Coast-to-Coast USA

USA coast-to-coast trip  ̶t̶h̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶b̶a̶c̶k̶ ̶a̶g̶a̶i̶n̶  Boston-San_Francisco-Boston, year 2017

stop 1.: Boston

instead of tea-parties - skyscrapers & yachts

and in the city are well, not exactly the Middle Ages, but kinda slightly updated England

no wonder there are so many blackouts over here: looks like they never changed cables since grandpa Edison' times

although they are prepared for catastrophes of any sort - just in case

police - where else - in a doughnut shop

aquarium is clean and most of other things are in order

if it wouldn't look so much as good old Britain I'd like the place, despite the weather

Anywho, it's time to go to Salem and see some whales on the way

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stop 2.: Salem

The best way to Salem from Boston is, of course, by sea

Lighthouses, ships and boats

 

and whales! well, if you are lucky

 

Salem itself today is just a small provincial town, a bit boring in my opinion: little harbor, houses with identical siding, cables, fastfoods... the usual.

It is known here for witch hunting: in 17th century they hanged 19 people and in total "convicted" about 40 persons, both men and women, for being devil's helpers 

For me Salem is more Arkham of Lovecraft, but - to my great regret! nothing mystical was seen :(

As for the witches - well, coming from the heart of Europe, digging whole my student years in medieval ruins made me smile on Salem' plastic skeletons and witchdolls

But, if we would took aside our expectations, Salem is nice, however it is full of strange signs, which even locals could not explain:

and it is an old town for US, it even has wooden Orthodox church

couple of days in Salem were more than enough for me, getting back to Boston, 

took a car and going west! next step: Niagara Falls

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Step 3: Niagara Falls

Niagara Falls is kinda 2 towns: one in the US and another one in Canada. The river is the border and they have customs controls right on the bridges. 

If from Canadian side it is skyscrappers, clubs, casinos and huge hotels for honeymooners, from states - it is quiet small provincial town

humble monuments from war times, 

little churches, 

crooked wooden houses on narrow streets 

there is a national park around the river, you can walk there freely, but it does not offer any special attractions, for some excitement you need to get to the Canadian side

and - of course - the waterfall:

waterfall is huge, but against my expectations - not high, just wide 

you can get there by walking, by ship, by helicopter or look at it from the bridges

yeah, you can look at running water for ages, day and night 

or just rumble around to check Niagara' mini-cascades 

We spent couple of days in US' Niagara Falls at some nice lady airb'n'b flat with 3 cats. All 3 cats were forbidden to go out, so we had to take care and not to leave the doors open. For that none of the cats wanted to be in the picture :(

And last day it was a Memorial Day with fireworks:

next stop - sweet home Chicago, but first:

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Step 4: The Highways

Niagara-Chicago road is about 8 hours drive, and mainly it was me who had to drive all those 2 month in a row. Therefore this is my tale about US highways:

Let me tell you first, how come we get into this road trip in the first place: my dear friend had a business trip to his silicon valley company for 2 weeks and then 1 week holiday, so he offered me to go with him and look around San-Francisco: the company pays for 2 weeks accommodation and whole time for the car (incl. holiday). At this point I had the cartoon eyes - you know, with $$ in each:

and a lightbulb over my head: I said: honey, why would I go for a country I never've been before for 3 weeks to see just a small piece of it? Let's do the road trip through the whole US - you, as a professional, can code your software in a car, I will drive, let's see as much of North America as we could! and he agreed ;o)

I drive a lot on business trips myself,  besides, in Europe the best way to get somewhere is by car, I would prefer to take whatever with me in a drive instead of weighting every kilo for the plane luggage.

And Americans, as we know from every movie we see, literally live in their cars: driving to work/schools/malls and even loosing their virginity or getting abducted by aliens in the vehicle.

Anyways, as I used to speedy highways of ours, especially German no-speed-limits-autobahns, I was frustrated by American roads.... No, they are of good quality - wide and clear, but there is a 90km/h limit almost everywhere in a country, 90! Imagine 2-3 lines highway in each direction, very few cars and cheap fuel - and 90 limits.... seriously, guys....

 

I just could not do that! When I was speeding, my dear friend pulled me down and bug me a lot, for which I - of course - told him "Look, I am watching the road - it is empty, there is nothing to be bothered about". aha... 

well - there was, the valiant police officers are always vigilant: somewhere in the middle of our way on absolutely deserted road suddenly: sirens, lights, police car! "Oh fuck!" says my friend; "oh shit" say I; "Hello, I am officer Ross, your license please" - says officer. I stretched to the back seat for the bag with documents - and at this very moment, less than a second! the officer unbuckles his gun holster and asks what I am looking for at the back seat? I wasn't even halfway to the bag yet he was so fast. So, friend of mine, who is in States frequently, shows officer both his hands and choosing very short words explains: "We have all our documents in the bag on the back seat. She will get the bag and give it to me. I will open it for you. Will take the documents. Will pass them to you" The officer nodded and watched us doing all this very attentively, by the way somehow he managed to get behind our side mirror too. He took our passes and my license and went back to his car, where his partner already was reporting something on radio.

At that moment we started to breathe again and both of us were glad that we are not black people. Although we might be exaggerating: officer Ross came back with our papers and informed us that there is no mentions of us in their database, meaning I am doing crime for the first time - was it intentionally or I just didn't pay enough attention? I started to explain with all my skill that ̶ ̶с̶а̶м̶и̶ ̶м̶ы̶ ̶н̶е̶ ̶м̶е̶с̶т̶н̶ы̶е̶, we are not local here, I am very responsible citizen, but your perfect highway look so much as autobahn back home, that I just out of habit, BUT! the very first and surely last time, ̶м̶а̶м̶о̶й̶ ̶к̶л̶я̶н̶у̶с̶ь̶ I swear! Officer Ross nodded solemnly and educated us on Ohio state law by which you can get into prison for up to 6 years for breaking traffic rules, but see how it is my first time, he would issue the warning, without even given me a fee.

Officer Ross made such an impression (especially his fastest hand on the West) that for the whole 2 months we were the best behaved drivers in US. Still - 90km/h, I weep till today people

Drivers in US are funny bunch: for example, not in every state bikers had to have helmets - we saw riders in flip-flops without even glasses, c'mon: our front window was full of smashed bugs every hour, how they ride I do not understand. 

They must be on some kind of insect based diet or something. And the trucks - oh, the trucks there I love!

Another surprise was no internet on interstate roads, sometimes even mobile connection was lost, so we had to buy paper maps and go old school

 

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Step 5: Sweet home Chicago 

We got to Chicago late, late at night without much hope to have any food available, nevertheless we venture to explore. Unlike Massachusetts, where ̶y̶o̶u̶ ̶w̶o̶u̶l̶d̶n̶'̶t̶ ̶g̶e̶t̶ ̶s̶n̶o̶w̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶w̶i̶n̶t̶e̶r̶ not only alcohol sales are limited, but any café/restaurants are closing early, in Chicago you can eat all the time. And you can eat as much as you want, and anywhere, and it will be good (most of the times). There is not only Chicago' pizza (not a fan btw), but all kinds of food and beer. 

You can see the whole town from skyscrapers, we were in Willis Tower (https://www.willistower.com/)

Scary - OMG I am afraid of heights - that is why anywhere I go I try to get on the tallest room in the highest tower, if you think it will help to stop being afraid - no, it doesn't, but I do it anyway and always get sickly frightened 

Getting back on warm streets of the city was a relief. Here is me poking into the "bean" to make it even more curvy:

From all the places I've been in US on this road trip and after, Chicago is my favorite: the atmosphere, the way it's build, the way it lives, and lake, and people - felt like home, like place I could live in.

The explanation of this attraction was found - as usual - in a pub: locals educated us every evening  about domestic history, so we were told Chicago and surroundings were settled mostly by people from Eastern Europe - hence the best beer in country & familiar mentality. 

Illinois state had lots of mines and eastern Europeans were the very people who were used to do this hard work here and in Europe too.

It was easy to talk to people here because of the language as well: we were told that Illinois has the clearest English because settlers were talking each on their own language and they all had to learn English equally to be able to talk to each other. Funny thing is they still articulate very clearly

Although, after some time they dig out everything there were here (pretty same as in Europe), mines were closed and many people lost their jobs. That is why now Chicago is one of the most criminal cities in US, it is divided on gangs' districts and shootings (among other crimes) is quite common here. Guys in a pub boasted that that weekend was very peaceful - only 39 gunshots... oh well, I can certainly live without that

Nowhere else in US it was so easy for me to get into conversation with people, mindless chatting or serious debates alike. 

Lake Michigan (one of the Greats) looks more like the sea and the city - in my head - become just an ideal place for me: the sea, the harbor, wind and skyscrapers, beer and food - as if Prague was miraculously upgraded and finally got what I miss most 

Schooner Windy is going to Canada, and we are going to the cowboys' country ̶w̶h̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶f̶l̶a̶v̶o̶r̶ ̶i̶s̶ to see real rodeo in Cherokee  

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Step 6.  Cherokee Rodeo

What is America without cowboys? When planning our trip I was checking what's where and saw rodeo in Cherokee. I thought ah, well - some redneck local show I guess we need to see it

but it happens so it is not a show but a real thing: seriously, rodeo is an international sport in both Americas, quite popular too! 

And there were cowboys coming to Cherokee from different countries because what I thought of as "show" actually was part of regular championship (https://www.prorodeo.com/) - with heavy competition, where emotions and passion were in plenty

Kids are getting used to these events and participate in them too, it seems to me that in "rural" states as Iowa rodeo is some kind of Christmas level affair. Rodeo took whole day: in the morning kids were riding sheep and hunting rabbits, 

and in the afternoon it was an adult time

here come real cowboys and wild horses

there were broken bones, unlucky riders (or parts of them) were cleaned up by rodeo clowns and new ones step in to show what they are made of

most of the participants were farmers, who are working with cattle whole their life and you could see the skill

next part of competition was much more interesting: there were real cowboys and very real almost wild cows. 

Chicago-Cherokee road is 8.5hours of prairie - just vast-vast  plains of grasslands all over you, all around and more, all the way to and beyond the horizon.

And there they were - cattle, huge herds of cows, living almost naturally over there.

 And by the way - these were the best steaks in my life!

there is a special committee which chooses cows for rodeo so none of them would be familiar to the participants 

there are several disciplines on how to catch the cow or calf, how to hold it and tie; some of these are done by one person, some - by two, all disciplines are time measured

the record of this rodeo was 8.4seconds, OMG for 8.4 seconds all I can do is push the camera button (not even that sometimes), but these guys are able to catch the beasts, pick them up (about 60kg of it!) with their bare hands and tie them up - amazing!

and late at night it come to the heavy staff: riding on wild bulls. This we could not watch, such a brutal competition was over our limits. The bulls apart from being huge were vicious, merciless creatures, they - unlike horses, had no genes for being ride on so anyone who tried got savage response indeed. Shortly - first couple of riders were almost torn into pieces, they get away from bull' horns in the very last moment by some miracle. The evening dark and all the dust make it impossible to do any photos, so we just went away from the bloody struggle, besides, it was already after midnight and we had long road in front of us next day

Rodeo is not just about animals: people come together from far and wide not only to compete, but to talk and drink and listen to the music. There were dances and some kind of farmers market: you could buy all kinds of cowboy staff from lassos to knifes, not the tourist ones but some genuine items. Me - I bought cowgirl boots and they are still in service today! 

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Step 7. Prairie 

Best way to continue west is through Nebraska, but I could not find anything interesting there (maybe wasn't looking good enough), so we went through South Dakota instead: the state of hot springs and mammoth bones, among other things

The road goes over prairie - huge limitless prairie of Iowa and Dakotas

In general it is a bit boring - grass land all over for hours, for about 8 hours... 

8hours of drive for 90 km/hour.... 

but if you pay attention there are all kinds of big and small creatures:

cows,

  

deer or some kind of antelopes even, 

prairie-dogs 

and other animals living their lives oblivious to human existence. 

Which is understandable: human existence here is very limited

Part of the prairie is national reserve of buffalo, not all of them live in the reservation, I guess because they still didn't get the concept of it, buffalo just roaming around in these vast steppes 

Once endangered, today buffalo population is back to normal, they are grazing all over the place

you can stop and stare at them - just remember not to go away from the car: younger ones are curious and they may wonder how strong you are and how it feels to get you up on their horns

The car will not save you either, just give you some advantage in speed - well, if you are lucky and get in in time

Therefore we rather get to Rapid City, place of hot springs and relax - so much needed after long road.

From there we went to see Crazy horse monument

 

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Step 8. Tasunke Witco / Crazy Horse

Crazy Horse (1840-1877) was one of very few who fight back Europeans successfully. His military talents were plenty: he won several battles despite huge difference in weapons, logistics and supply.  Unfortunately, his diplomatic skills were poor and he didn't manage to create an Indian coalition. Actually, it was so bad he was killed at the peace negotiations, although the circumstances are unclear but many records point to his wild character as the reason.

From the moment when monuments on mount Rushmore started (1927), Indians tried to commemorate their own hero. In 1939 one of the Rushmore sculptors, Korczak Ziółkowski took over the job. The Crazy Horse Monument supposed to overshadow Rushmore presidents in every way: it was cut from the whole mountain, was 4 times bigger and chief was depicted attacking his enemies.

Ziolkowski and Indians refused to get financing from the government, sculptor started the work literally by himself, now there are about 10 people continue working, these are volunteers and sculptor's kids/grandchilds 

Construction is financed by donations and income from tourists. Unlike Rushmore, which construction  was finished in 14years, Crazy Horse monument is still far from being completed.

During all the time it got lots of touristy staff growing around: shops, restaurants, souvenir' kiosks and other moneymaking things are all over the place. This obviously makes Indians quite angry: all the touristy staff belongs to Ziolkowski family. There is a popular opinion that some kind of disneyland is made from nation tragedy.

Plus many do not like that monument is carved on sacred mountain: the Black Hills are place of power - it was initiation place for youth, who had to go there for 4 days to be in nature all alone without food and water to become an adult. They were supposed to meet tribes' spirits in this journey and learn how to be humans.

Some are still keeping to belief that any image (sculpture/photo/picture) is taking part of your soul, doesn't matter if person is alive or dead. And there are many who are angry that construction become endless process.

https://crazyhorsememorial.org 

well, the story is not unique but still sad. 

Anyways, there are many Chip&Deyles around 

and other creatures 

but we are getting back on the road

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Step 9. Hot Springs, South Dakota

Town of Hot Springs, obviously, has hot springs, where we inserted our weary bodies to get some rest from the endless roads. While we were getting rest all kinds of hardships come to our minds, so this step will be mostly whining - about life, food, traditions and everything in this country.

After this American odyssey I've got +7kg, and not from sitting and driving (we were walking and hiking quite a lot every day), but from the food. Bloody yankees put sugar in everything, literally everything, and what worse: often it is not just sugar but corn syrup, which is hundred times more sweet and unhealthy. There is corn syrup everywhere: bread, meet, pre-processed food, even in freaking spices - everywhere. On the road we eat mostly in fastfoods, in cities we rented AirBnB apartments  where we cooked ourselves if we still had strength, but even then it was an impossible quest to find in the grocery shops some food without corn syrup or sugar.

The problem of sweet food (apart from making you fat and sick) is as well in making you hungry again pretty fast. This is the reason Americans eat all the time, snacking all the time, chewing something ALL THE TIME, and so did we. And we did get fat.

Plus all the portions here are huge, overwhelming amounts of food in every meal, for example on normal breakfast you will get steak with fries and pancakes with omelet and tons of sugary things on top.

Another thing which irritated me enormously were showers: they were fixed to the walls or to the ceiling, fixed for good: there were no shower hoses - just shower head sticking from the wall, extremely uncomfortable. And this was not only in cheap motels but in normal apartments too - I wonder how you can wash yourself everywhere with such system, I am a flexible person, but even for me it is just uncomfortable and weird.

The further we moved to the west, the more "free" was the country: first you could buy alcohol in supermarkets (west from Massachusetts), then - weapons in the same supermarket as milk and soap. Another surprising thing in malls were drugs on free sale: what you can get in Europe only on doctors prescription here was freely on the shelf. 

Well, that's what I liked in US - if you are considered as an adult you suppose to decide by yourself how to not/live; and if something went wrong - well, you can always sue LOL

It seems though even here (luckily not in every state) more and more people tend to decide for you, hope it will take them long time to kill the freedom for which people left their countries and went to America.

The thing making Hot Springs of Dakota famous is mammoth site. Around 1970s or so construction company accidentally uncovered big bones, they asked specialists and find out that the construction place is actually ancient swamp where many mammoths and other animals found their horrible death, and as well preserved themselves for us to see. The company covered the whole place with the roof and allowed paleontologists to dig there day and night, what they do.

 

https://www.mammothsite.org

Having seen plenty of bones and remains, permanently hungry and fat, we moved south, to Utah. 

The road become more interesting, scenery diverse but food and showers - still the same ;o)

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Step 10. Utah

Salt Lake City is a modern city (skyscrapers, hip parks, bicycle roads etc) therefore I was a bit bored there, and we actually come there not for the city, but for the lake and most of all - famous Salt Pans 

In our motel at breakfast TV showed local news of kids' made robots' competition: their robots were playing football, sorted packages and - of course - were fighting each other. 

The winner was a girl with rainbow hair, she was from a Mormon family and it was so cute to see here 5 mothers cheering for her so much you could not tell who was her "biomother". All of the moms were in serious black long dresses and Mormon hats, but the girl had "normal" outfit of ripped jeans and shapeless t-shirt.

 From one side it was a bizarre moment, from the other - well, Utah Uni was one of the founders of ARPANET in 1970s; besides, Mormons are sure that salvation comes not so much from belief, as from real deeds and hard work.

Salt excavation, which gave city name, is a hard work still, even today, and salt is here everywhere, which gave me headaches on the roads - with all these mirages and fata-morganas on bright sun  

Salt Lake is salty for 25% (to compare the most salty place of Dead Sea is 30%), almost noone lives here - no animals or birds, the ones who by some mistake gets here usually die of salty everything. The Lake smells awful not sure if because of dead things or salt or altogether 

Lake beaches are not for playing also: sand is very hard here and no sandcastles could be built - it does not keep together. Sand drawings are the only things left to do

For some reason there were Christmas Tree in the middle of nowhere - I wonder who was celebrating New Year there....

At Bonneville Salt Flats - place of world speed record (2018, 775кm/h) you will have enough space to accelerate yourself - nevermind if you use your legs or your paws

there is very little water there and it is SO salty (of course we tried), that I do remember the taste even now

The salty water is kinda thick - so it looks quite photogenic and reflects everything better than usual lakes

Well, from salt, mounts of salt and salt plants we are turning further south - to Grand Canyon

The Grand Canyon rips the states on two parts - it is not just one single canyon but the whole network of gorges, canyons and chasms made by Colorado river, which used to change its flow every now and then

In its northern part in Utah these are Bruce Canyon, Zion park canyons and Grand canyon parks - their astonishing beauty cannot be described by words, not even by photos - if you would have a chance - just go there, it is worth to see

nature's unique wonder

yeah - snow: 2700m over the sea level, June 2017, +12C

during the day it was warmer, up to +22C

and dry

fascinating still - so cool

simply amazing

next stop: Vegas, baby! 

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Step 11. Las Vegas

Vegas is the city of the night, during the day it looks bleary and faded, and you have a feeling of hang-over even if you were not drinking at all. Without night lights, neon flares, fountains and fireworks it is sleepy dusty place of no fun.

But at night! that's different story - story of wonderful artificial beauty, strange half naked people and wealth coming and going in seconds

At night here is music, dance, theatres, street performers and - certainly! - the casinos. Unlike it is shown in the movies, alcohol is strictly controlled here - nowadays you will be thrown away from any place if security decide that you have had enough, same with gambling - rules become more rigorous and you will be asked to leave if casino personnel would think you are getting too involved.

Unfortunately it is forbidden to make pictures in any casino/show although they themselves put cameras everywhere at every corner. 

Vegas lies in the desert, so not only insides are cooled by airconditioners, some streets are covered and airconed too, and to not loose any ad space - it is transmitted from these roofs and walls, the shit is literally pouring from all sides

And as if it was not enough - there are "live size" ads and boosters on the streets 

Vegas is the show place, with theatres, music-halls and circuses of all sorts, and all of them cost some incredible amount of money. We decided that if we will win - will go for Copperfield' show (the poor thing had 3 shows every day - freaking workaholic), and if we would be extremely lucky - we will go to Disney land (which is as well not cheap at all), but.... well, all in all I was in +5$ and my dear friend in -20$ - would not say from how much though LOL, it is a good thing we are not gambling types.

high-tech came to Las Vegas in form of card-shuffling computers, which makes any card game useless - obviously, smart machines make sure you get enough luck to keep your interest but will not let you win.

The rest as slot machines were never made for you to win, so the only relatively "honest" way to take your money is roulette: c'mon, luck - mama needs new pair of teeth!

But good old tradition of Vegas' weddings is still in place - you can do it even from your car: drive-through wedding service

And when you will understand it was not the best idea - the town is full of legal offices and lawyers, they are eager to "help" with your casino complains and loan issues, although I think you will get more problems after using these guys

Lately Vegas become more and more family place (maybe they try to attract more people because of strict rules for gambling and alcohol, any new ̶b̶l̶o̶o̶d̶   customer is good): hotels are very clean, each one has big play room for kids, swimming pools with animators, buffets with vegan food, nevertheless - there is nothing to do in Vegas at daytime. View from our hotel:

But - around the town are beautiful red rocks, where we went.

Our hotel gave us a map for the surroundings and strictly recommended to get back to the city by night, because of the snakes and scorpions and other wildlife, we got emergency phones for rangers too.

wildlife:

We were planning to get back in the evening anyway - for next day we had another 9hours drive to San-Francisco 

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Step 12. San Francisco

The first thing to do when finally got to San Francisco - is sleep. As I wrote before, my friend had to spend 2 weeks there for business purposes, and I had nothing else to do

After good few days sleep I went where I always go in the places near water - to the harbor!

In San Francisco apart from usual port' hustle&bustle with port cranes, dirty tug boats and huge container ships full of crap they have a lovely old tiny harbor with old ships, steam boats and sailing ships. 

All of them are still in business, working as a tourist attractions of course but keeping old ways.

and there is a navy port - here you cannot get on every ship obviously, but some are open for public

And the whole coast is lined up with seals. Seals are like cats - lying down on every surface, moving or stable - they don't mind, "if it fits - it sits", their glossy bodies are everywhere

and aviation is present too 

Famous red Golden Bridge in bright daylight is black. It is actually Golden Bay' bridge, so name of the bridge does not mean the bridge itself should be golden.

About town itself: well, from far away it looks nice - skyscrapers, sea, bridges.... 

Although great sandy  beaches are useless most of the year - in my opinion, as sea is freaking cold; 

to have a walk on the bridge - no, no romantic walks available: the bridges are huge, just one way will take you half a day and then you need to cross it back... So for San Francisco bridge walks you need to be serious walk' enthusiast.

By the way, the bridge is closed for pedestrians at night: we were (with other people) kick out of there by police, they told us it is anti-terrorist measure - as if terrorist cannot do any harm in broad daylight?  

The town' architecture is confusing: there are few nice buildings, but they kind of stay out, there is no common town style

and again - unlike in movies, for two weeks I haven't seen any police car chases or triads shooting, or just some mad cars jumping on steep winding streets - nothing

I thought the cable cars were trams, but no - they are literally pulled by cables. I didn't try to ride them though - so many people were there all the time it looked like every day public transport back home. I guess for local tourists cable cars - as most of public transport in US - is an unusual thing, but I pass

I was wondering again and again: why in hi-tech city of silicone valley full of IT-corporations they still have electric cables hanging over the streets... c'mon people, it is too much

for two weeks of my life here my favorite place become China-town: there were people on the streets, little shops and restaurants with not-sweet food (finally!), some town life with old people playing cards in little parks, kids running around, almost no tourists, just locals living their lives.

There are several national parks around San Francisco, I think it is the best what you can see here. On the way you can admire Californian pride: wine growing next to the oil rig, the teste is.... it is awful 

In the parks you can walk by yourself or in the group, if you go alone - you need to fill in check list and leave it in the car to be seen. If you would not get back in time - they will start search for you, this is nice.

In Redwood park I choose 2 hours route for waterfalls, but because several paths were closed I spent there about 5 hours hiking, and have no regrets: sequoia forest has special crisp aroma, I do not know how to describe it, but it make me energetic and I was not tired at all after long hike.

Unfortunately I could not make proper pictures of the seqouias - gigantic trees just too big for camera or  phone, the trees could grow as high as 100meters - and I think all of them were.

I was lucky there were not so many people in the park - mostly elderly German tourists, maybe because it was a working day. And waterfalls were in plenty, as promised in the brochure 

At the  gas station there I've got to learn something new:

Two weeks passed and we were on the road again: 

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Step 13. Monterey & LA

The most scenic road from San Francisco to LA runs along the coast. Sometimes it gets destroyed by wind - and it does blow! - but we were lucky

There are not only wind and views on the road, but the little town of Monterey, place of the first US aquarium made from part of the bay. That is the sea creatures are not sitting sadly in the glass bowls but live freely in their natural habitat, and could be seen through great glass walls put right on the ocean (https://www.montereybayaquarium.org)

From all I've seen in US, LA looks least like a town: it is just several unrelated districts, which for some strange reason are called one city.

There is standard downtown with skyscrapers, and district with ridiculously looking villas - rich and famous, only few of them testy, and block houses suburbs, and family houses where you can see owners' income level - all these I didn't like at all

therefore - as usual - I spent most of my time in the harbor

Hello, Queen Mary

or on the beaches - well, again, have no idea how they are used here - beautiful places they are but with cold and coldest water

accidentally while looking for parking place, we got to the dog beach and spend there the whole day.

My own doggo during the trip was back home in Prague with my friends. They borrow him to show their kids what it is to have a dog. Later on they took tortoise as a pet

and of course - China theatre where celebrities are put in cement

And wow Johnny Depp has big feet or small hands?...

How Schwarzenegger squeeze his feet into such a tight shoes? 

and the legend: 

And yes - we were at the Hollywood sign too, but just being there was such a kitch we did not make any photos

My friend' colleagues strongly recommended us to give up our idea to drive all the way to Boston on south road, they told it is way too dangerous, besides there is not much to see. Well, we rescheduled our trip to get more days for Grand Canyon, leave the car in Dallas and get back to Boston by plane.

The ocean coast ended - we are going into the desert

                                               *********************************

Step 14. Route 66, CA-AZ

When you go from west coast to Grand canyon you need to get through places most of which had in name "wilderness". The roads are getting emptier, weather drier and hotter.

Right here are the remains of famous Route 66: the transcontinental road once connected industrial Chicago with ports on west coast. Today Route 66 is not even on official roads' list - in some places it is destroyed and replaced by modern highways, in some - saved as a historical route, legendary but seldom used.

In the desert is - as usual - nothing, and as well several American's landsfields (some are just full of garbage, some - full of old aircrafts and such). There are few secret military and industrial polygons: you cannot get there of course, but they are not invisible: driving through total desolation on empty road without seeing animals or plants and suddenly - fences, cameras, barbed wire and then - desert emptiness again.

First time driving in US I saw state border, usually you know that you are in another state from road signs, but the border between California and Arizona is real, with checkpoints and serious border guards. Our car was thoroughly searched (I blame Massachusetts' car registration) but we had nothing so they let us go. 

We, or better to say our car had a rest in little town of Needles because it was +51 outside and we were afraid the car will not manage our usual 8hours trips. We did not risk to be left in the middle of the road in the desert with broken car, there were no internet or mobile connection on Route 66 over there and we were not eager to go to the highway in this heat to make emergency phone call. It is about 4hours drive from LA to Needles, we loaded car with 5litres of water for just in case, but nothing happened and we survived.

There is nothing to do in Needles, from local attractions is only little lake available and that' about it.

But what we did appreciate - a lot! - was returning of English language in our life. In California it was a real problem: in cities you can get on somehow, but on the roads (at gas stations, shops, motels and fastfoods) - no way Jose - only Chinese or Spanish (we know neither of them), so we were using our hands and international loud shouting. But here, at the end of the universe, people were talking English once again. At road café we got some table games to keep us busy before the food comes - yes, it was sweet again, but this time - with chili flavor

At the evening air cooled a bit: thermometer in our car showed  113F or +45C

Night was hot.

Next 4 hours took us to Arizona' place Flagstaff - it was our "base" to getting to Grand Canyon. Average temperature there was about +61C - nice! I liked this weather to my mild surprise (I do like hot weather in general, but never been in +61C environment before). I feel so at home with this weather, we decided that most probably I was a desert donkey in my past life.

Before getting to Grand Canyon we explore Flagstaff volcanos in retirement. The biggest one is Sunset Crater last active in 1085, that time it filled around 2000square km with lava and killed everything around. Since then the Sunset Crater is sleeping peacefully. 

In 1920s Hollywood'  moviemakers wanted to blast the crater to make it active again and film the best volcano movie of all times, luckily common sense won and by efforts of normal people it was forbidden. Since then the area around Crater become national park and it is actually prohibited to get up on the Crater itself, you can only go around.

https://www.nps.gov/sucr/index.htm 

Walking on lava fields is dangerous - lava is sharp, and hot weather made us feel as if volcano eruption stopped just a minute ago

Very few animals were seen - most of them hide from heat, and ones not hiding were breathing heavily - as we did

Next to Flagstaff is Bearisona  (https://bearizona.com) started as rescue place for bears it grow to accept other endangered animals too. They live on the forest by themselves, with little help of humans, because most of them are returned to their original habitats when they get healthier and stronger

 

It is possible to drive through the park - only on dedicated roads of course, and we were instructed not to open windows or doors and absolutely not stopping and going out of the car, because hot weather or not - animals are curios and wouldn't mind to hunt you 

and the biggest wonder lie ahead - The Grand Canyon

                                         *********************************

Step 15. Grand Canyon, AZ

If you think I am able to describe Grand Canyon - well, you are in a deep mistake, I cannot. No photos can show how freakingly huge and amazing it is either. 

As I wrote before Grand Canyon is not just one canyon, but many, going all the way up to Utah, through the whole country. 

People did not live there: even next to the river the air is extremely dry and you would not even feel how you will get dehydrated and die, not from thirst, but namely from dehydration of the whole body. In summer it is hot up to +45C and in winter cooling down to -10C

Spanish conquistadors did not manage to go through the canyon, although they tried several times, every expedition failed. First "white people" get through the canyon at the end of 19 century. 

Despite dangerous landscape and harsh weather, in 20 century people started to excavate canyon for copper and later for uranium. Now Arizona' part of the canyon is under the threat of uranium mines expansion. Indian reservations and national parks here fight back excavation expansions with varied success.

We were there for 5 days, unfortunately the weather was the same so all the photos are of the same sort, and I do not want to photoshop them into advertising posters, I prefer to remember what I saw 

local tourist

from all the stunning scenery, heat and dryness we become dizzy but still astonished

      *********************************

Step 16 and the last. Texas

I always thought that Texas from all the states - the americaniest to extreme: free, wild, rich in oil, big in territory and the attitude...

well - not anymore ( 

Nowhere else on the road we saw so many abandoned farms and even the whole towns deserted....

Here and there were few oil rigs, some working, some unused, and in general what we saw was ruin and desolation of north Texas along the road at least.

As we were told by some strangers met on the way, Texas was well off and engaged in everything until lately - and that was one of the reason why it all went down: most volunteers for US "international missions" were from Texas, so they get killed abroad; cheaper fracking kicked Texas oil industry in the nuts; + uncontrolled immigration from Mexico brought lots of manpower for low-low prices and voilà - misery we see today :(

Anywho, we were glad we decided to get back to Boston by plane, besides, 11617km drive in 2 months is too much even for me. 

So we returned the car and first time in month I got to drink beer again, didn't even mind it was made from corn and - yeah - with corn syrup, OMG...

But! The steaks - oh, the steaks are still great

As for Dallas - it is typical American city: skyscrapers, perpendicular streets, highways with tons of cars...

well, goodbye America ̶г̶д̶е̶ ̶я̶ ̶н̶е̶ ̶б̶у̶д̶у̶ ̶н̶и̶к̶о̶г̶д̶а̶

In 2 months here it seemed for me Americans live more in series "My name is Earl", less - in "Simpsons", and rest of the series - are just pure fiction. 

But I do like Chicago - maybe the only town I'd agree to live in here. 

Last look on Boston through the gun sight

and 9hours flight back home

that's all folks!