went on their patio to look at the river that ran along the back. To my pleasent surprise they had some friendly kitties whom I needed to touch. There was a little lion looking long haired boy cat who was chill and a little sassy adventure girl kitty who I was really interested in because she reminded me of Lola. 

After we went to check out their candy store. There I found a necklace to hang my pendent on and a pretty rearview mirror decoration. Finnley also found one of his favorite things there: cinnamon toothpicks. I was going to go to the ice cream store, but I figured I had spent enough money for a day. We went back to camp, got a nice fire going, and headed off to bed freakishly early again. 

Our last day there we started off kind of late and lazy. We relaxed for a while after breakfast before we headed off to Hospital Rock for a short hike. Right next to Hospital Rock is a little trail that heads towards a cave and small waterfall. Finnley of course had to crawl right into that cave. I was scared to, but eventually mustered up the courage and crawled in with him. We also went to a different trail along the river and sat on a rock. When we were done on that side we walked over to Hospital Rock and climbed on top. 

Still feeling a bit lazy we went back to the camp site and relaxed awhile before again heading into town. We went back to the ice cream place and I got a delicious homemade waffle cone with some amazing homemade ice cream in it. I still dream of it. We also decided to drive on to avoid boredom back at the camp. We ended up finding a little town where we got service and 4G! Hallelujah! We both got a chance to call our families and do a couple other errands before heading back to camp. Dinner, fire, and bed. 

In the morning we hauled butt to take down camp and pack up before heading to Death Valley that same day to set camp back up. 

On to the next...