Westward Bound Day 28-29, Las Vegas Baby!, June 1-2, 2013

For the weekend, Richard and I headed off to Las Vegas to finally take in a Cirque du Soleil production and explore the city. The trip from Munds Park was made much easier and more economical thanks to the generosity of Shirlee who traded vehicles. Her 50 miles/gallon Prius was not only a cost saver but so much easier to tool around in a big city than that big old doolie of ours. The landscape was pretty much brown all the way and the temperature just got hotter and hotter as we traveled. For miles and miles, the landscape was so barren and so much like a moonscape. I had no idea that so much of our country looked like this.

I loved the way so many southwestern cities. like Vegas, decorated their overpasses with metal sculpture and/or graphics designs. I'm thinking Florida should do more of this. 

We finally arrived at our hotel, The Quad, and scurried to get ready to pick up our tickets and head to our dinner reservation. We headed out to the Mirage, just a couple of doors down where all our evening activities would be taking place. For this Beatlemaniac from the 60's, I was so looking forward to the Beatle's Love production by the Cirque de Soleil!

 Cirque du Soleil was awesome and what fun to have an evening of Beatles music to boot. I highly recommend this production to anyone that loves the Beatles. It was awesome!

We started out the next morning by heading out for a walk with a breakfast stop at McDonalds. The picture below, on the right, is the ceiling of the restaurant. Fancy schmancy McDonald's but the prices were the same as at home. 

 

After breakfast, we continued our walk, spending most of the time walking through a huge shopping center within the Venetian Hotel, that included canals and gondolas. I felt like I was in a cross between Disney and Vegas.

    

We also explored the Flamingo Hotel and enjoyed the gardens the most.

In the afternoon, Jay Tull (Mena's son, Sheryl's nephew) swung by and picked us up to give us a personal tour of the entire city. 

This is a man-made lake near Jay's new home. It is amazing what
this city has created out  smack kadab in the middle of the desert.

After touring the outer areas of Vegas, we toured the downtown, original strip. Lots of interesting sites.

Only in Vegas...this Denny's actually has a fully stocked bar in it.

Not far from the Denny's was this grill. Why would anyone choose to eat there?

 Evidently Saturday is a big day for weddings in Vegas. We saw quite a few wedding parties like this wandering around, taking in the sites.

 

 

Jay had made us promise to stop by for deep fried twinkies.  Evidently this has become a tradition when he shows off his city to visiting friends and family.

Unbeknownst to Richard, Elvis was in line behind him in the Twinkie line.

 

Believe it or not, these were actually scrumptious!

Jay was so thoughtful. He made sure we got our picture taken in front of the classic Vegas sign.

We finished off the evening by heading to the Bellagio hotel to check out the lobby and watch their water show.

The hallways were so colorfully decorated with these upside down umbrellas.

The lobby ceiling was festooned with Chihuly glass.
So much more impressive in person.

We finished off the evening together enjoying the dancing waters of the Bellagio Fountains.

Hats off to Jay for a delightful visit and an awesome tour of Vegas!

Westward Bound Day 27, Sightseeing in Flagstaff, May 30, 2013

On Thursday, we traveled with Jack and Shirlee to Flagstaff where we met up with Jack's brother, Paul, to explore a state  historic park and home. The tour of the home that is filled with original furnishings and clothing from the early 1900's was fascinating. Perhaps even more so since this home was built the same year as our home in Live Oak.

The Riordan Mansion State Historic Park stands tucked away among the Ponderosa pines of Kinlichi Knoll in Flagstaff, Arizona. This five-acre park, which borders Northern Arizona University, showcases the remarkable home of Timothy and Michael Riordan, lumber baron brothers who married sisters, Caroline and Elizabeth Metz.

Together, the Riordan brothers built their thirteen thousand square foot duplex in 1904 while Arizona Territory still struggled toward statehood. The rustic mansion, built from rough, log-slab siding, hand-split wooden shingles and volcanic rock, blends perfectly with the rugged Flagstaff landscape. The home, designed in American Arts and Crafts style by Charles Whittlesey, who also planned El Tovar Hotel at the Grand Canyon, contains forty rooms, including six bathrooms called "indoor necessaries."The startlingly luxurious home consisted of two similar six thousand square foot wings, one for each family, connected by a large billiard room. Both families used the long Billiard Room, with its overhead log beams, as a recreation room. How is this for a SUPER DUPER DUPLEX!

Most of the art deco and craftsman structure/furnishings and artwork were original to the home. In the less formal living room, they actually had a long wicker swing hanging in front of the fireplace....I really liked that. Such an interesting home to tour!

Another really interesting item in the house were photographs taken by Grand Canyon

explorer John Wesley Powell's expedition photographer John (Jack) Hiller's actually printed on the glass window panes in the Billiard Room. These unique photos provide a glimpse of early Arizona. Here is one of the windows:

The home was filled with many of the original furnishings, dishes, and artwork. The owners filled their homes with art deco and craftsman furnishings and lots of Tiffany style windows.

The rustic exterior blended in beautifully with the wooded grounds.

As always, I love discovering the local flowers on the property.

   

Following our tour, we headed downtown for a yummy lunch at the Diablo Burger.

I was quite intriqued by how they have honored their history by preserving so many of the downtown buildings. Get a load of this thermometer that has been up since 1882!

 

Don't you just love this funky bench? 

There were several on the plaza - each one just a little different in design.

This is a view of the landscape as we drove back down to Munds Park. What a beautiful day!
 

Westward Bound Day 26, Bumping our way over the mountain to Sedona, AZ, May 29, 2013

On our second day at the Hustons, we had a leisurely breakfast and piled into our truck to take a rugged mountain trail that links Munds Park to Sedona with the promise of beautiful views along the way at the Schnebly Hill Vista. The trip start out a little rough but with the rocky terrain, it became bump, bump, bumpier all along the way. Our theory is that they keep it rugged as part of the "adventure" lure for people to take the commercial jeep tours from Sedona to the vista. There were lots of tour groups bump, bump, bumping right along with us.

We finally reached the vista after what seemed to take forever
since Richard had to go soooo slowly across the rocky, twisty mountain trail. 
But once we reached the top, the view was so worth the bumpy ride.

Jack and Shirlee

 

One of the many Pink Jeep Tour Groups we met along the trail. Watching them made me ever so grateful for the windows and air conditioning we had in the truck.

Once we reached Sedona, we were chuckling over the level of red dust that coated the truck. Then we headed on into a great southwestern restaurant for a fabulous lunch.

The restaurant was located in a wonderful conclave of shoppes that surrounded a courtyard with the most awesome landscaping and artwork.

              

 


After lunch we rode around the area and then rode up to the Chapel of the Holy Cross, a distinctive architectural design by Frank Lloyd Wright that has been placed on National Register of Historic Places.

  

We had to park at a lower level and hike about halfway up before we reached the golf carts that took us up the rest of the way. 

This is the awesome view from about halfway up, that kept us trudging up towards it. 

This is the view of the Chapel that kept us trudging on up the mountain. Impressive!

The four of us taken from the courtyard in front of the Chapel. This is the view people see when they walk out of the chapel. Wow.

This is a mosaic design in the flooring of the courtyard.

This is another view from the courtyard. The mansion below borders the Chapel property and is the weekend home of a Phoenix physician. Unbelievable!

Here are some of the flowers I observed as we went up and down the mountain.

 

 

We got back to Munds Park just in time to welcome Jack's brother, Paul, and his wife Kay. They were stopping over for a couple of nights before heading on to Las Vegas to celebrate their 40th anniversary. They were as fascinated with Shirlee's progress with the garden as we were.

After a great meal at Jack and Shirlee's the six of us retired to the camper for ice cream.

All in all, another great day with the Huston's!