Grand Canyon!

Today we headed out to the Grand Canyon. It was my turn to navigate and I was looking forward to some RT work as I havent done much since I`ve been out here! We set off relatively early as it gets bumpy in the late afternoon, and pre-flighted the plane. After a nice take-off, we were vactored over Nellis Air Force base and out over Lake Mead, just north of the Hoover Dam. The flgiht out was a little turbulent and was just over masses upon masses of desert and wilderness. You can`t acutally fly within the canyon boundaries but you can get pretty close.It was windy out there and after a late change of runway, Clay tried an approach but the gusts were all over the place so we went around and tried the other way. This was better and we got down smoothly. Parked up and got a taxi to the Canyon for some sightseeing and food!
After a few hours rest it was back in the plane. We had expected a longer flight back (the one out was over 2hours), but in reality it was a little quicker and after the kind people in Las Vegas Centre routed us direct to Stratosphere we made a nice landing back into North Las Vegas Airport!

So another long day in the saddle, and we`ve the rest of the Strip to see tonight. Tomorrow we`ll head off for Thermal (near Palm Springs), an airport that we both visited on our solo X-countries last year!