Day 13: Welcome to Sin City

Joel and I woke up several times during the night in this new campground, once I remember was because of the howling coyotes outside.  I have no idea how close they were, but by the sound of it....pretty close! At least we were safe and sound inside the car, which for the first time in this trip was pretty hot for me!  I don't think I even zipped up my sleeping bag....

When we got up I decided to go for a run, gotta make sure I don't put on too much weight this trip!  Joel wanted to come along, but somewhere along the trip we had misplaced his running shoes, guess we are going to need to buy new ones in Vegas! The run was nice, as the weather was not too hot yet and there were several other people out and about.  I ran to a gas station which had gas selling for almost 6 dollars per gallon!  By far the most expensive gas we had seen yet this trip!

When I got back from the run Joel and I headed out to Vegas with several stops in between   We stopped three times in the park.  Zabriski Point was our first stop, which had an amazing view of the badlands, something I am very familiar with, thanks to Alberta.  But it was really beautiful as the colors of the land changed, leaving streets of black and white.  I personally thought it looked like chocolate vanilla ice cream swirl. Another stop was for Dante's viewpoint, which is a gorgeous view of the entire valley.  One that shows all the Badwater Salt Field and more.  We walked around there, on top of the mountains for a while, but the wind was blowing so hard that eventually we retreated to the car.  We also went through the twenty mule canyon, a windy road that leads through the mountains, something that is supposed to show you how the mules would take the Borax, which is a mineral  out of Death Valley, and although this isn't the actual path they took, it was similar.  Quiet a beautiful drive, we took it very slowly as there was no one behind us, so we enjoyed it immensely.

We finally exited the Park and headed across the state line into Nevada.  Our first stop was for food, McDonald and internet in a town called Pahrump .  This was only the second time we had a full meal there and I was not impressed.  I had a ranch burger, one of the first times I have had a burger at McDonalds, I usually eat the nuggets.  It will also be one of the last times I do this....Gross. We e-mailed a couple people that we were ok and headed to get some cheap gas.  I think it was about 3.72 a Gallon, much cheaper than in Death Valley!

We then headed to Vegas! We got to our hotel a little early hoping for an early check in, unfortunately that did not occur so we sat down in the games room and read/played games on the computer.  At 4 o'clock, our check-in time we headed back to the desk.... unfortunately still not ready.  We weren't really willing to go anywhere because we didn't want to park the car with everything in it somewhere in Vegas, so we went across the street to Subway for an early dinner and a Shop 4 Less for some chips for tonight.

When we got back to the hotel at 5 the room was ready.  So we parked the car and headed up to our suite. Very nice room indeed.  Two bedrooms, a kitchen, living room, dinning room, and very nice bathrooms! Much nicer then the accommodation we have had the last couple nights in the back of our car!  We got unpacked, settled in, and decided to watch movies and shower tonight.  We have plenty of time to do Vegas in the next couple days!  Tomorrow we are heading to a dealership to get our car checked out, hope that this goes well!!!