OLA: Leaving Las Vegas

the Fremont Experience in downtown Las Vegas

with Ate Tesing and Kuya Ute at the famous Welcome Sign

This is not about Nicolas Cage, it is about me! On a plane headed for ‘home’ in Ciincinnati, I am already nostalgic about my several days of escape to the Sin City! On Friday Sept. 2, Bill got a clean bill of knee health. After cooking some food and putting them in the fridge, I was off to Vegas on Sept. 5, worried the supply was not going to be enough, earning the title of a negligent wife. As it turned out, Bill was hungry for 

pizza, chili dogs, chips and salsa, anyway! He had his own escape!

Ann , Jingjing and me in front of VDara Hotel

My first day was a shopping spree with my cousin Ate Tesing and husband Kuya Ute. I bought my first pair of skinny jeans!!! They also took me to the small Welcome plaza which now has a parking lot for tourists like me who would like her photo taken there for a souvenir shot. Then my first night was spent getting updated with each other’s goings-on...up to 3 in the morning!

no photography allowed inside, so just this pic! 

Excalibur at night

Then off I went to the very first mini-reunion outside of the Philippines with gal pals Ann Gatmaytan and Jingjing Romero! I picked up Jingjing from her son Doc Oliver’s apartment. We were booked at the newest hotel on The Strip, the VDara which also belonged of the MGM Group. The concierge told us that Wednesdays and Thursdays are The Strip’s lean days. So we had only one choice for a 9 pm show (we knew Ann would not make it to the 7 pm)… ‘Thunder from Down Under’, Australia’s Chippendales at the Excalibur. Anyway, ‘Whatever happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas’!

the funky garden inside Bellagio's Conservatory

Afterwards, however, we thought that it was a relatively tame show. All we got was a kiss on my cheeks, a touch on Ann’s thigh and a hand on Jingjing’s arm. But we relished the thought that finally we were able to watch this that we had all wondered about for a looooong time. Later we rode the tram back to VDara and walked through the summer flowers in Bellagio’s Inside Gardens but, sadly, missed the Dancing Lights because it was past midnight.

buffet at Palace Station with Angie and Wendell

The next night was truly a treat from a friend, Angie Manchester and her gentle giant of a husband, Wendell. They took us to the buffet at the Palace Station then to the Gordie Brown Show (comedic impersonator of Obama, Bush, and Cheney and a host of celebrity singers, including all my favorites) at the Golden Nugget.

Gordie as Elvis, courtesy of Angie

After the show we stepped right into the Fremont Experience in downtown Las Vegas. This original Strip is two blocks of 1940 casinos renovated through the years. On the middle of the street (no cars) were bands and sax players on several stages, different artists demonstrating and selling their crafts and tons of side shows. The highlight, however, was the hourly light show coordinated by about 300 computers on the long high roof that covered the strip! There was even a zipline that ran below the roofline (riding fees during the light show was
double).

one of the side shows at the Fremont Experience

We had shrimp cocktail before midnight at The Golden Gate, and passed by the White Wedding Chapel where Elvis got married before they took us back to our hotel!  I am now on this plane, leaving Las Vegas, thinking my gosh, I didn’t know there were so many other things to see in this infamous city besides The Strip! Hoover Dam, Lake Mead, a plane tide through Grand Canyons, and the Red Rocks just outside are also must-sees! Next year I will return, with Bill and M’A ‘turn, and stay for three weeks at the Las Vegas Thousand Trails RV Resort!   

the Little White Wedding Chapel where Elvis fot married

Next Post: Taking Me Home to Country Roads (West Virginia)

Visiting Family in Idaho & Passing-thru Big Sky Wyoming and Montana

After the spectacular duo of national parks, passing briefly through the big skies of Wyoming (seeing this unusual scene of a house being moved across a freeway and strange rock formations) getting there and Montana (seeing the arch welcoming people from the state into Yellowstone and snow catchers all along the highway) leaving there, we finally arrived in Boise, Idaho where Bill’s eldest son Jim and family live.  They were our first stop when we began this never-ending cruise last year and now we are coming back to visit, fourteen months after, on the way back to Seattle for a housekeeping visit and the trip to Alaska for Cristine’s (Bill’s youngest daughter) wedding in September!

Boise is the largest city in Idaho with a population of over 200,000.  Jim is married to Ana Goitiandia, a member of the Basque community there.  Numbering about 15,000, it is the second largest such community in the United States after Bakersfield, California and the fifth largest in the world outside Mexico, Argentina, Chile and the Basque Country in Spain and France. Downtown Boise features a vibrant section known as the "Basque Block" and Boise's mayor, David H. Bieter, is of Basque descent.

Jim is a partner in a real estate law firm in Boise and he and Ana have two lovely children, Madeline, 6, and Ben, 3. We went swimming, wandering around the huge Farmer’s Market, and visiting the Train Depot.  They went bumper car riding and ice skating (the same afternoons I chickened out and went to the library and outlet malls instead, respectively). We spent many hours playing games, watching movies and devouring delicious meals capped by delectable desserts which Anna and I alternated in preparing.

One night they stayed with us at the campground in Meridian, twenty minutes away from Boise.  They enjoyed the pool and spa, played billiards, tried puzzles, horseshoes, and the playground, and grilled burgers and dogs, barbecued chicken and steak, and made sinful s’mores (melted chocolate and marshmallows between grahams) over the fire on our brand new fire pit. Inside the RV we comfortably played Rummik-ube and sang with the Karaoke we bought in the Philippines (with a chip of 2,000 songs).

On our last night, the RV rocked from the huge 70mph gusts of rain-free wind that swept Boise, rendering the RV and most homes around powerless until the morning. Actually, when we were approaching the metropolitan area from the east, the whole horizon was a beige layer of dust storm.  I had not really seen both phenomena until this part of our trip.  The windstorm, in particular, scared me so that I did not really sleep that night, catching only about an hour or so after 7 am!

It was a great visit, nevertheless, and we look forward to the next one next year!

Next Stop: Moses Lake and Fall City, Washington

Gushing Over Yellowstone

Leaving the lovely Tetons was hard but going to Yellowstone, the first national park of America created in 1872, was also quite exciting.  We had to plan the entire visit well because we had only three and a half days, one of them being our wedding anniversary.  8PM, 8/08/08 was when we started dreaming of this lifestyle. We exchanged vows on board Champagne Lady on Lake Union in Seattle, Washington. Our wedding favor was a booklet I wrote on ‘Cruising to a Life Together’.

It took us four hours to drive from the Tetons, register at the Bridge Bay campground, set up our new home in the new neighborhood, and prepare and have our lunch. We saw boiling springs all along West Thumb on the shores of Yellowstone Lake, the largest mountain lake in North America. Along the way, although young evergreens, mostly lodgepole pines that have adapted to the thermal surroundings, were growing everywhere, the devastating 50 fires of 1988 was still evident.  

  

And the next day we travelled west to Old Faithful which is so named because it predictably gushes every 90 minutes, to as high as 150 feet.  We thought it fitting to celebrate our anniversary with him so we can be reminded of the faith we put in each others’ hands…to love and be loved by the other (our anniversary dinner was at the Old Faithful Inn).  And all around him, on Black Sand Basin, Biscuit Basin, Upper, Middle and Lower Basins was the largest concentration of geysers known to man. A little further up north at Norris are Porcelain, Back, Monument Basins.  

There are about 900 geysers in the world, over 500 of which are in Yellowstone.  The Park sits atop a subterranean volcano about 3-7 miles below the caldera that formed after its major eruption some 640,000 ago. The Pineland Glaciation during the last Ice Age further carved the landscape and even the 1959 earthquake (there are more than 2,000 a year) effected many recent changes. Thus Yellowstone is home not just to geysers (like the tallest in the world, Steamboat, at 400 ft.), mud pots (Mud Volcano), steam vents (Black Growler), and hot springs (Grand Prismatic Spring). 

Among the waterfalls is the 380-ft Lower Falls (taller than Niagara Falls) of the Yellowstone’s Grand Canyon called Artists’ Point.  Then there are the magical Travertine Terraces, a living sculpture at Mammoth Hot Springs (Canary, Palette, Opal, etc.), not exactly under the main caldera but carved from limestone rock, transferred magma heat, and deep pockets of water from snow melt and rain that seep  up through fissures.  Thermopiles, living microorganisms that thrive in heat, provide a color palette.

The rivers boast of the native cutthroat trout (4,200 to a mile in the Madison) for some of the best fishing in the country (and you only need a park permit!).  And in the valleys, particularly Hayden and Lamar, were thousands of bison, some creating huge traffic jams as they traveled the roads with the vehicles. We also saw grizzly bears, wolves, coyotes, mule deer, and elk.  Sadly, the only wildlife we missed seeing were the shy moose and the bighorn sheep that must have stayed up in the mountains.

There are lodges, inns, cabins, RV campgrounds, and tent villages from which to base an exploration of Yellowstone.  Each of Grant Village, Lake Village, Canyon Village, Tower-Roosevelt Area, Mammoth Hot Springs, Norris Geyser Area, and Old Faithful Village are equipped with general stores, service stations, dining facilities, and other amenities.  Only four (Grant, Canyon, Mammoth, and Old Faithful) had internet facilities so I was not able to do much of surfing and emailing. 

Yellowstone National Park is not only the first, it is many national parks combined.  We hiked many miles as we marveled at the different features and living things in the thermal areas, the canyons, and the meadows of 2 million acres of protected lands.  We urge you to visit Yellowstone while you are still in reasonable physical condition.  If you have more than five days, you will be able to relax, enjoy, and really appreciate the place the One Master Potter gave us to enjoy at least once in our lifetime.  

Next Stop: Boise, Idaho