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All set for the eclipse with my eclipse glasses. I planned everything way too late, so I just headed into the full eclipse area with my rental car. I ended up in the Warm Springs Indian Reservation, where I saw the eclipse.

And after a morning worrying about possible clouds it got darker and darker and it happened!

During the eclips it was pretty dark...

...but afterwards it got brighter quickly.

After the eclips I went eastward towards Idaho, and came upon a sizeable waterfall

On the border between Nevada and Utah there's the Bonneville Salt Flats

Salt Lake City

With a very nice union station building

Salt Lake City's light rail

But that pretty station is empty; no more trains

The Utah geology is a bit different from what we're used to in Europe

Arches National Park

The Delicate Arch draws a lot of visitors. One after the other people stand below it and have their friends take a photo

I came at the end of the afternoon so I could photograph the Delicate Arch illuminated by the last rays of the setting sun (no people in the frame for a few seconds!)

With the orange/red light of the setting sun gone a few minutes later, the Delicate Arch looks rather pale

Later that evening it was nice and dark in the park and I was able to take some photos of very many stars and the Milky Way

Bryce Canyon National Park

Bisons just before the Grand Canyon

The big Arizona meteor crater

Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, where I saw Saturn's rings through this telescope

Along Route 66 some Americana kitsch is to be expected, and I was not disappointed

My second to last day I visited the Hoover Dam. Which is full of access tunnels; some nicely finished, others not so much

This is the view from within the dam itself, from the end of such a tunnel

After the Hoover Dam my last night in Las Vegas

All hotels in Las Vegas are also casino's (and pretty cheap!). I have no idea how you're supposed to play the slot machines.

From Las Vegas with a small but comfortable plane to LAX and from there back home. Probably my last flight with a 747. And that's fine with me, because this flight was pretty uncomfortable with an in flight entertainment system from the stone age (2008, I believe).