Utah, Arizona and Nevada

October 2017

Page and Lake Powell

Hordes of American Tourists with own vehicles, but also uncountable international guests with hired cars.  

On the Glen Canyon steel-arch bridge you cross the Colorado River and the retaining wall of Lake Powell. Most activities  take place in the turquois water. The two impressive marinas hold hundreds of medium sized and large speed and home boats. The 299 km long barrier lake which stretches over the area of Arizona and Utah one can find numerous recreation areas.
A lot of locals visit of these in their gigantic mobile homes carrying along a second vehicle, mostly SUV or a trailer with a motorboat, motorbike or beach buggy. With these they then paint the sand beaches, the dunes or water surface red. Generators are allowed from 6 am to 10 pm. These hours the Ami’s need indeed to run the their up to three aircons per vehicle. And of course, the television is on from early in the morning till late at night. 

Lonely Rock Beach

Due to the strong winds we did not stay directly on the sand shores of Lake Powell, but preferred the higher terrace 250 meters inland. Undisturbed vistas over the shrub landscape onto Lonely Rock in the lake waters.  We enjoyed our sundowner. 

Four young Asians set up camp behind us. And the inevitable happened.

The distinctive, egomaniac and excessive urge of selfies, for which the Asians are especially prone to. The two girls taking pictures respectively overdid it even according to Asian standards.  What in the beginning was rather amusing to us became after, after the 50th picture with only slightly differentiating leg, head and hair-out-of-the-face poses rather ridiculous. 

Brigitte felt that I was starting to get irritated and found a very diplomatic solution. She shouted to the girls in English, if they were not aware that there were many poisonous snakes found in the shrubs in this sandy landscape.

Within seconds we were able to enjoy undisturbed views onto Lonely Rock.

Meeting long-term travellers

Fabrice had contacted us a few weeks ago, introducing himself and his family to us, and informing us that our Action Mobil Robusto had been the trigger of building his own truck.
We initially wanted to meet in Las Vegas. Due to repairs they were stuck in Lone Pine. Whilst they were waiting for spare parts from France we took a tour via Page and Flagstaff.
We arrived just in time for the installation of the long awaited spare part from France.
Fabrice Marie Saimara Serenn Together we enjoyed three unforgettable days in the unique Alabama Hills. We had a real ball! We haven’t laughed this much in ages.  

On one night we were joined by Anna Maria and Gerald with their Citroen from Austria. A lot of wood was burned during the exchange of funny travelling stories and experiences!

We will probably meet Fabrice and his family again on the Baja California. Something we look forward to!

Antelope Canyon, Page

Unique colors, in the flowing water-formed sandstone canyon. Photos Antelope Canyon:

Three times lucky

Our start in the USA was a bit tedious in the beginning, but by now we have also found our travelling rhythm here.

We luckily managed to get out of the way in time of the hurricane at the east coast and the flooding in Texas. The night of the massacre in Las Vegas, where a lunatic fired around like crazy, we were only 5 kilometres away on a campsite. We wanted to visit the Strip the next day and try our luck on the machines. In the afternoon we decided on a relaxing Apéro followed by dinner on the campsite instead. Thus, we read about the lunatic the next morning in the online newspapers. We left Las Vegas immediatly.