Home Again - a fun flight!

That three weeks certainly sped by quickly! Mom's plane for Stockton was leaving at 8:30, so we got up and caught the 5:30 (yes, A.M.!) shuttle to the airport on Wednesday. We got her luggage checked and went through security and had lots of time to spare at the gate. Once she boarded, I shuttled back to Planet Hollywood for a nap, a shower and check-out. I was alone on the shuttle at that hour and had a nice conversation with the driver who informed me that the cold weather we'd had all week was due to the recent eruption of the volcano in Chile.

At 11:45 I was back on the shuttle and an hour later I was at my gate waiting for my flight.

It was the most interesting and fun flight I've had in years! I sit on the aisle and the window seat became occupied by a woman from Japan. When the doors closed and it was obvious we had an empty seat between us, she went and got her friend who was seated farther back. They chattered away in Japanese and I read my book and dozed, after having smiled and said "hi" when they took their seats.

Along came the flight attendant with drinks. My seat-mates pulled out goodies to accompany their apple juice and handed over to me a little sealed paper-ish bag containing a Japanese snack that somewhat resembled a rice cake, but wasn't. It tasted quite good and I told them so. They also shared their (American) gourmet potato chips. I was looking elsewhere when I heard them exclaiming and discovered my can of Diet Pepsi was erupting. They immediately passed me their NWA napkins and no damage (to my book or clothes) was done.

Next, I pulled out my ziploc bag of trail mix and shared it with them, explaining "m&m," "cashew," "raisin," "peanut." Since I'd been carrying the trail mix around for awhile, the m's had worn off the m&m's so my neighbor wasn't sure what it was 'til she bit into it and exclaimed, 'Chocolate!!"

These women could also say "Thank you" and "OK" and "I don't speak English" and "Minneapolis?" and they taught me "thank you" in Japanese, which sounded something like "ai-ka-do." We smiled and nodded a lot and understood each other quite well.

When the plane landed at MSP airport, I showed them what time to reset their watches and the woman next to me pulled out a slip-in glasses case, demonstrated how you put your glasses in it and gave it to me! I tried to give them the rest of my trail mix (I wasn't going to give away my camera!) but they laughed and chattered and indicated that no, I should keep it and eat it myself.

I don't know where they were going from here, but we certainly enjoyed ourselves between Las Vegas and Minneapolis! And I was once again reminded that even if we don't speak the same language, we CAN communicate, and that the language of love and friendship and hospitality is universal!

High Rollers

Tuesday we set a more leisurely pace, eating a late breakfast at Planet Dailies, a restaurant in the Planet Hollywood casino. Even in the back corner, it was hard to hear each other talk.

Next we decided to take a cab to the Venetian. We walked through the lobby and casino & took an escalator up to the Palazzo floor where we felt as if we were walking in Venice at dusk. We had to pass all the shops and go to the end of the canal in order to buy tickets and for the gondola ride. We shared a gondola with a couple from England and our gondolier hammed it up and sang.

We shared a $3.50 bottle of water and headed back to our hotel.

In the evening we ate a quieter meal at Planet Dailies (were all the Memorial Weekend revelers gone?) and played the nickel machines, high rollers that we are! On the first pass I won $3.00 and cashed out. On the second I won $3.50. I broke a $10, gave probably $4.00 to Mom & she added a couple ones of her own. So, I probably put $6.00 into the slots and came away with $6.50. Mom said I was like my dad, cashing in when I won something more than a credit or two.

You probably don't want to take me along on your next gambling vacation! :-)

We took my camera and went back to watch the musical water in front of the Bellagio, enjoying it very much, once again.

From Zion to Vegas

We have so thoroughly enjoyed our Caravan Tour! It's hard to say "good-bye" to new friends and to think we'll all go our separate ways in just a few hours. So we took pictures....

and here we are with our Tour Guide, Bruce, and our fantastic driver, Gina!

and with my new friend Phuong from San Jose...

From the bus we caught a few last glimpses of the beautiful Colorado Plateau.

The bus toured us down the "Strip" on our way to the airport and then we unloaded quickly and a few of us shared a shuttle bus to downtown hotels.

Penny Strongman from Strongman Travel got me a good deal at Planet Hollywood, and the room was lovely, but when we walked in the lobby we couldn't believe the noise.

Two hearing-impaired people should NOT travel alone together to Las Vegas! We stood in line for 40 minutes to check in...

I could hardly hear a word the woman at the front desk said, but finally figured out that no, I did not want to upgrade to a different room! The girl at the bell-hop desk got impatient on the third repetition of an answer to my question, so after that if I had a question, I dialed 0 on the phone in our room!

I think we suffered from some sort of culture-shock. I felt as if I'd just gone directly from Nieman-Marcus (or some equally extravagant department store) directly to a junk shop. Such was the contrast from a week in the West's natural wonders to being unceremoniously deposited amid the neon glitz of the Vegas Strip. I didn't like it at all!

It was Memorial Day afternoon and the Strip was inundated with people! You couldn't even walk 2-abreast down the sidewalk, but we managed to find our way to McDonald's (the cheapest meal we had in Vegas) and to the m&m store, passing the Harley Davidson Cafe on the way.

We watched 2 water shows in front of the Bellagio Hotel and saw the fabulous flower exhibits in the lobby.

That was enough for one day!

Zion National Park

After last night’s least well-liked motel and restaurant, Zion Lodge is on par with Lake Powell Resort or probably better, in my opinion. We traveled through cattle and horse country between Bryce Valley and Zion National Park, stopping at the Red Canyon Visitor’s Center

and then at a trading post that had its marketing strategy down-pat … the men’s restroom was accessible on the outside of the building, but to get to the women’s you had to go THROUGH the gift shop!

Then we were on our way again, with a brief photo stop at a buffalo farm...

We stopped for pictures on the rim of Zion Canyon,

then started our descent to the canyon floor. We passed through 2 tunnels in the rock, one short and the other a mile long with occasional windows cut into the sides of the rock. Traffic has to be stopped on both sides because tour buses can only fit in the middle of the tunnel, so there was a 10-minute wait ‘til we could pass through. Our bus driver, Gina, is very talented, handling that huge bus with skill and finesse. Once through the tunnel, we were able to stop for pictures again.

It was a beautiful winding trip to the Canyon floor where we arrived at the lodge and spent the afternoon riding the free shuttle, getting off at different stops for photos and to visit the Human History Museum where Mom discovered that Zion became a National Park just one month before she was born! (1916) She told the Park Ranger at the museum this and the ranger gave her a bunch of park stickers.

We saw the "Court of the Patriarchs," Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,

and other majestic feats of creation that really made you put things in perspective.

Zion Lodge has beautifully decorated rooms, a balcony for each room, no TV (there’s enough to look at right out our windows!) and we enjoyed a fantastic meal (on Caravan Tours) at the restaurant above the lobby. We ate with another mother-daughter team and got lots of advice on what to do and see in Las Vegas. It seems a number of tour members are staying over in Vegas for a couple nights, but so far none of us are staying at the same hotel.

We are so deep in the canyon that cell phone reception is poor and my internet doesn’t work at all. And I must admit, in this gorgeous spot, I don't miss it at all!

Tomorrow morning will be more leisurely with time to enjoy the morning light on the canyon walls, take a group picture and then head for Las Vegas at 10:00 a.m. 

Bryce Canyon

After 2 nights at the Lake Powell Resort, we headed out this morning and soon ccrossed into Utah, necessitating a change to Mountain Daylight Time. The scenery along the way was gorgeous and we learned about the town of Kanab where many of the old Western TV shows were filmed. We stopped in Kanab for a restroom break and shopping at the trading post.

We then traveled on to Bryce Canyon National Park where the scenery was beyond spectacular! We were amazed at the Hoodoos and all the fascinating shapes they took. We ate lunch at the lodge in the Park and took our first pictures from there, where it was very windy and cold and it even hailed on us a bit walking back to the lodge.

We also viewed the wonders of Bryce Canyon from Bryce Point and Sunrise Point overlooking the Bryce Amphitheater.

We sre spending the night at Bryce Valley Inn in the town of Tropic, Utah, where the high for today was 46, definitely NOT tropical weather! I've worn my Grand Canyon sweatshirt for 4 days because it's the only warm thing I have. Zion is forecast to have a high of 63 tomorrow, so it won't be warm again until we get to Las Vegas on Monday.

Ironically, it was in the mid 70's at home today!