April 26, 2013

Boulder Beach Campground

 Lake Mead Recreation Area

 Boulder City, NV

With the windows open letting in a slight breeze and the absolute quiet, we had such a great night’s sleep.

When we first arrived at Lake Mead Recreation Area I went through all the literature I received at the Visitor Center and made a loose itinerary.  One of the things on our list was to tour Hoover Dam.  We planned on going to the dam in the afternoon.

We started off the day by returning to Camping World because Monte had forgotten to buy something he wanted when we were there yesterday. 

 

 

 

 

 

We got a pleasant surprise when we arrived and saw that lunch was on Camping World.  We had hot dogs, chips and a soft drink.  What a great bonus.

 

  

Our next stop was Sam’s Club where we totally pigged out because we just happened to stumble in during Taste of Sam’s including beef tips, ham sandwiches, cheese and crackers, etc. 

 

 

 

 

 

Before driving to Hoover Dam, we stopped off at Post Net to pick up an item Monte had ordered online.  (To be discussed at a later date.)

 

 

 

 

 

There is a checkpoint on the road leading to the dam.  When we stopped, Monte rolled down his window and thought he heard the guard give the okay to proceed so he started to pull away.  But we heard him yell to hold on and inquired about the contents of the big box in our back seat.  When we told him what it was he told us to go on.

 

We followed the signs, passing the first parking lot that charges a $7.00 fee

 

 

 

 

 

  

 and continued on to the free parking area. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Doing so required walking down a couple of long stairs and a loooong walk to the where the tours are given. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Following the signs for tours took us down an escalator.  Our timing was perfect because as soon as we paid our entrance fee we were ushered into a screening room where we watched a film about the building of the dam.

 

 

According to the brochure, "In the 1800s and early 1900s, the river (Colorado) often flooded low-lying farmland and communities in the spring and early summer as it surged with water from melting snow.  In late summer and early fall, it often dried to a trickle, too low to divert.  To protect the low-lying lands from flooding, and to assure a stable, year-round water supply, the river needed to be controlled. 

But before the river could be managed, its waters had to be equitably divided among the seven states it serves.  In 1922, a representative from each state and the federal government met for this purpose and created the Colorado River Compact.  Signed in November 1922, this agreement divided the Colorado River Basin into an upper and lower half, and gave half of the river's annual estimated flow to each basin."

 "Construction of Hoover Dam began in 1931, and the last concrete was poured in 1935."

After exiting the Theater our group entered the Power plant and a 70-second elevator ride took us down 530 feet through the rock wall of Black Canyon, through a long tunnel drilled in the 1930s for construction that led into the Penstock Viewing Platform overlooking the massive generators.

 

 

 

 

This location is atop one (of four) of the huge 30-foot diameter pipes that can transport nearly 90,000 gallons of water each second from Lake Mead to the dam's hydroelectric generators. 

Hoover Dam generates more than 4 billion kilowatt-hours a year-enough to serve 1.3 million people. 

 

 

Is anyone else nervous about water on the wall of the tunnel? 

Once back in the elevator we were let out at the Exhibit Gallery that houses numerous audio, visual and interactive exhibits, including a full-scale model of the huge buckets used to move concrete for Hoover Dam construction, a walk-through model of generator, and a detailed diorama of the dam. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two flights up is the Observation Deck providing panoramic views of Lake Mead, Hoover Dam and the Colorado River.

 

 

 

 

 

The Gift Shop and Café are located across the street from the Visitor Center. 

We climbed the stairs leading to the parking garage

to get a different perspective.

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Winged Figures of the Republic

 

Signs of the Zodiac 

Gemini 

Pisces 

 

 

 

The old Exhibit Building

Originally used as headquarters for soldiers protecting the dam during WWII, this building served as the dam's first visitor center. 

It contains educational exhibits and offers a narrative overview of the Colorado River Basin highlighted through a topographical model showing the location of dams and reservoirs along the river and its tributaries. 

Nevada and Arizona Spillways

On each side of the dam are huge spillways designed to direct high water from Lake Mead around the dam through tunnels in the canyon walls.  The spillways are so large that a WWII battleship can be floated in each one. 

 

The Mike O'Callaghan–Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge

Opened in 2010, it was the key component of the Hoover Dam Bypass project, which rerouted US 9w from its previous routing along the top of Hoover Dam and removed several hairpin turns and blind curves from the route.  It is jointly named for Mike O'Callaghan, Governor of Nevada from 1971-1979, and Pat Tillman, a football player who left his football career with the Arizona Cardinals to enlist in the Army and was later killed in Afghanistan.

   

As we walked back across the bridge toward the parking lot where our car was parked I complained about my sore feet (I wouldn’t recommend wearing sandals to tour the Dam) so Monte, being the sweetie pie he is, offered to get the car and pick me up.  Yeah!

I was glad that we only had a five mile ride to get back home because I was looking forward to soaking my feet.