West Trip - Day 3

Location start/finish: Las Vegas - drive to Hoover Dam - drive to Grand Canyon
Activities: drive, Hoover Dam sight seeing, drive, hike topside South Grand Canyon

The snoozers were harder to get up this morning, but we had another big day planned with lots of fun.

We knew we had a longer time in the car, so we treated the kids to a big breakfast at District Doughnuts, a place they tried in New Orleans last year.

A few HUGE doughnuts and breakfast sandwiches later, we packed up and drove to Hoover Dam.

The drive wasn't too long or out of our way. The dam was impressive, as were the sights of Lake Mead and the surrounding rocks.

The visitor walking area was very hot though - we stayed on the shady side as much as we could!
From there it was a long drive to the Grand Canyon. The landscape was beautiful, so we didn't mind, and the kids really kept themselves quite occupied (even without devices).

Once in the Grand Canyon area, we saw a few elk right away. They were not scared off by the cars!

We checked into the lodge quickly so that we could get onto a few trails before dinner. I don't think you can prepare yourself with photos or videos for the vastness of the Grand Canyon. It is just that big and awesome.

I didn't realize so much of the rim trails would be paved - somehow I missed that in my research, but it really came in handy to be able to use the stroller for Ruby (both to contain near the edges and to cover more ground when she got tired).

The kids and Lehr loved it and took every opportunity to get as close as possible to the edge.

I loved it and am not scared of heights BUT I couldn't be anywhere near them when they did that because it made me so nervous. A few times I even asked them to come back to the trail so that I could enjoy it for a moment and get close myself without worrying about them.

Just amazing.

On our last trail, we decided to cut through an old fire road (away from the edge) so that we could get back for dinner before dark. Halfway in, we encountered a female elk off to the side. No worries - we kept our eyes on her and made sure she saw us before we passed by.

Once past, we saw another straight in front of us on the road. So now we are 'trapped' between the two of them, half of us watching behind us and half watching forward. We carefully eased our way out of there without any confrontation, but not before Lehr spotted a baby hidden in the weeds. (If you ask Ruby about it now, she will still act out us being quiet and then running like crazy...quite funny now.)

This night was Maddux's favorite because after dinner, we all got into bed (at 815!) and fell asleep watching a show on the Food Network - she thought the tv/bed thing was the greatest!