Marc's Public Blog

The whole trip was a bit over 1000 miles in 5 days, not bad. We obviously didn't have enough time to properly hike or backpack in some of the parks, but Jennifer wasn't able to anyway, so it was mostly short distances from the car.

So, we flew into Vegas early morning, got our rental car, food and water and got the hell out :)

Day 1: Valley of Fire

Cool Roads

We went for a scenic short hike at the end of the park.

pink rocks were cool

more nice road/landscapes

And we finished with the famous elephant rock on the way out:

The Valley of Fire had a special meaning to me since my first book on the USA back when I was still in France, had elephant rock that happened to be from there (and I had no idea that was the case):

So that was well worth the time we spent there, and we then went on to Zion hoping that we'd get an hour or so to see the visitor center, but we forgot that we'd already lose an hour crossing the border, so that didn't quite work out. We just stayed by our bed and Breakfast to see a sunset:

Day 2: Zion

Except during very lowest season, the busses are required, but they run very often

that's a tasty mushroom :)

wheeping rocks

Day 3: Leaving Zion

light entry for the tunnel

From the other side, you can park and hike up:

that road would have been fun blocked off and with a real car :)

you get a nice view from the valley and road to the tunnel from up there

Day 3: Red Canyon

I did the reasonably short hike to the visitor center and Jennifer drove there

Day 3: Bryce Canyon

We then got to Inspiration Point, arguably the best view in Bryce Canyon:

And we finished with a beautiful 3 mile hike:

And we got back on top just in time for sunset and moonrise:

That was a really nice day, Bryce was fantastic. We then went to the nearby town for some food and sleeping.

Day 4: Page's Upper and Lower Antelope Canyons, and Horseshoe Bend

Day 4: Upper Antelope Canyon

Day 4: Lower Antelope Canyon

Day 4: Powell Lake

Day 4: Horseshoe Bend

it was a tiny bit late in the day sun-wise, but still nice

Just this once we finished the day a little bit early, although getting dcent dinner in Page on a sunday night was no piece of cake.

Day 5: Monument Valley

Day 5: Grand Canyon South Rim Sunset

Day 6: Grand Canyon South Rim

And after a lunch by the canyon, we drove to Flagstaff to return the rental car and fly home via Phoenix.

This was a packed 6 days, but we got to see a whole lot (probably 10 days worth at a slower pace, taking time for more hikes that we just couldn't do this time around). We sure got to see a lot considering, and I got about 1200 pictures after weeding the bad ones, not bad.

Lots of people came on Steven's Creek Trail

Roof parties

Ok, it didn't fly where we hoped, so I was just under it :(

We went for a hike to the farm in Rancho San Antonio.

Dinner was just walking around, right next to us :)

Made it to the farm

You need a haircut, buddy :)

Bacon!

Wild deer came by

On the way back, I took the slightly longer and scenic high road, and Jennifer took the flat one back

We went to check out the RC planes on the way back

Good little walk all around.

So there you go, a few more pictures:

pretty butterflies

we got one of those for our chat :)

James Hodges would be happy with one of these :)

A nice picture of Vernazza in Cinque Terre. We went there.

Either way, while the days were packed, I got to see everything I could given the time, especially on that very busy Sunday I flew out and described below.

Got a few shots from the plane:

Sea World

As soon as I arrived, I went to the waterfront to visit the Maritime Museum and got an included cruise:

the midway, which I went to visit later

Back from the cruise, went to visit the few boats and submarines they had on display

Next was the USS Midway, the best aircraft carrier I've ever visited. They show you a lot more than the average boat, you see 4 levels of decks, and the inside of the city on the sea.
You can see all the pictures of the Midway.

I then spent the rest of the day in downtown San Diego and the gaslamp quarter:

I also got to see a critical ride:

Once the conference was over, I went to Balboa Park to see the Science Museum. It wasn't the best one I've seen, but entertaining nonetheless. They did have good IMAX movies running, so I went to see 3 in a row :)

After the conference was over, I went diving off the San Diego Coast (kelp and wreck dives), which considering it was 6 dives in one day took 12 hours :)

The next day, it was my only day left to visit San Diego (2 in total) and I had a flight out that evening, so it was going to be packed.

I started with Cabrillo National Monument:

The naval base is well visible from up there

Next, I went to Jola to see the aquarium and Sea Horse nursery they had:

Next, I went to Old Town San Diego, which while I didn't have enough time to visit appropriately, was still quite nice to visit:

Wells Fargo

Next, I went to Balboa Park to see several things I hadn't seen the first day. I lucked out and saw birds that were there to be adopted. They were fun to be with:

From there, I went to the model railway museum:

Next, was time for the Air and Space Museum, which was a bit tough to see in 1h45, but I was able to see most of it and it was quite good: See my post on Air and Space Musem.

After the Museum, I jumped to the Zoo to catch barely catch a couple of hours before heading for the airport. Turns out, I hadn't quite planned for the fact that the zoo was going to be quite useless after sunset, so I had less time than planned, but made the best of it. Of course, seeing the San Diego Zoo in 1h and change, is a joke, but I took the tram around for the 10 cent tour, and saw a few things on foot before it got too dark :)

I have a few other random pictures. One interesting thing in San Diego is how much in the middle of the city the airport is. Great for commute, but interesting planes landing in the middle:

And there you go, the long somewhat rushed sunday was over, and time came to fly home. Next time, I'll plan for an extra day or two :)

they recognized a lot of pioneers of aviation, including French ones like Santos Dumont, Louis Bleriot, Marcel Dassault and others

Vintage Remote Controls

It was quite a nice museum, definitely worth visiting.

Little did I know that San Diego actually has colder water than LA and Catalina, and barely warmer than Monterey that is freaking cold (make sure you know where the hole in the ice is, so that you don't get trapped under the ice sheet when coming back up :) ).

Then I had another brilliant idea, if the water is cold, why not sign up for 6 dives in a day. I didn't even know it was possible if you were not on a liveaboard and none of those dives were night dives.

Smallish boat compared to my typical liveaboard, but good enough for a day :)

My 3 morning dives were pretty miserable. Diving in kelp wasn't bad, but 15C was monterey cold and my rental was only a 7mm suit with no vest (in monterey I had a vest for that). Unsurprisingly, I was quite cold, and while I got to see a few things and it's cool to dive amongst kelp, the temps just made it pretty miserable.

look carefully, these were the steps back up to the boat

In the afternoon, they thankfully gave me a 2nd wet suit, so I was now wearing 3mm plus 7mm on top, and the 10mm did the trick. The water was still only 15C, but bearable now.
The first 2 dives were to the yukon, which is indeed a huge ship and impressive to see. We didn't really go inside because I'm not trained for diving inside wrecks, especially because this ship is on its side, so up is not actually up :)
The Ruby was a smaller ship, but because the day ran behind it was a dusk dive turning into a night dive, so I didn't get to see as much. At last I saw the toilet that was there :)

hard to go on the toilet with 2 dive suits

I'll be honest in saying that I'm just not a fan of cold water. Having to wear 7mm with a suit and hood and still being very cold is not fun. The vis was also far from stellar and I'm told was actually pretty standard or even slightly above average. I did learn that I do need at least 10mm or an additional vest to dive in 15C water.
It was actually nice to see the Yukon which is indeed a pretty huge shipwreck, and kelp is interesting to see, but otherwise sea life was pretty minimal compared to the pretty high standards I'm used to.
It wasn't a waste of time, and it was cool to do 6 dives in a day in cold water no less, but I don't really need to be doing this again anytime soon :)