The Mojave Desert

We had a leisurely breakfast and then set off on the Interstate 10 to Las Vegas. But not before I finally managed to speak to David Harewood, the actor who was staying in our hotel. Most of you probably don't know who he is, but he was awarded an MBE for his services to drama only two years ago. He was perfectly charming and I asked him if any Americans recognised him as he is British actor who is more known back home, and he replied yes, all the time....which helped as they give him freebies wherever he goes! I suppose starring in Homeland got him known in the USA.

The journey from Los Angeles to Las Vegas is about 4.5 hours, and it takes you from California, through the Mojave Desert to Nevada. There was quite a bit of traffic and at times it was very slow. I thought I would find the desert boring but it actually is a fascinating landscape, miles and miles of wide open spaces that made us realise what a big country the USA is. It is beautiful in it's own way, having wide blue skies, an arid landscape and various cacti and other plant species. We stopped off at Barstow to get something to eat for lunch and as we opened the car door the wave of heat just rushed up into our faces...it was 41C.

If Los Angeles is la-la land, Las Vegas is glitzy and quite surreal, a city of huge hotels all vying to be more ritzy than the other. When we walk into our hotel reception we we rather gobsmacked at the opulence....a life size carousel made of flowers that actually goes around and around. And amongst all this opulence you have these sad people gambling away their  earnings - there were crowds of people using the machines. You also have the very wealthy who gamble, but they tend to go to the private suites and you don't really see them. None of us like gambling so we won't be having a go!

I had planned a night time shot of the strip, but we ended up having supper so late....first we had to wait an hour to get our rooms despite it being 5pm when we arrived, then knowing there are countless restaurants in the hotel we thought dinner would be no problem, but again....as we had not booked they were all full so we had to queue and wait for ages. We eventually found a Chinese restaurant where we had to wait 40 minutes for a table but when we asked again they gave us a table after 10 minutes!

So after a late supper I am too tired to go out to get some night time shots - this is a shot of the desert taken from the car window as we whizzed past.

We have to be up early tomorrow morning as we have a day trip to the Grand Canyon...very exciting!