Author: Jon

Tombstone and OK Corral

Tombstone, Arizona   is most famous for being the scene of the gunfight at the OK Corral in which Wyatt Earp , his brothers and Doc Holliday tried to run ‘The Cowboys’ our of town, but there are several threads of history running through the town, from the silver rush which bought everybody to the town, to the gunfight, to the creation of the courthouse where several men were hanged at the gallows.

We only had a couple of hours in Tombstone today but it’s impressively preserved and we had time to tour the town, visit the courthouse museum and see a slightly strange re-enactment of the gunfight just yards from the scene of the original gunfight (strange because the original gunfight lasted only 24 seconds and they managed to stretch the show to about half an hour).

We’ve just arrived in Roswell. Haven’t seen any aliens yet but we’ll see if we can find any tomorrow morning.

 

 

 

Titan Missile Museum

What better way to follow our slightly bizarre morning touring a US military base than to visit a decommissioned cold war nuclear missile launch site?

The Titan Missile Museum is an underground facility around 15 miles south of Tucson housing a 103ft Titan II missile which used to contain a 9 megaton nuclear missile aimed at Russia. We were taken on a guided tour of various underground rooms and corridors including the control room and the missile silo which still contains an inert Titan missile.

There were 18 of these missile sites located around the Tucson area and each one was manned in 24 hour shifts and ready to launch a missile within 58 seconds that had a range of over 5000 miles and could hit a target within 1 mile, which seems incredible even now, let alone in 1963 when it was built.

Being able to tour an actual cold war nuclear missile launch site was a privilege in itself, but being shown round by Steve, an ex-employee at one of these sites and taken through the launch sequence in the control room was pretty special. Steve uses a walking stick these days and can’t take the stairs, but his enthusiasm for the site was matched only by our fascination. I asked him if the job was scary, he replied “No, but it could get quite tedious”.

As you can probably tell, we’ve been pretty excited by our last couple of trips .Our last few days visiting meteor craters, airplane graveyards and cold war missile sites have been great fun. It really does seem that the weirder this holiday gets the more interesting it gets, which is good because after visiting Tombstone tomorrow we’re off to Roswell!

 

Airplane Boneyard

We arrived in Tucson, Arizona last night and we’re staying at quite a nice golf resort just outside town thanks to Expedia and their secret deals (rack rate $170/night, our price $56/night, bargain!). They’ve left us a nice leaflet warning us about the local wildlife; scorpions, tarantulas, rattlesnakes, coyotes and gila monsters . I can take or leave the wildlife, but the desert landscape is gorgeous. We’re only 40 miles from Mexico and you can’t move for cactii.

It’s been a busy day today. We started by visiting the Airplane Boneyard and the PIMA Air and Space Museum .

The Airplane Boneyard is an aircraft storage facility located at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson. It’s a real working military base so you have to be security checked first before boarding a tour bus for about an hour long tour of the facility.

The Airplane Boneyard is over 2600 acres in size and it’s where over 4000 military aircraft have ended up now that they are no longer needed. Instead of being destroyed they are mothballed and covered in protective plastic so that they can be put back into service, used for parts, or sold to other countries when needed. The location was chosen because the lack of rain, humidity and wind in the desert means that the aircraft will last a very long time without too much effort.

The facility is home to an impressive array of aircraft, from fighter jets like F-14’s (think ‘Top Gun’), 15’s and 16’s to bombers like the B-29 and helicopters like the UH-1 “Huey” famous for it’s use in Vietnam). The thing that impresses most though is the sheer size of the park and the billions of dollars worth of aircraft just lined up in rows for as far as the eye can see. It’s a bit of a shame you’re not allowed to leave the bus but it is a military base after all.

We also go to spend a short amount of time at the PIMA Air and Space Museum which organises the tours. The museum is home to hundreds more historic aircraft and allows you to get up close and personal with them.

I’ll post later about our trip to the Titan Missile Museum this afternoon.

 

 

 

Meteor Crater

We’re properly on the road again now, having covered another 345 miles through Arizona from Flagstaff to Tucson via “Meteor Crater” .

Meteor Crater is about 3/4 mile in diameter and formed 50,000 years ago by a meteor travelling an estimated 26,000 miles per hour. It sticks out like a sore thumb in the surrounding Arizona desert which is flat for hundreds of miles.

I hope the photos convey how big it really looks. I realise it is much, much smaller than the Grand Canyon where we were yesterday (the Grand Canyon is around 260 miles long), but there was something astonishing about standing on the edge of a crater formed by something  from outer space. Not only were we allowed to stand right on the rim, but the attached museum had real fragments of the meteor which you could touch and lift up (it’s much heavier tan normal rock!), along with lots of interactive exhibits and an excellent film about the formation and geology of the crater, as well and how it came to be discovered and preserved.

It was also interesting to hear how the crater was used as a training ground by NASA astronauts because the floor of it is so similar to the moon. Many well known astronauts like Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Jim Lovell trained there and equipment like the moon buggy was also tested there.

This might be controversial, but we were more impressed by the Meteor Crater than the Grand Canyon. Learning about how meteorites have shaped the solar system, killed off the dinosaurs and even created the Moon by smashing up the Earth certainly makes you feel small.

Our trip to the Meteor Crater also took us onto “historic” Route 66 , just for a few miles so we got to see a bit of the craziness associated with one of America’s first highways.

 

 

Grand Canyon Part 2

Having seen the Grand Canyon from a helicopter the other day we were looking forward to returning today to see more of the canyon from the rim.

The Skywalk is a glass floored bridge based on the West Rim, which extends over the canyon so that you can walk out, stand 4000ft above the canyon floor and look directly down.

It sounds impressive and it is, but unfortunately it’s also $150 for two people to spend 10 minutes or so walking out above the canyon. They also have a policy of not allowing any cameras on the Skywalk (enforced by airport style metal detectors) so that they can take photos of you and charge you $30 for each one. This was a massive shame, but I guess it was our fault for not reading the reviews on Tripadvisor first (pretty much all saying it’s a rip-off).

The Skywalk was unnecessary because the Grand Canyon is amazing whatever angle you view it from and I think getting to stand right on the rim and look down was possibly more impressive than the helicopter. There’s no fence at the West Rim, so it’s up to you how close you dare stand to the edge. The closer you get the more rewarding it is though, just such an amazing view.

Just driving though the desert on the way to the canyon and back was a fantastic experience. The landscape is covered in Joshua trees and there’s plenty of wildlife, including the biggest spider I’ve ever seen outside a pet shop (about 5 inches across). We also managed to spot a few mini tornadoes kicking up spirals of dust less than a mile from the road we were on (see the first photo).

Tonight we’re staying in Flagstaff and tomorrow we’re off to see a meteor crater!

 

 

Leaving Las Vegas

Sadly, it’s our last day in Las Vegas today. We spent our last evening at the Stratosphere tower before seeing Penn and Teller at the Rio.

The Stratosphere is apparently the 5th tallest structure in the US and the only skyscraper I know of with fairground rides on top of it. You take the elevator to level 109 and after walking through the gift shop (obviously, this is America), you take another elevator up to the roof where the rides are.

The ride that chucks you over the edge of the tower looked a bit much for me, but the bit of your brain that stops normal people from chucking themselves over the edge of the 5th tallest structure in America is obviously missing from Jen, so as she queued up for her first go I took some photos from the observation deck. She enjoyed it so much she even went up for a second go.

We finished the night by going to see magicians Penn and Teller. Normally I can’t stand watching magic shows (something to do with magicians being smug and delighting in keeping secrets from you). Penn and Teller, as usual though were brilliantly funny and clever, and most importantly they understand that how a trick is done is often much more impressive than the resulting trick, so they don’t mind showing you how most of them are done!

We also got to meet them afterwards for photos and signings, and yes, Teller does talk and he’s a nice guy too, which is a bonus.

 

 

Atomic Testing Museum

It might not be at the top of most people’s list of things to do in Las Vegas, but we spent an interesting couple of hours at the Atomic Testing Museum earlier today.

The museum mainly covers the history of the Nevada Test Site where over 900 nuclear bombs have been detonated, just 65 miles from Las Vegas, but also takes you through a general timeline of the invention of nuclear weapons.

I knew that the Americans were keen on testing nukes in the desert, but I had no idea it was so many and so close to Las Vegas. Apparently the testing was one of the factors in the growth of tourism here. People used to come to Las Vegas to visit the viewing points where they could see the explosions in the distance. Crazy!

I also had no idea the site was still in use, not for weapons testing but for training emergency services to deal with a nuclear accident or terrorist attack.

Strangely, they also had a couple of other exhibits that weren’t related to nuclear testing, including a large piece of a steel strut from the World Trade Center. There was no explanation of why, but why not?

The Vdara Hotel

I should start this post by saying that so far on this trip we haven’t exactly been staying in honeymoon-style luxurious hotel rooms. The point of the trip for us is to see as much of the US as possible and we don’t mind staying in 2 or 3 star motels in order to stay out here for as long as we are and do all the things we want to do.

Having said that, when in Vegas ….. we’ve decided to splash out a bit while we’re here with a 3 day stay at a new hotel called the Vdara .

Hotels here seem to fall into 2 categories, the classic themed hotels on the strip which everybody’s heard of like The Luxor, New York New York and the Venetian, which are an incredible sight and great fun to stay in. Then there’s a new breed of hotels built in the last 5 years and built to bring in the big spenders with 5 star luxury and ultra-modern design.

Having stayed in the Luxor we decided to try out the Vdara which is definitely in the second category. We’re staying in the 270 degree panoramic suite on the 33rd floor which (as the name suggests) has massive windows on 3 or it’s 4 sides, giving an amazing panoramic view of most of Las vegas.

 

Grand Canyon Helicopter Tour

 

I’m running out of superlatives to describe this trip, but I think today definitely deserves an “awesome”.

The day started at 4:30pm (as all the best days do), with us being picked up at our new hotel by a limo (I didn’t ask for the limo, that’s just what they do around here) which took us to Las Vegas Airport.

After registration and a quick safety briefing we were taken to our helicopter and boarded for our trip out to the Grand Canyon . The trip out of Vegas took about 45 minutes and took us past Lake Las Vegas , Lake Mead and the Hoover Dam . Our pilot was great at flying slowly and making turns over the sights so we could get a good view and some good photos. We flew at about 3000ft so we were never too high to see detail on the ground and when we passed over mountains we couldn’t have been more than 1000ft clear of them.

We flew right down into the Grand Canyon and landed at the bottom with several other helicopters for some photo opportunities, a picnic and a glass of Champagne. The canyon looked amazing from every angle and no matter how much you hear about it and how big you expect it to be, it’s still an incredible sight.

We took off again at sunset and got a great view as we flew back to Vegas (which just happens to be west of the Grand Canyon so you can see the sunset all the way). The trip finished with a low pass over the strip which was fully lit by that point. I had been expecting this to be great fun but even I was surprised just how low and how quickly we flew over the strip. At one point we were flying to the side of the Stratosphere, not above it.

An absolutely mind-blowing experience. I hope the photos and videos do it justice.

 

 

 

 

Bellagio Fountains and The Venetian

 

We were supposed to be going to the Grand Canyon today but our tour company was having some technical problems so while we wait until tomorrow for that I thought I’d post a few photos and videos we took at the Bellagio Fountains and the Venetian Hotel today.

We’ve decided to stay an extra couple of days in Vegas. Partly because we wanted to see Penn & Teller on Saturday night and partly because we think we can make the time up elsewhere without missing out on anything (by driving further each day basically). So, tomorrow we move from the Luxor to the Vdara which is further up the strip. I’ll hopefully be posting some photos of the Grand Canyon tomorrow night.