Sunday 8/10/14 - Great Sand Dunes National Park
When we woke up this morning, everyone was in moods. We were tired and some people had flights to catch... it didn't leave much room for fun. So we just drove straight to the park-n-ride, where Soup spent a few days hanging out. We then unpacked, re-packed, and said our goodbyes. From here on out it would be me, Jess, and Katie.
After getting the car settled, our adventure for the day was to drive South to Great Sand Dunes National Park. The drive was uneventful... a wind turbine here and there. Driving along the Rockies. But really the big thing was to see the Sand Dunes for the first time. Oh man, so cool. National parks are great because you enter them and your first thought is "how does this exist?" It was so pretty. Enormous dunes formed at the base of a mountain range. Evidently they formed from a long standing predominant wind from the West pushing against a rare but powerful wind up over the northeastern mountains. The dunes shift a maximum of 30 feet in either direction. Not something one would expect in the middle of Colorado.
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| Jess is trying, I'll give her that |
Excited about exploring, we quickly set up the tent and started walking up into the dunes. Wearing shoes was a poor choice, because I poured about 2 lbs of sand out by the end of the day, but it was an extremely fun hike/walk. A thunderstorm scared some people off, including Jess, and the whipping winds blasted us with abrasive sand, but we made it to the top of the High Dune. It looked like another world. So unbelievable. Sand dunes completely surrounding me; it looked so unreal.
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| Surely I'm not posing |
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| That weather was FUN |
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| More light jackets than a lot of travelers in the Sahara |
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| Is this even America? |
Going back down was a lot of fun: a lot of tumbling down the dunes. There was no part of my body uncovered by sand. Sand was absolutely everywhere. For days. In my hair, ears... yikes.
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| All of that sand is just what I dumped out of my shoes |
After that, we went on a short hike up to a lookout: seeing these impressive dunes reminded me of the dunes in Death Valley, but way bigger. So impressive.
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| The Rockies are weird |
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| Haha just kidding this is a famous painting I stole from a museum depicting something about Jesus |
We made some pasta for dinner and then had a nice night walk back to the dunes to see them under moonlight. Holy-freaking-crap. Are you serious? So amazing. I can't believe that I, me, Chris Severino, future Emperor of the Universe, was lucky enough to experience something so unique.
Monday 8/11/14 - Mesa Verde National Park
After an efficient tent packing we started on our way West toward Mesa Verde National Park. Staying in Colorado yet again - there's a lot going on here. And this will be the last national park in Colorado that I have yet to visit! We stopped for breakfast at what appeared to be a town, kind of. The restaurant was called "Boogies." The food existed. They DID have a 6 lb cinnamon bun though, so that's good.
Anyway, after more driving, we finally got to Mesa Verde and signed up for a cliff dwelling tour at Balcony House. We were just trying to understand how this park works, but apparently if we wanted to check this thing out the time is NOW. So we had to book it up the mesa and through the park to make it in time. The park is a lot of green, hilly mesa with several canyons. In many of these canyons, Ancient Pueblo people built their communities. Right into the sides of the canyons. The sandstone ruins remain, and they look incredible. So amazing to see how these people lived.
Our tour was very informative and involved climbing a few wooden ladders and crawling through some tiny doorways. There were quite a few "people of size" on the tour that maybe shouldn't have been on the tour. But whatever, it was still amazing to walk around INSIDE these sandstone dwellings. Apparently the people would farm the tops of the mesas, so every day they would literally have to climb up and down the sides of the canyons, rock climbing sans harnesses, just to collect and maintain the food supply.
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| Mind you, this is IN THE SIDE of a vertical cliff |
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| Katie's face has just a LITTLE bit more personality than that building |
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| Just you WAIT until you see a photo of the entire community |
After the tour we did a few short hikes, walked around checking out some of the other dwellings, went to some overlooks: it was a fun time. We definitely saw a lot of cool stuff. And I finished that gigantic cinnamon bun on top of a cliff. I win.
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| WHO DOES THIS |
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| Colorado, consider all of your national parks VISITED |
Some thunderstorms started moving in as we drove around the mesa, providing some fairly epic sunset views.
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| what the fuck is going on here |
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| You're looking in the wrong direction |
But after all the sightseeing, we set up the tent and had SHOWERS! What an unexpected treat! And we made some more pasta and called it a night. Good day though.
Tuesday 8/12/14 - Grand Canyon National Park
Today's adventure began around 7am, packing up the car and heading down toward the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. But first, we stopped at the Four Corners Monument. This spot is literally the point at which Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona meet. Kind of cool. It was on Navajo land, so we paid some money awkwardly to get onto the park land. But it was worth it to stand in four states at once. I guess. Whatever, it was fun.
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| Quad-State Starfish |
Then we got a bullshit breakfast at Denny's and THEN to the Grand Canyon. Quick stop off at our campsite, which is just outside the park (the one campground in the park was full, THANKS), and then on into the park itself. On the way in we passed a herd of Buffalo: these guys are everywhere.
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| So freaking lazy |
And then we headed right to the lodge and had a drink before anything else. Because you know, we're in a national park, so that's the thing you do. This gave us enough time for Jess to see the actual canyon for the first time, and it was ridiculous. So unbelievably beautiful. The colors and expanse were just as I remember and more - so freaking insane. Not as many tourists on the North Rim side, which is nice, but they can still be annoying over here. So we set off to drive over to some other viewpoints. We didn't want to go on a hike because it was so late in the day, so seeing different areas would be nice.
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| It's a greenscreen |
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| Most of those colors aren't even in the color spectrum |
We drove up to Point Imperial, the highest point in the park at about 9000ish feet, and to Cape Royal, which has some incredible views.
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| Severi-YES |
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| It was just ok |
We caught what might be my second favorite sunset of all time there. Holy crap so gorgeous: absolutely indescribable with the colors of the sky and the canyon all going BANANAS.
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| What is happening here |
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| THAT. FREAKING. SUNSET. |
We were hanging around with a group of photographers there, who seemed to be good fun, all heckling a shittier group of photographers who would yell at us to get out of their way. Fuck off. It's the Grand Canyon. Nature is free. Stop living behind your cameras.
It was definitely dark when we drove back to the campground at 8pm. And it took an hour from Point Royal. So we made some quick boil-bag meals (I had a pretty tasty beef stew made out of powders) and played our traditional game of Head's Up before nappy time. But the important thing is that on the drive back there were some nighttime buffalo grazing right next to the road. Kind of scary because they were so close, but it was great fun.
Wednesday 8/13/14 - Grand Canyon National Park
It's our second day at the Grand Canyon and OH GOOD the entire thing is fogged in. We're on the inside of a ping pong ball. We were going to get up for sunrise, but nope: rain. Ok, so we slept a bit more and drove to the lodge for some breakfast. We were seated right next to the window for a cool cloudy view of the canyon, but within moments, moments, EVERYTHING was fog. Nothing could be seen past 20 feet. Super annoying.
So we spent SEVEN HOURS writing postcards, catching up on my journal, reading, playing cards, and snacking. Oh and several adult beverages. When at the Grand Canyon... do as the Grand Canyons do? So yeah, not the best Grand Canyon day.
But hey, when the clouds did finally start to clear it was amazing. We went on a short walk and then drove up to Point Imperial again to see the shadows and colors of the canyon walls, which now included cloud remnants and rainbows too. Not a bad way to end our stay at the Grand Canyon.
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| Maaaaaybe the clouds made it better... at least just a little bit |
We went back to the campsite BEFORE dark this time and had one last round of pasta and Head's Up. And the clouds cleared, revealing an AWESOME starry sky. One of the best I've seen since that backcountry camping night in Yosemite. Thanks for a great sky!
Thursday 8/14/14 - Las Vegas
Today we packed up the tent one last time: no more camping on this trip (SADFACE). Tonight is Vegas night. We started the drive blind though, no directions whatsoever. We had to work on memory for about an hour until we finally got signal to look up directions on our phones. We filled up on gas at a place with about a thousand dead moths. HUGE moths, all over the place. What the fuck? So weird.
Our drive took us into Utah for a bit, then back down to Arizona for 20 minutes, and then Nevada. This is state number: who the fuck knows? We got In'N'Out burger just outside Las Vegas borders. No idea what time it was in Nevada, but apparently we arrived 20 minutes before it opened. And they still served us! I was order #3: so good. I love this place.
After our delicious meal we pulled into Vegas, seeing all the casinos on the strip brought back fond memories of trips past and... PTSD from when I tried driving the Strip in Joe's manual car. Haha. We APPARENTLY have a suite at the Venetian. So ridiculous. So big. So baller. Also it is 97 degrees holy freaking crap. I am outside at the pool right now. Super hot, but so great swimming and drinking Pina Coladas. Tonight we are probably going to hit up the casinos on the Strip. LIKE BALLERS.
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| My life right now is very different than it was 24 hours previous to this |
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| Just some road beers on a rampy escalator |
Well, we did it. We enjoyed Las Vegas a little too much. After the pool, we walked down the Strip for some drink fixins, road beers, and burritos. These got us back to the hotel, where we took showers (still amazed at how good showers can be) and unwound a bit while watching Shark Week.
We headed downstairs after that, where I promptly lost money playing roulette. So then we sat down at a video blackjack game and stayed there for about 3 hours. I put a $20 in and played that thing all night, eventually losing $10? After 3 hours of heckling the video dealer avatars and getting about 7 rounds of free drinks. I knew when I ordered a martini that things were going in a bad direction. Then the waitress started offering us shots and I started ordering 2 drinks at a time... uh oh.
So yeah then more debauchery was in our future as we then started walking down the strip.
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| Beer #?? |
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| Memory is fading from consciousness |
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| Always a fun time, even when you're not aware of it |
We bounced around to a few outdoor bars and tried to see the Bellagio water show... but it turned out to be 2am and we definitely, definitely missed it. Everything after that was hazy, but a cold Subway hoagie the next morning indicated that I tried and failed to have a late night snack.
Friday 8/15/14 - San Francisco
I am super pumped that my hangover isn't as bad as it could have been. We got up... later than I wanted to, but whatever. It's fine. Today was just a day to spend 9 hours in the car driving to San Francisco. It was long and slightly annoying, but we had some podcasts to listen to. The drive included a few Joshua Trees and a stop off at a fruit stand for some cheap strawberries. They were seriously delicious, like you don't even know.
We pulled into my temporary extended stay hotel around 6:30pm and very easily moved into the place. It looks awesome: deck, nice bed, amenities, a RUG. And it's really convenient for work. I think the next two weeks here will be nice.
After we got settled a bit, Jimmy and Tassi came over to welcome me to the bay area. They drove us up into the city to see Gary, who is in town for work. It was great to hang out together: we walked around the Fisherman's Wharf area and went to the strangest bar ever. It was an Irish pub/Curry house. What? It looked like someone took an Irish bar, complete with pool tables and air hockey, and wrapped it around an Indian restaurant. Great food and beer though. We were so tired, so we didn't stay out too late: just drove back home around midnight.
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| My home for 2 weeks until I find an expensive home |
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| Not touristy enough |
Sunday 8/17/14 - San Francisco
So... I start my first day of work tomorrow. Kind of excited and nervous all at once, especially since I haven't gone to work in like a month and a half. But the past few days of being in SF have been amazing. We toured the city with Blake, Gary, Jimmy, and Tassi. Eating sourdough breadbowls at Fisherman's Wharf, going to a bar in North Beach, walking around in Chinatown.
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| Arrow, you're not going to hit anyone sticking in the ground like that |
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| I think I've seen that expression before... in the Shining. |
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| Don't worry about this one |
At night we met up with Rebecca and Peter and had an incredible evening. Indian food followed by Bootie Mashup dance party! So much fun HOLY CRAP. It was the 11th anniversary of Bootie Mashups, which I've been a fan of for a few years now, so there was a weird burlesque show going on and live bands and everything. I didn't even know what was going on: it was nuts.
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| Rebecca excited is probably my favorite thing ever |
Today we've been exploring the Mountain View area a bit and relaxing. A pool/laundry day mixed in with just a bunch of stuff I need to take care of for work. Not a bad way to spend the day. Here's to a good first day tomorrow...
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