Reno Nevada, obviously not a patch on Vegas but a lot of smaller casinos. Real warm and dry image still thousands of feet up above sea level. I always imagined that the desert areas were at low altitude.

A beautiful sunset over the mountains in the Nevada Desert. It appears our first drama has happened. The train has come to a standstill here at Winnemucca, Nevada, apparently due to a signal problem on the lines which stops us moving on until the signal problem is fixed. Announcent is that a repair crew is on the way as we speak but we're stuck until it gets fixed, who knows how long. The problem this causes is that our scheduled arrival in Chicago was meant t...

The most amazing thing is realizing that so much of the US is so high above sea level. Once you leave the coastal plains you climb up over the mountains to about 6,500 ft. Down the other side onto Nevada plateau, only to realize nearly all of Nevada is about 4,300 ft above sea level. You sit in the train watching the wild west go by only to discover how high it is. Just amazing.

From Hoover Dam we headed into Vegas to check out some of the sights. We decided to only spend a few hours having a look around as we were continuing on to San Francisco for a 2 day stay before joing our train for the trip over the Rockies. The Vegas strip is certainly something to behold, so we stayed longer than planned to see it at night with the strip lit up like a xmas tree, pretty spectacular.

A really hot day today, and after nearly getting blown off the Hoover dam bridge we figured it was time for a good old cuppa.Tall Starbucks coffee in OZ - $7.00Tall Starbucks coffee on USA - $3.25Don't you just love Oz, but must say at least in Oz they know how to make a good cuppa, not here. This was the most washed out soapy tasting coffee I have ever experienced, couldn't even drink it, pretty revolting.