October 9 - 13, 2007

The St. George, UT newspaper had a notice about a Bluegrass festival next weekend in Logandale, NV so on the 9th we drove there and enjoyed the music at the Clark County, NV fairgrounds on the 12th and 13th.  We spent about 5 hours each day listening to different group play excellent music, each group sounding somewhat unique.  It was fun and the weather was sunny so we had to move often to be in the shade of the trees.  They had some booths set up with foods and crafts, also.

October 14-15, 2007

We camped at an RV park in Overton which is right next to Logandale with a combined population of about of 2500 people in  the Moapa Valley.  We went to eat at Sugar's restaurant which is one of four in the valley.  Karen went to the Baptist church here on Sunday as this is a Mormon valley with no Methodist churches in sight.  Yesterday we took a ride to Overton Beach at Lake Meade National Recreation Area.  The lake is down to the level where they've made the 30 or so residents that lived there move out of the area last year.  We keep wondering where all the people of AZ, NV, CA, southern Utah and environs will live when there is no more water in the Hoover and other dams in the area as so much of the water is being used for irrigation, and the area has had little rain and little snow in the mountains, and continuous building going on in the past several years--during a drought!

This area is dotted with ruins of Anasazi cities, some of them were submerged when Lake Mead was created by the dams.  There's an interesting museum in Overton dedicated to the ancient Lost Cities of the area.  The museum is on the left.  A pueblo dwelling on the right was reconstructed on the ancient site where the original foundations were found by CCC workers in the 1930's.

October 16, 2007

Today we toured the Valley of Fire State Park about 10 miles south of Overton.  The cliffs and mesas around the park are bright reds, yellows and whites.  There are lots of hiking trails through the canyons.  According to the visitor's center information the petroglyphs are from around 400 AD.

October 17, 2007

The "back road" from Overton to Boulder City, NV was a pleasant drive today.  Very little traffic over the 70 miles of Nevada Hwy. 169 / 67.  No 18 wheelers and no Las Vegas traffic jams.