Nevada is pretty nice this time of year

 So, here we are in Nevada, which is one of those states that I feel like kinda flies under the radar (except for Vegas). It is a state I have been to before, but just kinda in passing. But, this year, for my birthday, we decided to drive down to Lake Mead and Las Vegas for a few days to celebrate! It isn't actualy too far from Central Oregon where we have been for the past month or so, about 13 hours.

We departed Central Oregon on Thursday afternoon and arrived on Saturday afternoon. It is nice traveling when you can just kinda find a place to stop wherever you feel like it. We arrived at the Lake Mead Visitor's Center to get the inside scoop on where we should park. There are a few really nice free camping areas around the lake (2ish week stay limit) that we liked, and the first night we decided to stay at Government Wash. 

The temperature was perfect for strolling around, relaxing, and enjoying the sunset. There were a few other vehicles parked there, but it was by no means crowded.

Then, the next day we went to a water park! I do enjoy water parks. The weather was perfect, moving up to about 90F during the day. The water felt so good, and the lines were short! Ideal water park conditions! We did the slides a bunch, then sat by the wave pool in the shade and read for awhile before heading out. Red Robin for supper (free burger FTW!), some time in Barnes & Noble, then off to our next camping spot: Kingman Wash.

The drive out to Kingman Wash was definitely more daunting. It was a gravel road, between 3 and 4 miles, and we were definitely glad we had 4wd! We didn't need it, but there were times where it was nice to know we had it if things didn't go well. Having a slightly higher clearance was also a very nice feature.

Kingman is situated on the Arizona side of the like in a spot ideal for sunset viewing, the sun sets across lake mead from where the camping is, we are hoping to have a good view tonight (we arrived after dark last night). We also got in the water today! It was so warm! coming from the North West where the warmest water is like 70F this water felt amazing. We just hung out in the water for about an hour, didn't get cold, and enjoyed escaping the heat (90ish degrees). So far Nevada has been an awesome trip, the drive had some amazing mountain views, and Lake Mead is a great place for water activity! 


 

Tomorrow we are going to stay in Las Vegas so that Wednesday we can watch a magic show (Piff the Magic Dragon!). It should be fun times!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Costa Rica!

Image
 Over the last 2 weeks Julie and I went down to Costa Rica with Livingstone Adventist Academy Seniors (and Kirk, Julie's Brother, who works at the school). It was an awesome trip that was filled with beaches, waterfalls, painting, and scaffolding! The point of the trip is to allow the students to combine their Senior class trip with a mission trip, and this year we got to go. The town we went to is called "La Mona" and is on the southern Pacific coast, very close to the border with Panama. The flight down was good, we arrived on Tuesday night in San Jose and spent the night at the local Adventist University called UNADECA (Universidad Adventista de Centro America). Then the next day (Wednesday) we went to a valcano (Volcan Poas) and then headed to the Pacific coast for the evening. The weather was hot (always) but the ocean water was just cool enough that it was perfect to be in the waves as the evening wound down. The next day (Thursday) we made the drive down to La Mona...
Read more

Hawaii is a treat!

Image
 So, it is January now, which means that I didn't blog at all in December, even though we had some amazing adventures! December started out with a journey to the state of Hawaii! Sadly Vincent Van didn't Go to Hawaii, but we had fun none the less! We flew to Honolulu, then on to Hilo, and spent 2 weeks at Hale Laule'a at Opihi Point about 15 minutes north of Hilo. It is an Airbnb that my parents stayed at several years ago, and the owners asked them to come back to take care of the property and guests when they were on vacation. Julie and I were able to join them this time to help out and enjoy the beauty of the island, and it was wonderful!   It was a place where one can just relax and enjoy the peace of living in a place where the air is warm, comfortable, and possibly raining. But even the rain is pleasant. And, there are fresh coconuts! We were both working while we were there, but we had plenty of time to go on some adventures. My three favorites were: 1) Going snorke...
Read more

Converting Vincent

Image
Today we are in Iowa, heading for Indiana. We have been doing a good amount of driving this week, starting from Oregon on Wednesday afternoon, but we are nearly to the destination and can relax now that we are cloes and take our time, which is nice! Vincent has been doing great, our months and years of planning and prep have paid off! Most things are working how we planned for them to, and the things that aren't... well, that is life. Our plan to live in a van started in early 2020 when we were reviewing where we were in life and considering our options. We lived at a youth camp in the Cascade Mountains (Big Lake Youth Camp) which was a great place to live and work for me, but it was more difficult to Julie. In the winter she had to ride a snowmobile out to the car at 5:30 a.m. and dig it out if it had snowed, then drive an hour to work. A very long commute. Because of the camp schedule it was difficult for us to go on adventures, which is something we both want to do, so we were d...
Read more