Road trip update #13

After breakfast in Boulder City, NV, we got a pretty early start and were at Hoover Dam a little after 9:00. Little did we know what a good move that was. When we left 3 hours later the traffic snaked almost 5 miles back to Boulder City from the dam. It would have taken about an hour just to get to the dam. Since 9/11 there has been a lot of security at the dam -- cars are checked and there are metal detectors in the visitors center. They are also in the process of building a huge new bridge that will cross the Colorado just downstream of the dam. I think they said it would be 1,000 feet above the water. It looks like it will be very high. If you look at the top left-hand corner of the picture to the right, you can see the base of the cement pillars that will hold up the new bridge. The bridge itself is much higher up.

Jon and I visited the dam many years ago and were pleasantly surprised by the new visitors center. They have great displays and lots of hands-on activities for kids. They also still have the tour that takes you down inside the dam. You can see Joshua in front of the generators. It is awesome to see the inside of the dam and realize that it was built during the Great Depression. Amazing.

It was very warm and so after taking the tour, watching a couple videos and viewing the dam from both sides of the bridge, we were ready to go. It was Friday, July 27 and we had decided to get home that day. It was a long drive, but we only hit a bit of traffic coming into Riverside. We jumped on the toll roads off the 91 and were home by 7:00 p.m.

I have one more entry I want to make with stats from our trip. But I don't have all of my numbers figured out yet, so you'll have to wait for next time. Thanks for reading.

Sheryl