Western Excursions - Summer 2010

Why hello there, friends and family. I hope those travelling yesterday after the reunion made it home at least moderately intact. We, Porters, as you might recall from my previous blogpost, are currently located in the armpit of America, the Sin City itself, the ever fabulous: Las Vegas.

As we walked through the casino on our way to check out of Excalibur, our hotel for the evening, the air smelled of old smoke, spilt beer and bad decisions. Surprisingly (or really, not so surprisingly), people were still sitting on the slot machines, drinking beer, and pulling the lever, over and over and over again. Ugh, who can drink beer at 8:30 in the morning?

If I could sum up the Vegas experience in one term, it would be this: exhaust pipe. Not only was it so oppressively hot that I was constantly looking around for the bus I was apparently standing behind, but, metaphorically speaking, Vegas takes what it is given, sucks out the good stuff and expels the dirty, grimy part that no one really wants anyway. Just like an exhaust pipe.

We loaded up our car and set off on our 6 hour drive to the Grand Canyon, where we’ll be spending the next two days. Yepp we will be driving a 12 hour round trip to see a giant hole in the ground. Well it’s something to cross off the bucket list! Along the way, we briefly stopped at the Hoover Dam. And by briefly, I mean “Everyone-get-out-of-the-car-RUN-go-take-a-picture-now-lets-go-go-go!”

Carmen, our Garmin, also spent the entire trip trying to take us down small, tiny dirt roads but we had a mutiny, muted her, and opted instead to stay on the highway.

Pulling up at the gate at the entrance to the Grand Canyon, we saw that the entrance fee was $25. However, Dad whipped out his handy-dandy Seniors National Parks membership card and we all got in for free! That is the best deal ever. For a $10 lifetime membership, Dad can bring ANYone he wants into ANY of the national parks. For the rest of his life. So if you’re planning on visiting any national parks anytime soon, it is totally worth it to kidnap a senior to bring with you.

Spying a series of parked cars along side of the road, we too park out car and get out. My first thought: that it is freezing. It is about 65 degrees at this point, which is a huge temperature change from the 105 degrees that it was in Vegas just this morning. Doesn’t Arizona know that not only is it a desert but also the middle of summer?! (Nate pointed out that I am about the only person in the world to be cold in a desert).

Ok here are my impressions of the Grand Canyon:

1.       You’re kind of just walking along, la-di-dah-ing, and then BAM! GIANT CLIFF FACE OVERLOOKING A HUGE DROP. Can you imagine how the first settlers must felt, just stumbling across this thing?

2.       The multicolored canyon walls stretch as far as the eye can see, and it feels like you are standing on the top of the world.

3.       You couldn’t see the bottom. At least not here. Something about the way the canyon walls sloped downward obscured the views of the Colorado River.

4.       The whole thing was blue. Yes, blue. I don’t know, many most canyons are blue, but I was expecting it to be reddish brown, like the pictures. Maybe it is normally. But it look very blue to me.

So I tried to take some pictures. I really did. And I’ll try and show you, but of course I’m going to have to preface it with the cliché “they really don’t do the place justice”. And they don’t. Still photographs can never give you the sense of depth or magnitude that two eyes can. So if anyone happens to be living vicariously through this blog (and I hope not, since that would only pressure me into doing crazy, adventurous stunts to feel worthy of that status), don’t look at these pictures and instead just journey your way over here to see it for yourself.

We check into our cabins for the night, and by this point, it is dark – meaning we missed the sunset. Alas. Next time. I hesitantly make the silent promise to awake bright and early tomorrow to see the sunrise. (Anyone who knows me well should be laughing their heads off right now). Yeahhh, me and mornings aren’t exactly a match made in heaven.

I spend the latter part of the evening going on an epic quest for internet, which actually involved more trials and tribulations than one would assume. Finally, victory is mine! I chat with a few friends on Facebook, only to watch helplessly, a few minutes later, as those “friends” proceed to like-bomb me.

What is like-bombing, do you ask? Well, let me explain. Like-bombing is when several people, simultaneously, begin “liking” every single status, post, link, comment, etc. on a single person’s Facebook page. “But Ellen,” you ask, “doesn’t this make you feel loved and appreciated?” NO, absolutely NOT. It makes you want to grab the nearest sharp object, cut your computer to shreds and then use the pieces to spell out your suicide note. “But why don’t you just ignore it?” you ask, confused. Ignore it? You try doing ANYTHING on the Internet when your entire browser is blowing up from the 84 new Facebook notifications filling the screen. Yeah, that’s what I thought.

The only consolation is that Nash’s computer crashed three times as a result of this. Ha ha, karma’s a b*tch.

Ok, enough petty complaining for the evening. Tomorrow, we will awake bright and early to go hiking throughout the canyon. Hasta la vez proxima.