We had a good journey from Kingman to Hoover Dam, then past Las Vegas and onto Death valley and up to Beatty where we are staying.

This is the view from the highway towards the Hoover Dam and you can see the Colorado River after it has passed through the dam.

First place we stopped near Death Valley was Zabriskie Point. We walked right up the pavement to see the view down to the Death Valley. Can you see the 2 people on the rocks, it shows how huge the mountains are.

We saw snow on the mountains above Death Valley too, what a contrast in temperature!

It was 80*f today….lovely xxxx

Today we followed the famous Route 66  through the Mojave desert. It was a steep mountain pass over the Black Mountains stopping at Oatman and then on through Fort Mojave indian reservation to Topock where we picked up the motorway back to Kingman. It was an interesting journey.

The desert looked yellow because of all the wild flowers and shrubs in flower.

The road was steep with scary hairpin bends.

When we reached Oatman, it was a weird place with hippy type people in shacks selling teeshirts, jewellery, snake skins and trashy souvenirs. It had a goldmine up to the ww2 and there was a ghost town nearby.

What is granddad up to with the gold???

There were wild donkeys (burros) wandering around and the smell of donkey poo in the heat made me feel sick.

Lily look what this shop was called!

The next part of the journey was not steep and we crossed the Mojave indian reserve.

We are now back in Kingman and tomorrow we have  long journey to Beatty near Death Valley.

Hope you are all having a lovely Easter. We had our Good Friday fish  at cracker barrel Matthew and Blandine! enjoy your break away with the children. Lots of swimming Louis and Alicexxx

Hope Anona  has made Otis  an easter egg hunt , he was telling me all about it.

Have a nice time at the farm Lily

and a good time in Thornbury Alex with Otis and Xavi and Anona ……safe journey back to Sheffield.

love from me xx

 

Do you like my butterfly photo? I’ve entered it in a competition at the Phoenix Botanical gardens!

We left Phoenix following route 60 then 93 until we reached the famous route 66 at Kingman. The road follows alongside the railway track and we saw huge trains pulling hundreds of containers behind them; pleased we didn’t have to stop at the crossings to wait until they went by!

We  loved the Sonoran and Mojave Deserts. The environment is very dusty with orange and red soil/mud. Everywhere it was covered in mostly yellow flowers, also orange and red at times. We saw many huge cacti like organ pipes and lots of prickly paw paw cacti.

Then we passed by miles of Joshua trees in a forest. They aren’t real trees but from the Yukka and Lily family of plants. They only grow in this Mojave desert and nowhere else in the world.

We stopped for our lunch at a place called Wikieup

When we stopped to looks at the views I saw a long lizard.

At Kingman we visited the museum and I stood next to the famous Sante Fe Steam train.

Its VERY windy here and about 78*f

These cars and shops used to travel along route 66.

More news tomorrow. Our hotel room is huge in Kingman pleased we are here for 2 nights.xxxxx

We spent nearly all day in the beautiful botanical gardens. I managed to see a road runner with a lizard in its mouth! Look hard Louis and Otis and you will see it.We saw lots of humming birds. A lady showed us a humming bird nest. It was smaller than a chickens egg. The tiny birds pick up soft bits off the ground and bind them together with spiders webs. Their eggs are as small as a jellybean and when the chicks start to grow the webs allow the nest to expand without it falling to pieces.

It was very hard to photo them as they are so quick and I was very lucky to capture them.

We saw the butterflies again and they live between 1 and 6 days only, once they emerge from their cocoons.

The flowers and cacti are so amazing here and hope you can see them one day

We travel to Kingman tomorrow for 2 nights to visit Death Valley again. Its going to be even hotter there. Its 98*f today. lots of love xxxx

We arrived last night after a 10 1/2 hour flight. Very tired but happy our stay cation has started.

Today we went straight to the Phoenix botanical gardens. The temperature was just right and we saw masses of different types of cacti,many in flower.

There were birds….woodpeckers, American robins, humming birds, quails, finches, starlings, sparrows.

Other animals we saw were ground squirrels, chipmunks, lizards and butterflies. Lily you would have loved the butterflies!

We are back in our motel for a couple of hours as it is so hot and then we will return about 5pm as the gardens are open until 8pm.

We are really pleased with our photos. Grandad nearly left my camera bag on the airport bus but a lady saw it before the bus left, how lucky was that.

Hope Lily Louis and Otis will mark Phoenix on the map 🇱🇷

Love to you allxxx