Las Vegas, Nevada 365 km

Had a great in-room deli dinner: ribs and all the fixins at the Best Western in Tonopah last night then went for a bit of a walk. The more time we spent in Tonopah, the more it reminded us of Coober Pedy in Australia. We especially enjoyed a bit of an impromptu tour through the Mizpah Hotel, a turn of the century operating landmark in Tonopah, furnished with appropriate period furniture. It was like stepping back in time. (built in 1907 to accommodate the influx of silver miners).
Today was another day of blue sky riding, albeit a bit warmer than the past few. We took a bit of a break midday to check out the largest ghost town in Nevada – Rhyolite. The only building left sort of standing was the Casino, all the rest are in varying degrees of dilapidation (see photos). We did not find any rattlers., just saw one large lizard. We also stopped in the museum in Beatty for a short sojourn.  Nevada certainly has a rich mining history.

We arrived at the outskirts of Las Vegas around 2:00 in 36-39C temps (yes, we did have our cooling vests on which work very well as long as you are moving). Heavy freeway traffic was followed by gridlock on Las Vegas Blvd as soon as we exited interstate 15. Caesar’s place was similarly gridlocked at check –in. We finally got in our room with our luggage around 4:00. Now for a cool drink and change into summer clothes before we go exploring. We were supposed to be going to a ball game tonight but neither of us want to venture out into that traffic again so will just do some walking and site seeing.