Today I will just post some photos of the great and beautiful city of Las Vegas. I have enjoyed every single second being here, and I met so many nice people, it was amazing. 

I returned my car today.   Drove 1407 km  in 4 days  and visited 4 different national parks. All in all in the States I drove 2400 km. In Australia 4500 km, in New Zealand 3500 km and in Hawaii with the scooter about 150km. I had 4 different types of cars: Daewoo Nubira Station Wagon, Nissan Maxima, Mazda Demio, Dodge Avenger and a Nissan Versa. So altogether I was

>>>>>10550 km on the road<<<<<

Distance from Bangkok (Thailand)  to Reykjavik (Iceland).

Today I got up at 8:00 am and had some breakfast at the motel. During my breakfast I talked to a guy named Tobi from Germany, Niedersachsen. He and his travelmate wanted to go to the Zion National Park as well and so we did it together.

When we had arrived there we decided to do the Angels‘ Landing Hike (2,5 miles uphill). It was really sunny and we had enjoyed the hike till we got to the part, where you had to stick to a metal rope to climb up the mountain.

Suddenly the weather was changing rapidly and the rope got slippery. In the end we managed to get to the top of the mountain and the weather changed to sunny again.

We had a nice lunch afterwards and we split up at 4:00.  I had to return to Las Vegas.

After a 2-hours-drive I checked in at my motel and went to the fashion mall to go shopping for the first time in Vegas.

There I bought some cool stuff and returned home. Then I went to bed immediately.   It was a good day.

Today I got up at 8:00 o’clock, had a tasty breakfast in the motel, where I had stayed overnight and started my trip to the Grand Canyon (one and a half hour drive). My first destination was a lookout called Grandview, from which you could overlook the whole Canyon. As soon as I had arrived there I was overwhelmed by the scenery of this really giant complex of valleys and mountains.   I stopped at almost every lookout and just decided to go for a hike.

On my hike I enjoyed silence, just the sounds of the eagle’s wings flying over my head once or twice. It was such a quiet

place  there, down in the Canyon, I only wanted to get out my laptop and to start writing my blog or to paint a picture of this amazing place. After this inspiration I drove to the last lookout called Desert View.

During the drive to this point the weather had changed a bit and it had become windy. That’s why I was wearing my beloved sweater “ World’s Best” From Desert View I could see the Colorado River ( where I had undertaken my rafting-trip the day before). It was awesome to see the river running through the Canyon. Glen Canyon is a bit further down the river but I thought I could see it in the distance.

It’s amazing how nature could create such a huge valley of canyons. I stayed in the park for 3 hours, bought a poster of the Canyon ( I want to put it onto my wall in my next flat or in my room at home) and started my trip to the next motel in Hurricane (4 hours drive). In the States you always have to drive along one road (highway) for hundreds of kilometres with a top speed of 70 miles per hour (ca. 120 km/h). I got really bored in the car and started to entertain myself by telling me jokes. I think I’d never had to laugh about my own jokes as much before as during this trip.  All the way along the road I was enjoying a really nice scenery view (surrounded by mountains, driving through the valleys on the 89 A). It was just the road, (eventually some cars behind me) and pure nature. At one point I was almost out of gas. Problem: I was in the middle of the valley and the light kept flashing only 40 miles to go until “out of gas”. So I checked on my navigation system where the next petrol station would be. It said in 134 km was the next Chevron. I faced the situation as it was and kept on driving. Luckily my navi was wrong, there was a petrol station after 40 miles. With the last drop of petrol I found it and could fill up my tank.

In the end of my little roadtrip I tried  Tacco Bell and checked in at my motel ( with pool).

Tomorrow I will drive to the Zion National Park and return to Las Vegas after that (2-hours- drive).

Today I got up at 7 o’clock and started to Page in Arizona ( the city where my rafting trip for the Colorado River was going to start). After half an hour drive we arrived at the Glen Canyon Dam. There we split up in groups, 20 persons in each boat. My group was quite awesome and we had a really good and funny time. Our guide explained us a lot about the canyons and we went all the way to Horseshoe Bay. (2 hours ride) We swam in the Colorado River (8°C) and enjoyed the beautiful redish sandstone mountains. I also kissed the mountains to get enough luck for Vegas.

It was an awesome day and the return to my Motel next to the Grand Canyon was  3 hours and 40 minutes.

I arrived there really late and went straight to bed. Tomorrow I will drive to the Grand Canyon.

Our roadtrip took the whole night ( 9 hours drive to Vegas) and we arrived at 5 o’clock in the morning at the Las Vegas International Airport where the girls dropped me off. I got my new car at the airport and drove – after one hour sleep – in the car straight to the Death Valley National Park (2 hours drive). I arrived there at 9:30 and figured out what I wanted to see in the park.

My first destination was the Zabriskie Point ( the point where Zabriskie decided to name the national park Death Valley)

My next destination was the Golden Canyon it was a long walk till I reached it. In the park was a really dry heat and it was so hard to walk long distances. The sun was burning all my skin and so I decided to skip the 4 mile walk ( it’s not good to go for such a long walk on your own) and did the 2 mile walk to the Red Cathedral.

Red Cathedral

I had to take all the pictures on my own today…

As I finished my hike I decided to take the Artist Drive through all the colourful mountains. It was worth it.

I totally enjoyed all the different colours in the

mountains and learned why they are there.

Here is the solution :

It was a great day today in the National Park  and I returned at 17:00 and checked in at my HOTEL!! It’s the Riviera Hotel directly on the Las Vegas Strip. It’s so huge I almost got lost in the hotel/casino. I will check it out tonight. Tomorrow I will catch up with the Swedish girls again to explore the city and get a new suit.

Today I got up at 8 o’cloIt to meet the Swedish girls in front of the pier where the ferry started to Alcatraz. It took us 15 minutes to go over to the island and we arrived there at 10:15 am. On the island we talked to a really nice ranger who showed us the parts of Alcatraz normally no visitor gets to see. We had our small private tour and enjoyed it completely.

After that we went to the entrance of Alcatraz and got our headseats to start our self-guided tour to the cells and the huge jail.

We got many information about the history, about the prisoners, the riots, the construction of the jail and about the end of Alcatraz. The one fact which impressed me the most was the escape of three prisoners in the year 1962. They used spoons to dig the hole through the walls of their cells, climbed up really high pipes and swam through the river (12 km to San Francisco). Nobody knows if they’ve ever reached San Francisco ( really tough temperatures and currents) but they were really intelligent.

In the morning of 11. June when the guards were counting the prisoners three prisoners kept lying in their beds. When the guards pushed the bodys to wake them up the bodies fell apart. They figured out that they were dolls made of cereal and a lot of other stuff in the beds of the prisoners. We saw also the cell of famous gansters like Al Capone and The Birdsman. We really enjoyed the audio tour and learned a lot. In the end I bought a souvenir from Alcatraz ( a baseball which shall remind me of Alcatraz and the same time of the baseball game I had watched the other day. In the end I decided not even Alcatraz can stop me, I am a free man and can climb every wall I want. So I escaped from Alcatraz and returned safely to San Francisco with my two mates.

Then we did a boat cruise to the Golden Gate Bridge and finally started our roadtrip to Las Vegas.

Today I got up at 5:00 am and started a tour by a really small bus to the Yosemite National Park. The group consisted of 11 people from different countries and of a huge variety of ages.

I was the youngest. Our first stop in the National Park was at the giant Sequoia trees. They were amazing. It’s incredible how fat and tall these trees grow.

On this trail we saw another huge tunnel made out of the trunk of a Sequoia tree.

Then our group started to head to the Cascades Falls, Half Dome and had some lunch in the Yosemite Lodge Restaurant.

Our second stop was at the Yosemite Falls (North Americas biggest Waterfalls). It was quite impressive to see how huge these falls are and they reminded me of my former trip to Venezuela where I stood under the Salto Angel Falls. Our last stop was at El Capitan and the Cathedral Rocks. A huge mountain where we saw some rockclimbers (tiny little spots on a huge rockwall).

Today I got up at 12:00 pm and did the whole day nothing than to book some hostels for my next trip and to lie in the sun. At 6 o ‘clock I met Olli and Lara in front of the ferry building and we started to walk to the AT&T Arena where the baseball game San Francisco Giants vs. Minnesota Twins took place. In the beginning it was a bit boring but then the Giants hit a homerun and got 3 points. After that we got to know some nice men in front of us who gave us some insider information about all the players so that we could follow the game with more enthusiasm.  

After the 6th. inning ( a baseball game has 9 innings) it was really funny to see how the Americans celebrate the Kisscam. The atmosphere in the stadium was calm ( baseball isn’t such a suspensful game) but we had a lot of fun with the guys in front of us. In the end the Giants won with a score of 6:2 against the Twins. We had a huge aftershow party and we returned to the hostel late. Tomorrow I will go to the Yosemite National Park for one day.  

Today I got up at 10:00 o’clock and had some nice breakfast. After that I did my laundry and skyped with my parents. I had some problems with my credit card here in San Francisco and got some advice from them to solve these problems.   At noon I hired a bike with my friends and we started our bike ride to the Golden Gate Bridge. During our 2-hours-ride we saw a lot of San Francisco and totally enjoyed it, because it was a downhill ride.   After we had arrived there, we ate a corndog (roll with some sausages and cheese in it) and crossed the bridge.

On the way back I realized that going downhill in San Francisco is a lot of fun,  but if you have to ride uphill it’s not so funny anymore. :/ I got home with sore legs ( good workout) and got some free pasta in my hostel. I was totally exhausted and went straight to bed.

Today at 7 o’clock in the morning we arrived in San Francisco. After we realized, that we couldn’t check in before 1 pm we decided to return my car. So we drove to the airport returned the car, got the deposit back and returned by bus to town. There we split up and I walked to my hostel to check in, then I bought an adapter and a toothbrush. Later I walked all the way to Fisherman’s Wharf, took a ride on the cable car (saw that you get turned at the end of the track)  and went into the Machinery Museum (didn’t gamble)