Pics from the Colorado trip back in November, 2009 (with Ujwala and Maa). We spent two days in Rocky Mountain National Park and a day over in Colorado Springs and around (Manitou Springs, Pikes Peak – highest peak in that area).

It’s heavenly – have to go there again in Spring 2010 )along with the parks in Wyoming, Montana).

Click on the photo to get to my SmugMug page – feel free to leave a comment

And I have to remember this blog for ever. I wrote it right at 1234567890 UTC (and on Friday the 13th!)

$ watch -n1 -d 'date +%s; expr 1234567890 - `date +%s`'
Every 1s: date +%s; expr 1234567890 - `date +%s`

1234567890
0

Last weekend I, Ujwala and two of my old time friends, Daboo and Nandini met up in Vegas.

We went around, saw the fabulous (should I say decadently smashing) hotels/resorts/casinos and did a little money-wasting (it would be hard to call slot machines gambling). The Cirque Du Soleil Mystere show was really superb – perhaps the best live performance (in theater/circus area) I have seen. The crazy horse show was… well… disappointing.

We had Grand Canyon in mind when we were planning for the trip but heavy snow and bad weather made us cancel it. And Hoover Dam too…

But we did go over to Death Valley National Park Area and Red Rock Canyon – was rocking!

My top five of the trip are -
1) Cirque Du Soleil Mystere show
2) Red Rock Canyon
3) Badwater Basin (and the drive to/from)
4) The fabulous Vegas Strip – special mention goes to Bellagio fountains, the Wynn resort, The Mirage Volcanic fountains
5) The view from top of Stratosphere tower

Taking this opportunity, let me showcase a few of my pictures. All my photos from the trip at arnab-o-scope on smugmug.

Daboo also took some great pictures. They are at Nandini’s picasa album)

Update on 12/24 – finally updated the photos. They have come out really well!
Here’s one of the sunset – http://tinyurl.com/ArnabPicsSunsetGC. And another one of the highway along the hauntingly beautiful landscape – http://tinyurl.com/ArnabHighwayGC.

View the full smugmug gallery: http://tinyurl.com/ArnabAlbumGC

This weekend we (Maa, Ujwala and me) are off to Grand Coulee Dam – the biggest concrete dam in North America – generates about 6500 Mega Watts – the highest for any dam in the world.

The drive from Seattle is beautiful – it passes through the Seattle hills/lakes, the Snoqualmie area (water falls, snow-capped mountains and passes), beautiful farm-lands and then on to the arid eastern Washinton area. The route follows the Columbia river and there are some really amazing viewpoints over the gorges along the way. There is a sound and laser show on the dam every evening from 8:30 PM (May-September) – the lasers use the dam as the screen! It is supposedly the largest such sound and light show in the world! The Columbia rivers history is depicted – so all that this weekend.

and the trip weather looks good: weatherbonk link