To Las Vegas via Death Valley

Quite a few are asking for pictures on this blog. Since I write each blog twice and use quite alot of space, I´ve made an online album instead! So you can now find hundreds of pictures on www.nordicelegance.myphotoalbum.com. Check it out and enjoy! I haven´t edited anything, so please forgive me.

The drive from Palmdale to Las Vegas is very special if you drive via Lone Pina and Death Valley. The first part of the trip runs through the Mojave Desert. Then the valley narrows a little bit at the time and rises in altitude towards the cowboy town Lone Pine. Apparently, there are quite a few scenes from good old western movies from this area; for instance when the old revolver heroes ride into the sunset. (My point of reference is an episode from Tom and Jerry, and it kinda tells me that I should watch more old Western movies.) But my parents recognized quite a few of the faces on the walls at the place where we had lunch. Cheese, bacon and avocado omelet with hash browns (fried in butter) and toast sits for a while! We only had 2 meals per day so far. And that´s ok as long as you eat enough fat and a limited amount of carbohydrates. ;-) By the way, I read in a Norwegian newspaper that the financial crises makes people exercise less and eats more cheap, fat food. hmmm... Is there really a thing like "cheap, fat food?" The example they used was two young people on McDonalds eating Fries, Burger, Chicken McNuggets, Coke and Ketchup. Ok.. now.. there is some fat from the deep frying and a tiny amount of fat on the burger. Besides that we have a large amount of potatoes, wheat bread, proteins with bread crust, sugar and sugar. Ladies and gentlemen: calories are not equal to fat. A fast food meal is a carb-bomb with plenty of calories, but not really that much fat. Believe me, I try to eat as much fat as humanly possible, and it´s darn expensive!! *Cough..* wellwell, enough missionary work for today...

The highest mountain of the USA can be found by Lone Pine, Mt Whitney 14505 ft. And just 76 miles east of that we can find Bad Water in Death Valley 282 ft BELOW sea level. We didn´t climb the summit of Mt Whitney to be honest, but still.. the downhill in a very short time is still pretty significant! We only had 77-78 degrees in Death Valley that day, and that was nice. In the summer it will reach 110-120... It´s a very special place geologically, with a salt lake and strange things. Watch the photos! Then we drove to Las Vegas and got a very nice view of the town in darkness. It´s really quite a sight!