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Our room was behind the gazebo. The people were real nice who checked us in. They gave us a menu for the restaurant down by the lake's edge. Originally we had planned to take the evening dinner cruise on Lake Mead but still full from lunch we figured we'd just get a couple of small things from the restaurant to go and relax in the room for the eve, take the dinner cruise tomorrow. We were just killing a little time, relaxing, unpacking stuff we need, reading the menu, checking out what's on the tube. It was 5:18 here, 8:18 back home. After a few channels what appears but a National Hockey League game, but not just any game. Its the Philadelphia Flyers vs the St. Louis Blues and the Fly guys are winning! Oh damn, the Blues just tied it 2-2.
We took a stroll down to the Lake, went to the restaurant and ordered a turkey club sandwich and some jalapeno poppers. Got them to go and returned to our cozy little room. Turn on the TV and Manderville scores! Kent Manderville who couldn't score to save his life all year puts the Flyers back in the lead. Earlier in the season when he scored, the goal was disallowed for some technicality. But today magic struck. He gets the puck while the Flyers are killing a penalty. Skates it up ice shoots but like so many attempts this year it hits the post. Only this time instead of carooming off to the boards it hits the goalie in the back and then bounces in the net for his first goal since sliced bread. All this with 30 seconds left in the period. This almost tops the goal scored by Rick Tocchet by having a shot bounce off his mouth knocking out 2 teeth and into the net as the flukeist one of the year. Ah, hockey by a lake in the desert, you gotta love it. So we ate our meal. Watched the Flyers beat the Blues (a possible preview of the Stanley Cup Finals.) Then read a little and crashed for the night.
The next day we walked around the grounds a bit. Then went back to the restaurant for breakfast. As we were leaving two tour busses full of Japanese tourist arrived and proceeded to feed the huge carp that inhabit the lake whole wheat bread. I know for a fact that they prefer vanilla ice cream but that's another story. We went back to the room, packed, went to the office and reserved a room at Echo Bay while we checked out. Then took off heading to Hoover Dam to take the Dam tour. The Reverend Horton Heat on the CD player this time. A little CD ripped from five different RHH CD's by the Blaiseman called coincidentally The Best O' Blaise. On the way we bumped into the Alan Bible Visitor Center which had a great interactive display of desert life as well as a map of Lake Mead that showed all the towns and roads that were swallowed by the lake once the dam was built. Outside was a nice garden full of desert vegetation. We saw something that looked like partridges walking around the cactus garden but they were called something else that I don't remember in the display inside. Later on the side of a hill, Marylou spotted some bighorn sheep. We got a good view of them through the binoculars we have, a real small unit but great magnification. Next stop Hoover Dam.
We got to the dam and I passed the parking lot on the Nevada side because we wanted to drive over the dam first. When we got to the Arizona side, guess what? Free parking. It cost $3.00 on the Nevada side. Now I know why the chicken crossed the dam. We parked and walked toward the dam. About halfway there we see a sign. No bags or purses allowed on the dam tour just in case some wacko Timothy McVeigh or Osama Bin Laden type wants to make a statement. A wet one. So it's backtrack to the car. While there we meet some people who had toured the dam 10 years ago and were amazed that they had the nerve to charge $8.00 to tour the dam nowadays, $25.00 for the extensive, intensive, all inclusive extry special with a cherry on top tour. We moved the car to a closer and still free spot. In the shade too. loaded up our pockets with whatever we thought we needed an began again.
After a nice walk over the dam we entered the Visitors Center, paid our $16.00, got in line and after about 20 minutes, it was quite crowded, started the tour. Our leader was a middle aged guy from the Maintenance Dep't. impressed into service as a tour guide. He apologized if he was the first smiling face we saw today, all the while never smiling. But he had an interesting and informative background narrative to the sights we were seeing. We went down some elevators and through tunnels and came out through the generating room outside to the bottom of the dam. It really looks big when you look up at it from the bottom. Then back through and up to the top all the while learning the design, history of the construction, the working conditions of the builders and the capacities of the dam. It was fascinating. The guide confirmed that with all the protections workers receive through unions and OSHA and the like, the dam would not be economically feasible to build today.
Once again outside, we saw the sightseeing
boat doing the lunch cruise. Having seen the sights from the road that
parallels the lake, we decided to blow off the dinner cruise as we had
pretty much seen it all anyway and we had both been on boats before. So
we took off for our next motel at Echo Bay. This is when Marylou spotted
the Bighorn Sheep right
up the road from the Hacienda
Hotel and Casino, rooms $29.95 while they last, 2 for 1 buffet. On
our way to Echo Bay we discovered another feature we weren't supposed to
get with our rental car, grues
control. I mean cruise control. We sure got a deal there, don't cha know.
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