35. Las Vegas Trip: leaving Hoover Dam and looking for Lake Mead's scenic route

Johnny Mack it travels back. I am out of breath. If you listen to the last episode, you heard that I had parked up the hill a little away from Hoover Dam. I just climbed back up a staircase. I am pretty tired. I got to catch my breath. So we're gonna head. We are parked in Arizona, and I'm gonna head a little bit into Arizona, not too far, and see what we find, and then I'm going to make my way over to the Lake Mead. Scenic Route says. We had out here heading west from the Hoover Dam, climbing up a very winding road. Beautiful as always, and as I said in the last several episodes, it looks like the star trek Gorn could attack you in any second. But this is my kind of dropping. I love these windy roads. More free parking all the way up here. If you want to walk it, I guess that ten dollars is for convenience. I didn't think the walk was that bad, despite me being out of breath. Let's see, here's another overlook. We are sixteen hundred feet elevation and climbing limit fifteen, so that'll give you a sense for the type of road. So the road straight is closed and it looks permanently closed. I'm in the Lake Mead recreational area and I'm guessing that they have Okay, so we can't drive into Arizona because the road is closed for whatever reason. I guess you're supposed to take the highway bypass. Now here's a helipad, so you know when they say you've reached the end of the road, we've reached the end of the road. I wonder why that road is closed. Something for me to google and not driving a car. I am really curious why that is closed off. But it is like barriered barriered. I'm sure part of it is a safety thing, because I did have to get my car checked, if you heard in the last episode, out of my car checked to enter this area. So I guess it must just be a protection thing. One way in, one way out, and I think that can totally make sense. Nice view of the damn on my right downhill at fifteen miles an hour. I am able to look out because there are no other cars around. I'm looking at my ways map. So on the last episode, you heard my curiosity about Interstate eleven. I'm seeing here on the Arizona side, the same highway is signed US ninety three, So I guess Interstate eleven takes you to the Nevada Arizona border and then ends for those Interstate Highway fans of Travelers Back podcast, So yeah, if you listen to the last episode, there's plenty of parking up here. Maybe not on the weekend. It is Friday afternoon when I'm here, but there's a completely empty lot here. You'd have to walk a little to the damn from here, but there are two more lots, so I don't really know why you would pay the ten dollars unless you know you have an elderly person with you can't walk that well, or you're just lazy. But terrain is gorgeous. I don't see any harm in walking it. There are at least thirteen parking areas. The last one that charged you was Parking Area ten. I parked in Parking Area eleven, which seems pretty popular. Probably should have just driven the extra six feet and parked in twelve. It's funny with the temperature two, the car heats ups every time I get back in. I'm really warm, and then I drive with the sunroof open for two minutes and I'm cold again. Making my way back down to the Hoover Dam, driving directly into the sun, so there's a shadow coming up. I can't even see the other side of it. This is fun. I wonder what this was like when it was a state road that you would actually take. Now on the dam itself and now leaving the dam made an edit for time there. You didn't need to listen to me drive it silently across the dam, passing the gift shop, and now we're onto this episode proper. The goal is to take the scenic route along Lake Mead. I have not planned this out at all. It's my favorite type of adventure. Just see what happens on my left, Just beautiful valleys and canyons, courts and driving kind of underneath the Pat Tillman Bridge right now. Listen to the last episode as I walked across that bridge. Now curving my way back out to where that original security station was, passing the railroad trail, some other trip, some other life. I do not have time, especially the sun is going to set on me. Hopefully I'll see a sign here that tells me where the scenic route is, passing a sign declaring the official Pacific time zones. Welcome back to Pacific time. It's exactly four o'clock Eastern Standard time. Here's the lake View overlook. I almost zipped past it. I definitely want to do this now. I'm starting with Cowboy a little bit. I have sixty six miles worth of gas, which is enough. I'm not in the middle of nowhere. This is a dead valley, but it's also enough to keep an eye on. You don't want to get too carried away. This road looks relatively new to me, and by that I mean twenty years, not fifty. I could be completely wrong, and we have come to the top of a hill and a very scenic overpass. Okay, sir, you can back out. I'll give you a second. Come on, let's go. He is not very good at backing out. I'm losing my patients. Come on, sir. Oh wow, Oh, I don't I even had to describe this to you. Blue, silver, purple. Let's get out of car and take a look at this. Wow, my friends do not sleep on this view. It is absolutely gorgeous. Let me go left or right, Just a big flat plane, and then there's a marina with a bunch of boats there. And then the water's just gorgeous. It's blue and it's silver and it's a lighter blue, and the distance the mountains and the light is just crisp and is absolutely gorgeous, like meat is beautiful. You can really see how the water level has dropped, though, that is a little absolutely terrifying. You can get a sense of where on the left side where the marinas. You can get a sense of where the water used to be and where it is now. But what really gives your way is there are land masses in the middle of the lake where you can just totally see white three quarters of the way up the mountain and just water has dropped. That This is I've been in a grand canyon. This is right there with it in terms of beautiful, boy, I wish I could describe the water too. Just blue and silver and it's just absolutely gorgeous. Don't sleep on this. I'm glad i'd blow that turn, caught it last second. It's a quick show. Were drive up from wherever we were, All right, let's go back and see if we can find the scenic route getting back in the car. Now. I know I say this a lot, but there are so many places you just wish you could just take in and take in and wow, the water is just so gorgeous. We've got an hour left of daylight, and I don't want to see what else I can see. And this is a place I feel like I can get back to. It's not like when I went to Iceland. You know how often you're gonna get there. Las Vegas is somewhere I can go, and I can rent a car, and I can come back out here and stare at this again in a few years if I'm missing it. So let me tell you again what that was called lake View Overlook. It is just west of the damn you'll see it. I'm going to make a right turn back onto this two lean State Highway. There is a mountain lion crossing the next two miles, so be careful. There could be a ram or whatever that is. So theouetted on the sign. I guess it's a ram. It had long horns, mountain goat. I'm from Queens. I don't know all right. I've come to a choice junction Interstate eleven. I know that will take me back to Las Vegas. Strado took me to Lake Mead and Boulder City and US ninety three. Let's do that. I'm heading north on Business ninety three and I do see a Chevron station. I think I'm going to top off the gas and hunch in scenic route and see what I can find. Be right back. Well, nothing there worked out? The cast station good. A bunch of loops. Every pump is broken. That's not really helpful, Chevron. This is telling me I can only make a write coming out of here. Well, that's annoying, all right. And the other problem is I decided to hit into ways a scenic route, and I don't have enough data to pull up ways, so I'm just ad libbing this. So I have to go back down and loop around this traffic circle. People have bigger problems than that, so we'll just do that. The traffic circle is a quarter mile away. Maybe I can get some bars and search for the circle route. There was a guy waiting for a bus at the Chevron station. I don't know how often the bus comes in Hoover, Dam, Nevada at the Chevron station without gas. Wish you well, sir. All right, here a bunch of signs Lake Mead Hoover damn. I want that way, so I'm gonna go. This is probably going to take me back to the Chevron station. My next event isn't for four hours. I have to be at a soccer game at eight twenty long story, trust me, it makes sense. So I have four hours to get back to Vegas fifty eight miles worth of gas. Of course Chevron would have comeen helpful there. I don't think they'll be sponsoring travel is backing back around now to the Chevron and the man waiting for the bust. Let's see if the bus is coming the last few minutes. Something tells me it hasn't. We're five miles outside Boulder City as in the Hoover Dam lodge on the right. That doesn't look bad. Helicopter tours thirty nine dollars in up and the man is still waiting for the bus. Good luck, sir. The Hoover Dam lodge does not look awful. There's a casino, of course. We're in Nevada here and probably does well with people bouncing right over the border from Arizona. Ooh here, it looks like you could rent some canoes. Keep that in mind for my next trip. Now I'm on a beautiful it seems pretty new ish four lane US Highway, two lanes in either direction. The Lake Mead a National rec Center, visitor centers in half a mile, so I can't be too lost. Ways is still searching Lake Mead over my right shoulder, Absolutely gorgeous. Now passing the visitor center, I'm going to keep going. I mean, if there's a scenic route, it has to be on my right because there's nothing between me and the water. So I just think I'm gonna hug the water here and see what I find. You know what I just missed it. I just saw a lake shore drive. It wasn't signed, but that's what I was looking for. So I'm going to have to go up and look back. Now this is a divided highways. I don't know how long it's going to be before I can make this turn. Draft a lot of double backing in this episode. Let's say I don't want to cowboy, that that'd be a little wide. Oh, I know what I can do. I can come out of here and then cowboy across. Okay, I found a overlook and now I'm looping out and I'll put on my left turn signal. There's nobody coming on the left, a couple of cars on the right. I will chill it out and here we go. All right, not too much wasted time heading back towards the visitors center, and this time I have to make sure I don't miss that Lake Shore Drive. There's a kim in front of me. I bet he's going there. Let's follow him. So yeah, if you're looking to do the scenic drive. When you come out and you pass the man waiting for the bus and the whatever casino I said it was, Lake Shore Drive does not have a lot of signage, so it's going to be this little side street looking thing. It's going to come up on you before you know it, so keep an eye out there. But here we go. I'm just gonna follow this camper down. This looks like it's going to be a gorgeous drive. Hey, I'm coming up on a fee area. I didn't realize I was going to have to pay to drive through this. I'm not sure this is what I wanted. I'm not being cheap. I just don't have time, and I don't think paying a large fee for this drive makes sense with the amount of daylight I have left, so I am going to switch back and go back to the highway I was on that Business ninety three. I will save that drive for another day. A fair amount of people coming down and doing it though, So that's the Lake Mead National Reservation area. All right, Let's head back up to Business ninety three and see what we find there, and welcome to Boulder City. The road is taking me away from Lake Mead. I think the only way to do Lake Mead would be to hug along and pay that price there. So all right, Well, when to Boulder City. A lot of one story houses, nice nestled up in the hill. We're entering the Boulder City Historic District. So as I'm driving through Boulder City, here palm trees in the middle. It kind of looks like La meets Long Beach, New York and a dairy queen. That's pretty tempting, but I gotta drive. Here's Vinney's little Italy in Boulder City. Boulder City is pretty cool, all right. The canoe guy just passed me, and wonder where he's going. It's an A and W restaurant. I haven't seen one of those back East in a while. They all closed up a few years back. Chinese food at the China Beastrue Boulder City is kind of cool looking. It almost looks like grand Theft Autos version of what a city would look like, if that makes any sense. With the palm trees and just the kind of stores on the side. I like it. This is cool. Another gas station. I didn't see it. It's on the left. I'm looking for one on my side. A subway drive through. I didn't know that was a thing. Hey, I lost side of the canoe guy. He must have turned. Where'd you go? Can you go? Oh? Yeah, I see him in the review mirror. All right, the canoe places in Boulder City. This looks like it's going to open back up. Let's check the gas. Thank Johnny Mac. Fifty four miles. We are okay. We are eleven miles from Henderson and only twenty one from Las Vegas. I'm happy to be doing this road instead of the interstate. You know, you want to see the country. Right. A traffic light what I can't believe there's a traffic light, and I can't believe it's read Oh on the right here just a pretty basic railroad trestle bridge. But I always like those, always take pictures of things like that. Oh no, I can't take a picture. My phone is full. I'll have to delete some podcasts or something. All right, railroad, trestle bridge. It's not meant for me to take a picture of you. But I enjoyed your company. Well, friends, I took you as ninety three, and it has forced my hand. It has merged with Interstate eleven. So Interstate eleven it is so at least we got to look at Lake Mead from the top. Not quite the adventure I thought this one was going to be. But that's part of the fun of travel, is back and just heading out on the road and see where we're going. I'm gonna leave you here. I'm gonna drive back to Vegas. Listen to you two's the Joshua Tree, which I'm telling you us sounds wonderful driving across the desert. Hopefully get some gas and we next hear from me. I think I'll be on Fremont Street in downtown Las Vegas as a kill some more time before the soccer game. You can follow this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Google, Spotify, wherever you get your shows. See you soon.