PLANNING AND LOGISTICS:
In December 2011 we split our usual
holiday of 17 days in 2 parts. The 1st one was at Disney World at
Orlando, Florida for 8 days from December 5-13. I have given a
report in the previous posts about our Disney vacation. We had chosen
Disney World over DisneyLand in California after deep research as to
better value. Otherwise it’d have made sense to just fly west from
Houston, visit Disneyland and then go on to the Nevada part of the
holiday
After a day of regrouping we flew west
to Las Vegas for the 2nd part of our holiday. We had bought a very
low priced package deal from Southwest Airlines for return flights as
well as stay at Hotel Flamingo for 8 days. We had tried to book
accommodation inside the Grand canyon national park but none was
available. We had decided we’ll do day trips to Bryce and Xion
national parks from Vegas. We knew the Grand Canyon deserves at least
a 2 night stay and we can’t do justice to it on a day trip from
Vegas
Surprisingly we saw on the site of Xanterra group responsible for reservations at the Grand Canyon
showing they had a vacancy in Maswick lodge for 2 nights, Dec 16-17 as
we had wanted. They even offered a discount and we grabbed it
happily.
So we would fly into Vegas on Dec 15,
drive straight to Hoover dam and then drive back to Vegas hotel,and
check in to our hotel.
Next day early morning we proposed to drive to Grand Canyon, stay there for 3 nights and then drive back, return our car. We kept out hotel in Vegas unoccupied for those 3 nights… it was part of the package and amounted to just under $40 /day, Everything worked out GREAT!
Next day early morning we proposed to drive to Grand Canyon, stay there for 3 nights and then drive back, return our car. We kept out hotel in Vegas unoccupied for those 3 nights… it was part of the package and amounted to just under $40 /day, Everything worked out GREAT!
WHEN TO GO?
Both Florida and Nevada are pretty hot
in summer and so we chose early part of December before Christmas
for our visit to enjoy cool weather and less crowds. Worked out great
for us.
Look at this lovely card made entirely of flowers. The extra decor for Christmas added to the charm in Vegas hotels and the max temp was a balmy 13°C /55.4°F in Vegas [a far cry from the temp above 40°C /104°F in summer].
Look at this lovely card made entirely of flowers. The extra decor for Christmas added to the charm in Vegas hotels and the max temp was a balmy 13°C /55.4°F in Vegas [a far cry from the temp above 40°C /104°F in summer].
The Grand Canyon was below freezing with temp minus -5°C, but we managed
WHY VEGAS?
117 years ago today, on 15 May 1905,
Las Vegas was officially founded as a city, when 110 acres of Nevada
land beside the Union Pacific Railroad tracks was auctioned off.
Since then the place has become a byword for gambling, glitz and the
ghastly.
Vegas has a reputation for off color pursuits and is even nicknamed Sin city.
But we felt it has a great scope for clean fun as well. Fantastic food at decent prices, thrill rides, quality shows, including even multiple free ones, high end shopping again at supposedly good prices ... it's all here in Vegas.
We intended to enjoy the man made marvels and yes we had a great time,
Hmmm... flower bear!!
The decor is beyond awesome
Below is the amazing Wynn hotel, constructed at a cost of billion dollars
Vegas has a reputation for off color pursuits and is even nicknamed Sin city.
But we felt it has a great scope for clean fun as well. Fantastic food at decent prices, thrill rides, quality shows, including even multiple free ones, high end shopping again at supposedly good prices ... it's all here in Vegas.
We intended to enjoy the man made marvels and yes we had a great time,
Hmmm... flower bear!!
Below is the amazing Wynn hotel, constructed at a cost of billion dollars
Floor mosaics are awesome 
Sculptures lend an authentic European charm... who won't believe one is in Paris here?
Say Hi to the Statue of Liberty...
A little bit of dolce vita in Italy...
Bocca della verita [The Mouth of Truth] from Rome..
DAY 1, Thursday, DEC 15, 2011:
As planned we took our flight from
Houston to Las Vegas in the morning , got our car rental from the
airport and drove on toward Hoover dam. Did not waste time and effort
driving into the city and check in. our bags remained in the boot of
the car.
Here's the map of our 1st day drive to Hoover
https://goo.gl/maps/npyjqL24TXn4KcKW9
We were Off on the drive to Hoover dam from Vegas airport. Hoover Dam is 30 miles from Las Vegas...from Vegas took I-515 South towards Boulder City. Route 93 is part of I-515.Here's the map of our 1st day drive to Hoover
Shortly before reaching Boulder City, I-515 ends and Route 93 continues as a two lane highway to Hoover Dam. We stopped at the parking garage on the left . From the parking garage it is a short walk to Hoover Dam.
The weather was beautiful--cool sunny day perfect for sight seeing.
At the Hoover dam..
Hoover Dam, once known as Boulder Dam, is a concrete arch-gravity dam in the Black Canyon of the Colorado River, on the border between the US states of Arizona and Nevada.
It is thick at the bottom and thin near the top, and has a convex face towards the water above the dam. The curving arch of the dam transmits the water's force into the side rock walls of the canyon. That is why the dam has suffered no damage due to the pressure of the water all these years. The wedge-shaped dam is 660 ft (200 m) thick at the bottom, narrowing to 45 ft (14 m) at the top, leaving room for a highway connecting Nevada and Arizona.
It was constructed between 1931 and 1936 during the Great Depression and was dedicated on September 30, 1935, by President Franklin Roosevelt... he called it the boulder dam and avoided mentioning Hoover's name. however, the controversial name of the previous president stuck to the dam. Its construction was the result of a massive effort involving thousands of workers, and cost over one hundred lives. ...
Here we are on our guided tour to the interior of the dam... we were in the tunnels inside the mountain and it felt like being in an Enid Blyton adventure.
This is the view of the bypass bridge from inside.The new Mike O’Callaghan – Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge connecting Arizona and Nevada is 2,000-foot long --it crosses Black Canyon just south of the dam, 900 feet above the Colorado River.
So how is a dam built over a flowing river?
Before the dam was built, the Colorado River was diverted away from the construction site. To accomplish this, four diversion tunnels were driven through the canyon walls, two on the Nevada side and two on the Arizona side. These tunnels were 56 feet (17 m) in diameter.Their combined length was nearly 16,000 ft or more than 3 mi (5 km)...We were walking through one of those tunnels on our guided tour. Only in late fall and winter was the water level in the river low enough to safely divert... so the construction had to meet the deadlines.
The river was diverted into the two Arizona tunnels (the Nevada tunnels were kept in reserve for high water) on November 13, 1932. This was done by exploding a temporary cofferdam protecting the Arizona tunnels thus opening them up for river flow while at the same time dumping rubble into the river until its natural course was blocked. Following the completion of the dam, the entrances to the two outer diversion tunnels were sealed at the opening and halfway through the tunnels with large concrete plugs. The downstream halves of the tunnels following the inner plugs are now the main bodies of the spillway tunnels.
Thus the construction site was drained of water, excavation for the dam foundation began. For the dam to rest on solid rock, it was necessary to remove loose materials in the riverbed until sound bedrock was reached. 1,100,000 m3 of material was removed.
Since the dam is an arch-gravity type, the side-walls of the canyon bear the force of the impounded lake. Therefore the side-walls were excavated too, to reach virgin rock as weathered rock might provide pathways for water seepage.
The men who removed this rock were called "high scalers". While suspended from the top of the canyon with ropes, high-scalers climbed down the canyon walls and removed the loose rock with jackhammers and dynamite. Falling objects were the most common cause of death on the dam site. The construction site had, even then, become a magnet for tourists; the high scalers (the "Human Pendulum") were prime attractions To protect themselves against falling objects, some high scalers took cloth hats and dipped them in tar, allowing them to harden. When workers wearing such headgear were struck hard enough to inflict broken jaws, they sustained no skull damage.
The cleared, underlying rock foundation of the dam site was reinforced with grout.
Concrete was poured on the cleared river bed. Since concrete heats and contracts as it cures, it may lead to cracks. Engineers calculated that if the dam was built in a single continuous pour, the concrete would take 125 years to cool and the resulting stresses would cause the dam to crack and crumble.
So the ground where the dam was to rise was marked with rectangles, and concrete blocks in columns were poured, some as large as 50 feet (15 m) square and 5 feet (1.5 m) high. Each five-foot form contained a series of 1 inch (25 mm) steel pipes through which first cool river water, then ice-cold water from a refrigeration plant was run. Once an individual block had cured and had stopped contracting, the pipes were filled with grout. Grout was also used to fill the hairline spaces between columns, which were grooved to increase the strength of the joins. This was a clever idea...
Concrete was poured from aerial buckets into the columns and a team of men below guided it to the right column. There are myths that men were caught in the pour and are entombed in the dam to this day. But each bucket only deepened the concrete in a form by an inch, and engineers would not have permitted the flaw caused by deterioration of a human body...
It was cool and pleasant when we visited; here's the lake Mead in the background below...
however, the site of Hoover Dam endures extremely hot weather, and the summer of 1931 was especially torrid, with the daytime high averaging 119.9 °F (48.8 °C). many workers died of heat strokes. There was a lot of racial discrimination when the dam was built..."Mongolian" (Chinese) labor was forbidden by the construction contract,while the number of blacks employed never exceeded thirty, mostly lowest-pay-scale laborers in a segregated crew, with separate water buckets...
Official count of deaths associated with the construction of the dam is 112. There were many more heat stroke deaths, and carbon monoxide poisonings. The 1st was J. G. Tierney, a surveyor who drowned on December 20, 1922, while looking for an ideal spot for the dam. His son, Patrick W. Tierney, was the last man to die working on the dam's construction, exactly 13 years later on Dec 20, 1935. The memorial at the dam reads "They died to make the desert bloom."
.We had been inside the copper tower in the background during our guided tour before entering the diversion tunnel inside the mountain.
Terrific experience....
These 30 feet tall bronze figures are
called "winged angels of the republic".
A touch of their
feet brings good luck!!
These were each formed in a continuous pour.
To put such large bronzes into place without marring the highly
polished bronze surface, they were placed on ice and guided into
position as the ice melted. W e drove back to Vegas. Parked at the hotel garage. Took our bags and checked in after waiting in a long queue for some 20 minutes.
We had an early start the next day, so slept off .
Report of Days 2 to 4 in Grand Canyon is here:
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