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Hey, there’s a big hole in the ground…

Friday 8 October 2010
USABlue Sky Flying AdventuresFlying

It’s hard to believe that the weather in the San Diego region is still poor. We’re having the best flying conditions one can imagine. After an American breakfast (yeah right…) it was time to move on again. Just after takeoff at Page, we overflew this nice scenery.

We’re in the “Grand Canyon” region. Everyone knows the tourist spots at the canyon, but there are far more similar locations. Just have a look at the pictures.

Lex and Max finally managed to orchestrate a nice “fly-by”.

We are on route to Grand Canyon National Park. This is the airport where all the helicopter rides over the canyon start. It’s extremely busy in the sky and we have to make sure that we follow the instructions. When we are on the base leg for landing, the helicopters pass below us! There are no facilities on the airport, but there is a small area nearby for lunch. This is also the place where you can find the IMAX theatre. We didn’t visit it, but I did a few years back and they show a very nice movie about the Grand Canyon; visit it when you’re here!

After lunch it was time to move on to another airport in the area: Grand Canyon West. It’s a great airport to fly to. The airport is more or less at the edge of the canyon. On our way over, we have magnificent views. This landscape is amazing.

Once you’re on the ground, fun is over. There’s nothing at this airport at all. It’s here to bring tourists in or to execute a scenic flight over the canyon. That’s it. It’s also the starting point for a short bus tour. The tour will bring you to 3 different points where you can overlook the canyon.

At one of these points you can visit the Sky Walk; a construction with a glass floor over the edge of the canyon.

Having looked at all these nice sceneries, it’s time to move on to the place of all sins: Las Vegas! It’s getting late and the sun is getting at its lowest positions. The windscreen or our plane is extremely scratched and having the sun right in our face makes it very difficult to see. By the time when we are over Las Vegas, we’re asked to “report when Stratosphere in sight”. The Stratospere (nowadays The Strat) (see picture: it’s the pointy one on the left/bottom side) is the tallest tower in Las Vegas, but we couldn’t see it until the point where we almost passed it… From that point onwards it was just a short flight into Last Vegas North.

It took some time to book a hotel room; it’s Friday and almost every rooms seems to be booked. We ended up in the Stratosphere hotel (yep the one that is part of the big tower). After another great day of flying, we ended up in the Stratosphere restaurant. The restaurant is located almost at the top of the tower and rotates; you’re having a good view on the whole city while having dinner.

After dinner it was time to get out and “do Vegas”. Due to the “what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas” rule, I can’t tell you anymore…

That’s it for today. Have a look at the pictures: Flying from Page (KPGA) to North Las Vegas (KVGT) and the tracks of today:

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