HIGHLIGHTS OF 2016

The last half of this year has been full of adventures. One of the places of interest was Las Vegas.
As you can tell below that I spent some time on the Eiffel Tower observation platform. These are but a sampling of the 200 plus photos taken at various times of the late afternoon and evening.

 

 



Views of the Fountains of Bellagio

 

 





A new attraction that opened in the later part of 2015 is a tour of Wayne Newton's private 52-acre ranch. The tour lasted about three and a half hours. I could take all the pictures that I wanted so I came away with over 400. I predict that tour will become the most popular tour in Las Vegas.

Looking from north to south

 

 

His private jet that flew him and his show all over the world doing USO shows

We visited his 21 car garage where he keeps 13 cars, 7 of which are Rolls Royce.

Wayne has a love affair with Arabian horses. He had 67 Arabians in his two barns at the time of my tour. Over the years, he has personally fould over 1,000. He still does that today. He has a house on the grounds where he stays just for that





You can get up close and personal

 

 

When it is hot out, the horses get to go swimming

Located near the barns is a show arena where tour guests can observe horses responding to their trainers. No whips ever are used, just the location of the plastic bag that is attached to the end of the stick. 

 

 

 

This is his "back yard"

Next, we go inside Wayne's rather nice home

Master Bedroom

Dinning Room

While staying in the Yuma, AZ area, I visited the Castle Dome Mining District. This is about 9 miles off the paved road, but well worth a visit.

Over the 4th of July weekend, I met up with the Golden Spike Chapter of Family Motor Coach Ass. in La Grande, OR. Our goal was to ride two railroads that were in that area. We stayed in the RV Park located next to the Hot Lake Resort. They have a hot springs that puts our over 2.2 million gallons of 120 degree water every day.

The renowned sculpture David Manual and his wife Lee, own the resort and his studio and foundry are located there. He did the by-centennial statue for the Oregon Trail Ass. This and the one in Portland, OR are the only ones of this size.



An Osprey nest is at the RV Park



 Our group traveled to the town of Joseph and some of us rode these Rail Riders 6 miles to the next town It was hard peddling up hill all the way back

 

In September, our Golden Spike group met in Santa Cruz to ride more trains. First off was Roaring Camp Railroad. This is a narrow gauge RR (3 feet). There is one portion of the track that is over 8%.

Next day we road the Beach Train (standard gauge) from this location to the Boardwalk on Santa Cruz beach.

 In 1915 the city of San Francisco held a year-long celebration of the opening of the Panama Canal.

A 1/3 scale railroad was built on a mile of 19-inch gauge track to transport fair goers around on the grounds.

After the celebration, the track and rolling stock were sold to the founder of Orchard Hardware. The  

railroad was set up on his ranch in Davenport, CA. The large ranch and railroad were eventually given to the UC San Louis Obispo. Volunteers keep the railroad going and it is only open to the public twice a year. Three steam engines were built along with many passenger cars.  We were fortunate to be invited to ride this historic railroad.





Two of the steam engines were getting new boilers and the third engine needed work. So they fired up the Southern Pacific diesel electric and pulled our train over the one mile track and back. Not only

ONCE but TWICE!