{"id":5995,"date":"2013-09-13T00:49:33","date_gmt":"2013-09-13T04:49:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/?p=5995"},"modified":"2013-09-18T20:22:09","modified_gmt":"2013-09-19T00:22:09","slug":"westward-ho","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/?p=5995","title":{"rendered":"Westward Ho"},"content":{"rendered":"

Friday, September 13, 2013<\/span><\/p>\n

Late last night we flew into Las Vegas, Nevada to begin our self-guided tour of several national parks in the southwestern part of the U.S. \u00a0Jeff had made a one-night reservation for us at the Four Seasons Hotel because it was advertised as a quiet, no-casino, no glitz, centrally located hotel. \u00a0It was actually located on the top five floors of the Mandalay Bay Hotel which had lots of glitz, twenty-two restaurants, many shops, and a 135,000 square foot casino.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Four Seasons & Mandalay Bay Hotels<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Lobby of the Mandalay Bay Hotel<\/span><\/p>\n

The lobby of the Four Seasons was quiet, peaceful, and tastefully decorated. \u00a0This morning, we went downstairs to explore Mandalay Bay. \u00a0It was crowded with lots of people and loud music was everywhere. \u00a0We discovered that the casino was empty at 8:00 o’clock in the morning. \u00a0We had breakfast at Raffles and took a walk outside.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Huge Casino<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>View of the Luxor Hotel<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>The Excalibur Hotel<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Casino<\/span><\/p>\n

Afterwards, we checked out and retrieved our rental car and drove down the famous “Strip” to see the other hotels. \u00a0Las Vegas is an amazing city with an incredible number of huge hotels and gambling establishments.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Las Vegas Boulevard. aka “The Strip”<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>New York, New York<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Part of The Paris Hotel<\/span><\/p>\n

The temperature was heating up over 90 degrees. \u00a0We drove through North Las Vegas and found an entrance onto Route 15 and continued north to Utah. \u00a0The land just outside the city of Las Vegas was flat barren desert. \u00a0The speed limit on the highway was 75 mph.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Driving Through the Desert<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Advertisement Outside Las Vegas<\/span><\/p>\n

Route 15 continues through the northwestern corner of Arizona before going into Utah. \u00a0The land became more mountainous as we continued northward.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Arizona Landscape<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Southern Utah<\/span><\/p>\n

Springdale, Utah is the small town at the entrance of Zion National Park. \u00a0It is a tiny community of hotels, restaurants, and hiking outfitters which service the needs of the people who visit the park.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>View From Our Hotel Room in Springdale, UT<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Inside Zion National Park<\/span><\/p>\n

Zion National Park is preserved land which has two main parts. \u00a0One section straddles Route 9 and cars are able to drive along the road and stop at several turnouts. \u00a0There are numerous trailheads for hikers and lookouts for drivers. \u00a0The other section is off-limits to private cars. \u00a0Visitors must part their cars at the Visitor’s Center and take the free shuttle bus into the park. The road meanders along the Virgin River for about 12 miles making several scenic stops.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Rock Formation in Zion N.P.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Desert Flowers<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Ribbons of Color<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>View of Mountains<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Mountain Sheep Crossing the Road<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Grazing<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>White Rocks<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/span><\/a>Spicy Dinner at the Whiptail Grill<\/span><\/p>\n

We had a tasty southwestern dinner at the Whiptail Grill. \u00a0I had spaghetti squash enchiladas with salad and beans. \u00a0Jeff had spicy chicken enchiladas. \u00a0The temperature had cooled so we ate outside as the sun set over the mountains. \u00a0We had a great day from glitz to glorious.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Friday, September 13, 2013 Late last night we flew into Las Vegas, Nevada to begin our self-guided tour of several national parks in the southwestern part of the U.S. \u00a0Jeff had made a one-night reservation for us at the Four Seasons Hotel because it was advertised as a quiet, no-casino, no glitz, centrally located hotel. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5995","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-travel","category-western-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5995","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5995"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5995\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6023,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5995\/revisions\/6023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5995"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5995"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gallivantinggrandma.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5995"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}