Beverly Hillbillies

After Death Valley, we went to Edwards Air Force Base.  Interesting place.  If you ever saw the movie "The Right Stuff" (one of our favorite movies  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086197/ )  then you should be familiar with Edwards.  They do testing there.  Mostly aviation type. 

The campground at Edwards was not very nice.  Very small spaces and you are right in the middle of nowhere.  The base is not very populated or big in that sense, but in size, it is huge.  That way if you have to crash your airplane, like Chuck Yeager had to, you'd have a place to do it.  http://www.chuckyeager.com/#/HOME

One day we decided to go to Hollywood.  Chris loves everything about Hollywood and movie stars and movies, etc.  We drove west over the snow covered San Gabriel Mountains (we think) and down the Topanga Canyon to Hwy 1.  We went towards Santa Monica and the pier.  We then ended up on Mullholland Drive and Beverly Hills. 

http://www.santamonicapier.org/location/

We didn't stop anywhere except some pull offs that had fabulous views.  It was everything you would think about the area.  It was a beautiful, cold day and area.  It was President's Day so the traffic was reasonable.  There were a lot of "For Sale" signs in Beverly Hills, so if you ever wanted to..... go for it.

Click the link, select slide show and F-11 to enlarge the pics:

https://picasaweb.google.com/ChrisTorrance/BeverlyHillbillies?authkey=Gv1sRgCNKHyeee3daRZg#

Death Valley National Park

Left Vegas and headed to Death Valley.  We didn't spend more than a couple of hours there, which really doesn't do it justice.  We had goofy campground reservations and that shortened our time in the valley.  However, the time we did spend was great.  Believe it or not, Death Valley is a beautiful place. 

Here are the best of the pictures we took.  Select slide show and hit F-11 to enlarge. 

https://picasaweb.google.com/ChrisTorrance/DeathValley?authkey=Gv1sRgCJKVtZ3Wh9nTNQ#

For some reason, my computer would not pull up Death Valley National Park, but you can google it and hopefully get the site for more info. 

Valley of Fire State Park, Nevada

While in Vegas we drove about an hour north and went to Valley of Fire State Park.  Wow, we didn't really know what to expect.  We were blown away.  This State Park rivals some of the wonderful National Parks that we've been to.  We would describe it as a Sedona, Arizona without all the traffic and commercialization.  And, they have petroglyphs.  Hundreds of them. 

It was special to stand very near these petroglyphs and figure out what these people where trying to tell us. 

Hmm, when asked, Alex says "women could learn a lot from these petroglyphs, keep it short and to the point".     Oh my, ladies have at him.  I'm sorry I asked for his opinion.

Let the pictures do the talking.  The last few pictures show the reason why the Indians settled here.  The trail lead to a natural tank (water).  It was hidden and protected by the rocks.  We took 244 pictures and below we picked out the best 30.  As usual, click the link, select slide show and hit F-11 to enlarge your screen. 

https://picasaweb.google.com/ChrisTorrance/ValleyOfFireStateParkNV?authkey=Gv1sRgCJLcvZr0-cbfaw#

http://parks.nv.gov/vf.htm

Las Vegas and Nellis Air Force Base

We headed to Las Vegas last week.  It had been over 20 years since either of us had been there and we wanted to see the changes. 

We stayed at Nellis Air Force Base. They have a nice campground.  We were able to use our satellite, cell phone service and air card service.  It's nice when you can watch TV and communicate.  The problem with Nellis is the jet noise.  We are use to it since Alex use to fly a jet, but at Nellis the jets go into the break right above your head.  Nellis is home to the Thunderbirds.  So, while we enjoyed our stay, we wouldn't want to stay there long term. 

We went to the Vegas strip while we were there.  We headed to the Belagio Hotel.  They have free parking and one of the best buffets in town.  $20 for lunch.  We had a nice late lunch and then walked up and down the strip until it got dark.  We didn't gamble.  Just watching the people and the Vegas lights is enough fun for us. 

We went back to the Belagio and watched the fountain show.  The fountain show at the Belagio is worth the effort to go to Vegas in itself.  It's a beautiful show in the middle of a lot of crazy things going on.  It was the highlight of our Las Vegas strip visit.  See it if you do nothing else in Vegas and it's free. 

Our pictures turned out OK.  The fountain show picture didn't turn out very good, so don't judge the show by it. 

Eagle View RV Park, Yavapai Indian Reservation and Casino!

Forgot to mention where we went after we left Matt Torrance's driveway when the wedding events were over.  We headed up to the foothills above Scottsdale and stayed in a very nice casino campground.  Eagle View RV Park is connected with the Yavapai Casino.  In fact, it's across the street from the casino on the reservation.  It's in a beautiful area.  You can take many hikes right from the campground into the high desert and it's just wonderful.  We will go back there.  It's got full hookups, nice large spaces.  I expect it's full most of the winter.  Best to make reservations way ahead of time.

Foutain Hills is very close, so there is shopping and the usual restaurants.  We didn't go into the casino, but will try to check it out next trip.   It was fun there.               http://www.ftmcdowell.org/

Two Hikes

It's cold.  I didn't need to tell you that.  Even those of us in southern Arizona are cold.  In spite of the cold we went off in search of a hike/walk.  Some hikes are hikes, but some of the hikes we take are really just a walk.  A hike should be at least a few miles. 

First up was at McDowell Mountain Regional Park near Fountain Hills.  http://www.maricopa.gov/parks/mcdowell/              We took Pilot with us and he's slow.  We went on two short trails.  They have many trails to choose from.  We had a nice time.  It was very quiet.  It's hard to find "quiet" in this world.  Even in the middle of the desert you have jets flying over every few minutes, but in between them, it was nice and quiet.  Here's a pic....

Next up was more of a drive than a hike.  We drove up to Payson, AZ one afternoon.  http://www.paysonrimcountry.com/     That's a great web site of a nice little town.  People who don't live in Arizona know very little about the northern part of the state and that you can drive an hour from Phoenix and be in the forest where it will be much cooler and you'll feel like you are in the mountains of Colorado. 

We drove through town and headed for the Mogollon Rim.  http://www.fs.fed.us/r3/coconino/recreation/mog_rim/rec_mogollon.shtml

We got to the top and there was snow.  Enough snow that the Parks Dept. closed many of the roads along the rim.  Even though, we got to see the fantastic view from the rim.  We stopped at a playground/picnic area and got out for a little walk.  Of course we were not dressed for the weather or snow, nor did we have the proper foot wear.  We didn't even have Pilot's jacket for him to wear.  It was very cold but we played in the snow and threw snow balls at each other.  Alex got Chris pretty good and it was a stinger.  She'll get him back some day.  Pilot hated it.  He didn't like anything about it.  Walking in snow was worse than all the rocks, stones and pebbles in Arizona combined as far as he's concerned.  "Why did they think I would want to get out of the car and walk in this?"

Another Torrance Wedding

Andrew Torrance married Melissa Marks in a small, intimate wedding this past weekend.  It was simple and sweet.  They are a great couple who have two wonderful families supporting them.  We were happy to be there and are very happy for them.    Sweet indeed.