March 23rd:  The weather was perfect in Joshua Tree..hot during the day and 
cool enough at night that we had to turn on the heat.  A few interesting 
facts about Joshua Tree:  First, it is called the Oasis of Murals.  Almost 
every corner has a beautiful mural depicting a historical event on a 
building wall.  Next, they have had two powerful earthquakes; a 7.3 in 1992 
and a 7.1 in 1997.  Also, General Patton used this area for training the 
Marines and they never left.  We know this because you can hear them 
training, very loud explosions!!

We arrived at Needles and did some housekeeping.

On March 24th:  We took another detour with our car and went to Quartzite, 
Arizona.  This is the area where in January over 100,000 RV's arrive to see 
the largest RV show in the US.  On the way back, we found the London Bridge 
in Lake Havasu City and drove on a small piece of Historic Route 66.

March 25th:   We traveled to Las Vegas and visited "The Strip".  Instead of 
gambling, we purchased tickets to a couple of shows.  Actually, we did 
gamble two dollars each.  I lost mine in about two minutes, but Rudy took 
much longer.  We could have won $10,000,000!!

March 26th :  Rudy and I took a ride to see Death Valley. I had no idea how 
beautiful this area is.  I was blown away!!!  The scenery seemed to change 
around every corner.  The colors continuously changed from one color to 
another.  Some of the colors were different shades of blacks, grays, tans, 
golds, greens, and reds!!!  As we descended from 3000 feet above ground to 
282 feet below sea level, the temperature climbed 75 degrees to 98 degrees 
all within 20 minutes.  While we were at Badwater, (a miner's mule would not 
drink the water because of the salt and sulfur content) we were surprised by 
the 11,000 foot high mountains around it with snow on the tops.

That night we went to The Aladdin and saw "Stomp at Loud."  It was very 
unique.  The cast used every form of non instrument to create music and 
exciting rhythms.  Some of the objects they used were brooms, boxes, tubes, 
water, garbage cans and lids, keys, lighters, plastic bags and their hands 
against their bodies. After the show, we went to Paris to have a couple of 
Crepe Suzettes..boy were they delicious. As we walked back to our car (all 
parking is FREE), we watched the Music Fountain at the Bellagio.

March 27th :   Rudy went to do some errands and I walked up and down the 
Vegas Strip and took pictures.  I got half price tickets for dinner (they 
also sell half price tickets for shows.too late for us!!)  We went to Paris 
again and had two fantastic dinners (half price).  Then we walked to 
Caesar's Palace to see Elton John's Red Piano Concert.  This was his first 
night at the Coliseum since celebrating his 60th birthday in New York and he 
was still celebrating his 60th birthday.

March 28th  :  Today we went to see the Hoover Dam.  What an enormous 
project this was!!!  It is still going on because they are now building a 
new road to go around the small winding road that actually crosses the dam.