So here's another Endorphin Adventures, or Squirrel and Studley tale. These two guys met in 1989 and over those 27 years, Studley has trekked halfway around the world, from Australia, to visit Squirrel seven times now...but who's counting. Each time we simply just catch up, where we left off, a few years back; it's as easy as that. Even if it's in a different country.
This time I flew to Calgary, where Squirrel lives now and we had a road trip down to Vegas. Twenty hours driving, gave us a chance to catch up and bring us up to speed with each others lives. As soon as we hit Vegas, we leapt out of the van and launched into a little hike to loosen up the legs, we didn't waste any time. Most of our hiking was in Red Rock Canyon, just out of Vegas. Other hikes were down near Lake Mead and hot springs near the Colorado river.
Squirrel planned the whole thing, I simply just followed. He is a master of the plan and keeps a mean list, in his pocket, at all times. I am very lucky to have a friend like him. I am also fit enough to keep up with him, which helps immensely. Every day was planned to perfection and he knows Vegas like the back of a dealer's hand.
I feel there is no need to comment on each photo, on this blog entry; a picture really does paint a thousand words. We are simply hiking/scrambling to the top of a mountain each time. We park the van, walk through beautiful desert, through beautiful canyons, up a wash, over a rock fall, and climb over bigger rocks, until we get to the top. It's as simple as that. But you need to look how much fun we are having, hiking, scrambling and wriggling through little cracks in rocks or shimmying up bigger cracks or pulling ourselves up ropes on trickier bits.
Check out the beautiful desert scenery; the rich colours of the rocks and the hardy vegetation. You can tell that we are happy just being a part of it, there was something magical about the colour of the rock; it calmed you, yet inspired you at the same time. Our hikes took longer than the hiking notes in a book suggested. It was nothing to do with us being in our fifties, we just stopped and admired the scenery and took a gazillion photos, which added an extra hour each way. I'm happy to race the authors of these hiking books up the mountains on another occasion, if a fast time is important.
So these photos show ten days of good clean, healthy fun, shared by two great mates, in a great location. We hope that other people can experience something as good as we did. We both sincerely apologise to the gambling state of Nevada for not spending/losing and average of $534 per person in a casino. We did eat in some lovely restaurants in the casinos, so hopefully that will count.
So until next time my friends- where Squirrel said he is coming over to Australia in a few years time. We can't wait.
Cheers
Studley and Squirrel
