A few statistics...

We spent 42 days in the USA, visited 11 states and covered 8,000 miles (which is the equivalent of the flight from the capital city of Alaska to Punta Arenas by the Strait of Magellan); six times we went over the continental divide, every day we covered (on average) 190 miles. It is a little less than we expected, which means that mileage computed by Google Maps is pretty accurate. With average gas mileage about 23.6 mpg we used 340 gallons of regular unleaded gas. Counting also the flights, we covered some 18,500 miles, which is about 3/4 of the Earth's perimeter.

We covered the biggest portion of the mileage in California (3,100 miles), which is the equivalent of the flight from Seattle to San Francisco and from San Francisco to New York, combined). We also spent most of the nights in California -- 18; followed by Colorado with 8 and Arizona with 5. We visited 18 national parks, 10 national monuments, 6 state parks and other monuments, and 7 big cities. We experienced 125 F in Death Valley and snowing in Rocky Mountain; we made it 12,000 feet above see level and 280 below; we survived violent storms in Badlands and dry deserts of California.

Our total cost reached 10,500 USD, from which the price for air tickets (4,700 USD) constitutes almost an half. Another big item was the auto rental (2,500 USD). We spent 970 USD for gas, 980 USD for food, 760 USD for accommodation, 200 USD for admissions, 170 USD for souvenirs, and 280 USD for other items (like camping gear). So the trip was less costly than I estimated in Fall, even though we payed twice as much for the SUV than I originally planned and also gas mileage was somehow worse. Total costs per day and person therefore averaged at 63.35 USD, air tickets included.

Should we choose our favorite park, it would probably be Great Sand Dunes because it is so unique (I wouldn't believe if I didn't see it) but also because it was far not crowded. Other highlights were Bryce Canyon, Badlands, Yosemite... there was no disappointment. The most pleasant surprise, however, was the American society, the way how people treated us (even strange people we met). I can hardly imagine such a trip in Europe.

Thank you!

We'd never be able to experience what we have experienced in 6 weeks if we didn't get so much help from our friends in the USA. You helped us with reservations, auto rental, planning (and much more); we could sleep in a real bed (after weeks of tenting), wash our sweaty shirts, you gave us excellent food (after so many burgers in fast-foods), guided us through big cities, we could try fishing in the ocean, shooting (plus much more), we had always someone to talk to and experienced and learned many new things. It's me (Tom) who writes this post but the others were loudly reminding me to thank you on their behalf. So here we all say: Ken & Betty, Edie & Norm, Moki & Garry, Don & Joyce, Vickie, Hanns, & Thorsten, Delene & Barry, Chuck & Denise, THANK YOU! I hope I didn't miss anyone and that we'll be able to welcome you in the CR or Slovakia one day.

Last Moments

After an excellent dinner, we spent the last night at Ken's and Betty's place. We got up around 9, had a similarly excellent breakfast, and went for the last (but very short) trip with our red Grand Vitara -- to buy some candies and shirts for our family back home. We say bye to Betty and Ken at 2 pm (we spent altogether 4 nights at their place and enjoyed being with them a lot), stop at a fast-food for the last time (Burger King, our favorite) and return the car at the Radisson Hotel. After that, we took a bus to the airport. The flight to London takes some 9 hours, but this time it didn't seem to be so long (despite the British Airways stewardess). We have 3 hours in Heathrow which we sleep through, and finally get to Prague at 18:00 after a much shorter flight. It's time to say bye for now. Michal stays in Prague, Zuzka's mom drives her to Bratislava, and me with Petr drive to Litomysl.

Thursday 13.8. (Great Sand Dunes)

We slept pretty well on the sand, without matraces, and in the morning we get up pretty fresh. We did not hear any bear or puma at night (and the food on the tree is still there, hanging). At 8 it is already warmer, we have a quick breakfast and hike the way back to the campsite we arrived yeasterday. It is more pleasant walk than yesterday since the sun is not scorching in the morning, the sand is colder and most importantly -- we walk almost all the way down the hill. We arrive at the campground, with 23 kilometrers at Great Sand Dunes in our feet, which is after Yosemite the most. We are pretty hungry, so that we leave the park and drive on the highway to Denver, with a stop at Carl's Jr. Fastfood meal, but still very good after 2 days of cookies and cold canned beans. In the evening, we arrive to Ken and Betty at Westminster, Denver and finish the trip in the same way we started.

Wednesday 12.8. (Great Sand Dunes)

This park is probably the most extraordinary and interesting place we have seen in the last 6 weaks in America. The highest sand dunes in Northern America (300 meters), which the sand "desert" consists of, 10 miles long and right next to it peaks of the mountains, the forest, meadows, marshes and a creek full of trouts -- completely amazing view (and each time of the day unique in different way), which we have to share only with a small amount of other tourists, the smallest from all the other parks which we visited till now. In the morning, we climb at one of the highest dunes. From the camp it looks so easy but the dunes are higher as it seems and the moving sand does not ease the climbing. Even if it is not so hot yet (about 30 degrees in the shadow), the sand was pretty hot and we agree that this is one of the most challenging hikes in the USA, so far. At last all of us climb to the top, we enjoy the nice view (and the way down as well). Before the noon we drive to Visitors Center for the backcountry permit and at about 1 o'clock we set off for the 10 kilometers long walk along the dunes. We walk constantly on the sand, often through smaller hills and dunes, so that we arrive to the end of the hike (primitive camp on the other side of the dunes, where is nobody else just we) only after 4 hours. During the hike we make a stop at the Medano Creek and freshen ourselves a little. We set the tent, hang all the food 3 meters from the surface on one of the tree branches (because of bears and mountauin lions who live there in large amounts) and enjoy the wilderness. After the sunset we look at the meteoric fall from Perseid constallation, the sky is almost perfect, without the light pollution.

Tuesday 11.8. (Mesa Verde)

We get up early to be at the reasonable time in the Visitors Center at Mesa Verde Park and buy the tickets for a tour to rock pueblo. We choose Cliff Palace, it is the largest pueblo in Northern America -- impressively biult in the window of a rocky wall, from the distance looks like a birds nest. We climb down with ranger and walk along the pueblo. The rest of the afternoon we spend by sightseeing of other archeological interesting sights of the park (several other rock pueblos and an older pithouses on the lands above the canyon). In Mesa Verde one can find a number of things and can spend much more time than a single afternoon which we have at disposal. We leave the park, driving east to Great Sand Dunes, to the more humid areas (looks more like in Alpes) and drive through the continental divide again, getting in the 11 ths. feet elevation (about 3 and half kilometers). In the evening, we get to to park and take one of the last empty sites in the campground (camp is pretty small).

Monday 10.8. (Navajo, Monument Valley)

In the morning we leave Grand Canyon and heand east along the cliff, the same way we took on Friday and make make a stop for the overlook. We have a long jurney before us, almost 600 kilometers, whole way in Indian reservation. Approximately half-way we stop at Navajo National Monument (pueblo built undre the cliff), take a short walk and continue toward the Monument Valley. Originally, we wanted to take the main road, but we decided to pay Indians for the entrance on a very bad dirt, winding road between the rocks (we have SUV so we finally managed to use this advantage). 20 dollars is definitely worth the fun, even if these 15 miles only cost about quarter of our gas. In the evening, we arrive to campground at Mesa Verde, swim for a while in the pool and rest till dark in the hot spa.

Sunday 9.8. (Grand Canyon)

We spend the whole day at Grand Canyon. Our campsite is directly at the Grand Canyon Village, a short walk from the shuttle bus stop (in the whole park there are several lines, no charge). We get to the Kaibab outlook, where a downward trail inside the canyon starts. We do not go too far to the river but still are pretty sweatty (even if the walk is more pleasant than in Zion or Yosemite) and have several nice views along the way; in the morning there is a fog inside the canyon but till noon it disappears and the view is much better. Beautiful day -- we are pretty lucky to have such a weather. The hike lasts only 3 hours and the rest of the day we spend driving the bus routes and making short hikes along the canyon. The lunch is at Grand Canyon Village, even if originally we wanted to cook something (which delayed the dinner). In the morning, it should be 4 C degrees cold.

Saturday 8.8. (Meteor Crater, Walnut Canyon, Sunset Crater, Wupatki)

Even if from the campground by Meteor Crater to the Grand Canyon it is only about 2 hours of driving by car, it takes us the whole day, because there are so many things to see. In the morning, we see the Meteor Crater itself (first crater proven to be caused by meteorite and still the best preserved in the world), we walk along the crater, very impressive overlook. From that point we drive few kilometers to Walnut Canyon, where in the canyon walls are the old Indian dwellings, pueblos. We drive a little on Route 66, make a stop for lunch at Flagstaff and continue to Sunset Crater National Monument, which is a nice volcano. We take a short hike to the top of one of the smaller volcanos and walk through the lava trail. From there, it is only few miles to Wupatki National Monument, where are several Indian pueblos. We walk in between them and return to the main route, head north and reach the Grand Canyon National Park. The sun is low above the horizon, so that it nicely shones on the eastern part of the canyon (due to several fires from the lightning, the western part is not visible). The view is amazing.

Friday 7.8. (Petrified Forest)

In the morning we left Chuck and his family and head toward Petrified Forest. As we approach futher to the norteast, the elevation is getting higher and the desert is exchanged by forest while the temperature is lowering slowly (so that when we got to the paark, it is already nice weather). We walk through the petrified once wooden logs in the rocks, which look very much as Badlands NP. A bit further in the park, there are the ruins of old indian pueblo with the original petroglyphs on the rocks around. Driving more to the south into the Painted Desert, we have beautiful overlooks on the colorfull rocks around. We drive from the park on highway heading west; make a stop at Burger King and in the evening we arrive to the camp at Meteor Crater. It is a nice campground and after a longer while we return again to the tent setting.

Thursday 6.8. (Phoenix)

We get up around 9 and go for a trip that Chuck recommended us -- about 200 kilometers through the Arizona desert. We see the gost town at the former golden mine, everywhere present cactuses and silent mountains as from some horror movie. We drive beside several water reservoars, but the water here surprisingly does not change the desert character of the surrounding country. We have a sandwich in Tortilla Flats and continue further on the windy dirt road, where hardly two cars can get one beside another; beautiful views at the desert. We head back to Chuck and his family in the afternoon and with pleasure we try the pleasant water of their outside pool (outside is around 43 degrees and the water is around 31, about twice as warm as the ocean, in which we swimmed the day before yesterday). In the evening we get from Denise excellent Mexican meal.

Wednesday 5.8. (Joshua Tree)

The heat from the morning sun wakes us up and so we start todays jurney pretty early. We camp at the southern part of the park and now we continue northeast, where the real Joshua tree starts to appear, as well as groupings of rock formations typical for this park (often resembling faces and are also named by what they resemble). It is extremely hot (later in the afternoon we have 47) and clear day, so that we limit hiking only to a few short walks on the marked trails (in between the cactuses, Joshua trees and the rocks). In the car we cool down, so that the park looks more fair to us -- only few people and the nature is nice. We try to get to the pond (or a lake) advised by the guide, but there is no water at all (only few mices and rattle snakes live below the rocks). We drive through the whole park and get to its northern border, which is practically empty and straight road (very much preffered to the highway); we stop for the lunch and drive down to the Arizona toward Phoenix (gas price falls by 30 cents per gallon, we are away from California). Along the way we see several wind devils which look like small tornados. In the evening, we are glad that we arrived to Chuck.

Tuesday 4.8. (San Diego)

In San Diego we sightsee the Balboa Park (the largerst city park in the USA), nice Spanish colonial architecture, but mainly neautiful gardens. In San Diego, there is very pleasingly, around 30 degrees and fresh wind blowing from the ocean but the sun is scorching while we look for a place at the beach. We drive to the ocean through the peninsula Coronado and see one of the oldest hotels in the USA (victorian Del Coronado) and stay at the beach near the hotel. The beach is beautiful, the ocean colder than yesterday, waves are great so the we let them drag us for several hours. We are only 10 miled from the Mexican borders. Before 4 o'clock, we try to get rid of the sand even from the ears and set off toward the Joshua Tree. We ge to inlands, into the desert, the temperature rises to 44. Arriving to the campground in the national park we are more or less alone here (camping in the desert in the the summer does not seem to be that attractive for the natives). But in the evening, it is getting cooler, more bearable to exist. Rarely we see a rabbit or a lizard but otherwise it is empty and forsaken.

Monday 3.8. (Los Angeles)

From Malibu we drive to L.A. along the coast, turning left to the Sunset Boulevard we head to Hollywood around Beverly Hills. We make a stop at the Universal Studios and City Walk, then drive to Hollywood Boulevard to walk of fame and leave the city behind (it is far less pleasant city then SF even if the weather is far better than expected, given circumstances -- in the city around 33). We try to get out of the city on Highway 1 but the traffic is bad and each few meters stands a semaphore, so that we return to the speedway. We continue south and on a half way to San Diego we make a stop at the beach where we spend the rest of the afternoon. The water is warm, the air colder and the ocean has bigger waves so it was fun to swim along the coast (in practice, swimming is impossible only if one gets further behind the waves into the calmer water). In the evening we arrive to the Valley Center to Delene and Barry, we get an excellent dinner and beeing exhausted we go to bed.

Sunday 2.8. (Big Sur)

We leave SF and continue further south on Highway 1. Contrary to the travel from Eureka we have a beautiful day without the fog, temperature under 20 degrees, so that it is quite pleasant at the sun. We make a few stops and admire the coastline; Highway 1 goes often completely at the edges of the cliffs and winds above the ocean. We park at one of the state parks near the road and go on a half hour walk, sightsee the coast more closely, big crabs and smal fish imprisoned by the tide in the small lakes between the rocks. Driving a little further we get into the area known as Big Sur. We stop at the waterfall directly at the beach; beautiful view. By Santa Barbara we get into the first real heavy traffic, but we success to arrive to the campground darkling, barely seeing where to set a tent. Campground is very loud and full of people but still in the nice surrounding (considering there is a megalopolis only few kilometers away).

Saturday 1.8. (San Francisco)

Today we drive to the city alone. It takes a while to find the parking place (in San Francisco it is quite a problem, such as driving the car with manual is, because many streets go up the hill), then we start the trip on the boat to Alcatraz -- excellent experience, starting with the view from the ferry, continuing by the audiotour of the prison with a nice nature surrounding the island and the island itself. We stay 3 hours at the Rock. Back in San Francisco, we see the Fisherman's Wharf but it is getting really fogy, it is cold and we are pretty hungry. In the evening, Vickie made us spagetti (it is not in human capabilities to return back to fastfoods again).

Friday 31.7. (San Francisco)

The first day in San Francisco we spent by sightseeing of the city with Thorsten (son of Hanns and Vickie), which was awesome. We drove along the coast, saw Golden Gate in the distance, went through few parks, Twin Peaks, had a beer in the highest storey of the Bank of America (probably the tallest building in the city, beautiful view at the dock and Alcatraz), we took a cable car drive and saw Chinatown, where we had a chinese meal (pretty good). In the evening, we returned to Los Gatos, Hanns and Vickie made a barbeque to the dinner, everything tasted so good! We tried the local (and German beer) and went to sleep.

Thursday 30.7. (Point Reyes)

Around 8 we said goodbye to Don and Joyce and set off further along the coast -- we continue south on the I-101 and get to California highway 1, which is curved along the coast down to LA. It is very slow road, but more pleasant than the other large roads few kilometers inlands; highway 1 offers beautiful views of Pacific. When we went from Eureka, it was of course completely in the fog, but only few miles south it cleared out -- and approaching San Francisco, there it was again. We made a stop at Point Reyes reservation and walked to see the famous lighthouse, but the whole country was sunk in the fog and it was really cold. We continued toward the city, went through Golden Gate Bridge and arrived to Los Gatos, where Vickie and Hanns live.

Wednesday 29.7. (Eureka)

We get up early, before 6, Don takes his boat and us fishing. We leave the dock few kilometers from Eureka and besides Don, a friend of his comes with us to help with finding the best place to fish while Don takes care of our trials to catch a fish. For a person who never saw the ocean (as I am) it is a unique experience (even if the waves made their job); besides few nice fish which we, to our surprise, caught, we saw many seals and sea lions and also one little whale. We spent about 4 hours on the ocean. Then, we returned to Eureka to Don's and rest a little, while Don did all the dirty work cleaning the fish (tonigh, we eat them). In the evening, we tried also some abalones.

Tuesday 28.7. (Eureka)

In the morning, we went with Don and Joyce to the ocean; it is still foggy, even if in comparison to yesterday the visibility is better. We walk along the rocky shore when it is short tide and Don shows us the ocean life (starfish, crabs..). We see the historical centre of Eureka and the dock, from which we should go tomorrow fishing, if the weather is good. In the afternoon, Don let us shoot from a few of his gun collection (hunting gun, gun, shotgun and pistol) on the property of his friend, which we enjoyed very much :). Afterwards, we went to the brewery to taste local beers (I really liked the beer; here, they are not afraid to experiment a little with the beer so there was a plenty of different kinds to pick from) and we have a dinner here.

Monday 27.7. (Redwood)

Leaving the Crater Lake and Oregon behind us we arrived again to California. Driving down to lower elevations, the ocean is right before us and it starts becoming warmer (in the morning it was about 8 C, at noon it is 30 already). As we approach the ocean, 15 miles from the shore, it gets cooler by 15 degrees and we see a fog coming from the west, which surrounds the shore whole summer. We drive on the dirt road in the redwood grove, where except of the tallest trees in the world there is also other diverse flora creating an impresson of a jurrasic forest. We arrive to the ocean but everything is misty. Great coldness. We drive through the rest of the Redwood National Park, make another short hike between the redwoods and then drive to Eureka to Don and Joyce. Joyce make a perfect dinner (venison), we ate well and went to sleep.