Silly Saturday ...

... with a 3:00 a.m. wake up call.

Yes ... you read that right ... we had to get up at 3:00 am for an early morning flight out of Newark Liberty International Airport.  This made for an extremely loooooong day.  So what is our destination?

Las Vegas, Nevada!! 

Actually we won't be spending all that much time in Las Vegas as we have a few side trips planned that will take us to California and then Utah.  And we couldn't be more excited about both these trips.

Back to today (and my collage) ...

We got to the airport and through security just in time to see the sunrise from our gate whilst we waited for our flight.  The airport is located in Newark, NJ which is right outside New York City.  You can see the city (and the Freedom Tower on the right) in my sunrise picture.  There is a double sun due to shooting through the window.  

After a five and a half hour flight we arrived in Las Vegas, NV.  I was apprehensive of a long flight during these tough times (and having to wear a mask non-stop for so long) but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be ... even with a very full plane.   We are travelling with a special companion but he didn't need to wear a mask.  The upper left photo of the collage was taken while we were flying over the Colorado Rockies ... stunning.  I waved to pipersmom as we flew over! 

We collected our rental car and headed out to find something to eat.  They only served snacks (pretzels!) on the plane so we were quite hungry.  It was 10:30 am in Vegas which is 1:30 at home on the East Coast.  After that we headed for our vacation condo.  Thankfully the condo was ready even though check-in wasn't supposed to be 4:00 pm.

We settled into our condo before heading out again in order to get some groceries to keep us fed and hydrated for the week.  We are in the desert so keeping hydrated is very important.  We forgot to buy sunscreen but we will rectify that on Sunday. 

By this time I was so tired as I only got about 2.5 hours sleep last night.  But we still wanted to do a few things before settling in for the night.  Red Rock Canyon is less and half hour away from where we are staying so we took the short drive over there.  Unfortunately, the park is working on a reservation system (and we didn't have one!) so we were unable to get into the park itself.  Luckily, you can still see these beautiful rock formations by simply driving up the road.  We pulled into a picnic area to get some photos and encountered the two young women doing back-to-back selfies!  Actually they were with a huge .... and I mean HUGE ... group of people at this pull-off spot.  Everyone was wearing black and dressed very nicely so I'm thinking it was some sort of memorial service.

We finally returned to the condo for some relaxation ... and were both in bed by around 9:30 pm.  

What a great start to our adventures ... with so much more to come.  The trip to California is to visit my mom (and other family).  We will stay with her for one night before returning to Vegas for a night.  Then it's off to Utah to visit our blip friend shirleyray (Sheryl) for two nights.  Can't wait!