We were up early, cooked some breakfast and got ready to spend the day at the zoo. It was only a 5 min drive from our hotel. On the first turn out of the hotel we realised we were staying right by the park where the drunk driver came off the bridge and dropped onto people partying after a bike ride. We'd seen it on the news last night; 4 dead and many hospitalised. Having arrived after dark last night we didn't know how close we were to where the tragedy happened...

We set the GPS for the long way round and as usual a four hour drive became a lot more. For the most part the back roads were through unremarkable semi desert terrain. More interesting was the drive around Big Bear Lake. The levels are way lower than we recall from a couple of years ago, one side of the bridge is totally dry now. From there the road wound it's way down towards the coast, the marine layer making for a spectacular view from above it. After that w...

At first today we were again passing red rock ridges, after that we were dwarfed by the towering Beaver Dam Mountains. It all changed after we crossed into Nevada, for the most part it was a dry desert landscape with small towns here and there. We stopped at a smallish town just over the border to buy water and fuel. We noted most were old, presumably retired people. Our biggest surprise came when we entered the supermarket and right inside the door was a small...

We got an early start, after breakfast we headed to Upper Antelope Canyon. We were about one person short of getting on the 10am tour so we paid for the 11am tour and went off to check out the other side of the highway. There was a massive queue of people trying to get into the lower canyon for a tour probably due to a guide there being $25 vs the one we bought which was $40 ea plus the $8 ea fee to enter Navajo lands. We scrambled around at the boat launch area...

I prepared breakfast in our room this morning, none was included here. After checking out it was a two minute drive to the north rim of the canyon drive. This rim has fewer overlooks but they are just as spectacular as the other side. The first stop was for a little over an hour. It's mor Ethan just an overlook like they have at the Grand Canyon, here you can walk out a long way, clambering up and down the rocks. At one point on our wander we could look right do...