Hoover Dam and Grand Canyon

We had gone to bed late last night which was why we spoiled ourselves with a well-needed sleep-in today with a late breakfast. After check-out we headed for Hoover Dam just outside of Las Vegas. Honestly, I though the dam was supposed to be bigger than it actually was. After all Google researching about it, looking at pictures and reading about it I had built up high expectations. Though it wasn’t that spectacular IRL and I got really disappointed. Well, well… “been there, done that…”

We kept on driving towards Grand Canyon. After discussing which entrance to drive to we realized that the best entrance for us would be the West entrance with its famous Skywalk. The last part of the road towards the West entrance – basically a dirt track – was in such bad shape that you could barely drive. Due to the number of tourists visiting Grand Canyon every year you would expect the road to be in better shape than that.

When we arrived (the parking lot was asphalted thought) the entrance fee was US$76 to get into the area and getting access to the Skywalk. At the entrance there was a gift shop with various souvenirs to buy. Just outside the entrance building the buses ran all the time back and forth to the Skywalk only few kilometers away. After some photos of the Grand Canyon and the Eagle we decided to take the next bus to the Skywalk. The security was rigorous before you even could get out on the Skywalk. You had to lock up all your belongings (cell phones and cameras included), passing through a body scanner and put on shoe protections to protect the glass floor out on the Skywalk. Then you were allowed to enter the Skywalk! It was a pretty cool feeling walking around in “the air” above Grand Canyon. It was literally like 100 meters down to the bottom of the canyon underneath you and due to the glass floor, you stared down at the almost bottomless canyon. So, if you suffer from fear of heights might want to think twice before entering the Skywalk. My fellow traveler actually suffers from fear of heights and was actually crawling around at first, but after a while she managed to stand up and walked around. So brave of her!

The sunset started and it was time to leave Grand Canyon and find a staying for the night. We drove as far as we could and ended up in Kingman before we checked in for the night.