11:42am PDT this morning, everybody was working in the office as normal this morning. Suddenly everything started to shake. 1 second later I realized it's an earthquake. I was freaked out, looking around for any help or any direction, but I got nothing. Xi was still asking, "should we run away?" Then I saw Zehua was running out. I followed immediately without thinking. At the stairs, the building calmed down and the earthquake stopped. Phew~~~ We walked back and found everybody's in the hallway, listening to a professor's talking about some science of earthquakes, "... You can estimate the distance to the epicenter by the interval of the P wave and the S wave. It's the same as estimating the distance to the lightning point by the interval of the lightning and the thunder. For this earthquake, the interval was only a few seconds so the epicenter should be quite near... " I could feel the interval of the two waves but I had no idea how fast those guys propagate. A department secretary was walking around asking if everybody's OK.

I got back to my office. The internet was totally normal. The news saying that the quake magnitude was 5.8 was already published online. How fast! That's about only 3 minutes after the quake. Google map also showed that the epicenter was about 20 miles from Irvine. Professor Chen came in and said our office building can sustain a quake of magnitude 7. Telephone services were jammed for quite a while since too many people were calling families and friends.

After lunch, I went back home to confirm everything's fine. News changed the magnitude of this quake to 5.4.

[Map contained, read the original topic to see it]

See also:

• Earthquake Rattles Southern California
• L.A. suburb at quake epicenter gets hard shake
• This is Hollywood, but that shaking wasn't a special effect
• QUAKE'S TRAVEL IMPACTS: Delays but no damage to airports and rails
• `Moderate' Los Angeles Quake Highlights Need for Preparation

(Chinese version of this topic, 中文版)

I want to thank Shiwei, Yuyu, and Zheng Z. for organizing this trip and driving. I had a lot of fun. Each time I went to Las Vegas, I earned new experience, although this time my main purpose was to visit Grand Canyon.

• D1 Drive to Vegas and the Palomino Club
• D2
  • Grand Canyon
    • Skywalk
    • Lunch by the canyon
    • Condors
    • Ants
    • Helicopters and airplanes

  • Las Vegas
    • PH Spice Market Buffet
    • The Strip
    • The fake Venice in the Venetian Hotel
    • Stratosphere Tower - standing on the 109th floor of Vegas

• D3 Brunch, gambling and driving back

See all the photos in Photo Gallery...

See also:

• Las Vegas (Dec. 18-21, 2006)
• Las Vegas and 3 national parks (Jan. 19-21, 2008)

(Chinese version of this topic, 中文版)

Early in the morning (5am), we started our Grand Canyon West Rim bus tour ($94 + tax, skywalk admission not included). Although we heard that the South Rim had better views, we wanted to experience the famous glass skywalk in the West Rim. The canyon was spectacular, but the skywalk turned out to be nothing but junk.

Going through the Hoover Dam, crossing the border between Nevada and Arizona

• Skywalk
• Lunch by the canyon
• Condors
• Ants
• Helicopters and airplanes

At 5pm, the bus took us back to Las Vegas.

See also:

• Hoover Dam (Jan. 20, 2008)
• Previous topic of this trip: [D1] Drive to Vegas and the Palomino Club
• Next topic of this trip: [D2][Grand Canyon] Skywalk
• Other topics of this trip

(Chinese version of this topic, 中文版)

Checked out the hotel rooms, we had a brunch buffet ($17.23 including tax) just at the hotel we stayed - the Stratosphere Hotel. Again I had a lot of king crab legs. They were just so tasty.

Then we gambled a little bit. I put in a dollar to play a little poker with the computer. When I almost lost it, the other guys urged me to leave, so I pushed the "maximum bid" button, expecting to lose more quickly. However, I won twice in a row. Then I pushed "cash out". As a result, instead of losing the dollar, I won an extra quarter. Yay!

On the way driving back, we encountered a very serious traffic jam:

...

Read the whole topic

(Chinese version of this topic, 中文版)

After visiting the fake Venice, we went to a dancing club, but we failed to get in and play together. Then I wanted to go on top of the Stratosphere Tower with 2 other guys, who had the tickets and got stuck in the traffic jam on the Strip.

The tower was going to close at 2am.
1:35am, they still couldn't get back, so I decided to buy another ticket ($13.95) and go by myself.
1:40am: I rushed to the ticketing place. The seller told me tripod was not allowed on the top, but I didn't have time to put it back, so I went directly towards the tower entrance, pretending I didn't know tripods weren't allowed.
1:43am: At the tower entrance, I had to pass the security check. I took the keys, cell phone out, and walked through the security door. It beeped, but the man said, "you're fine." I thereupon ran to the elevator.
1:45am: The elevator was so fast. I think I stayed in it for less than a minute. Then as the door opened, I walked out of the elevator and was already on the 108th floor. Since there's not too much time, I immediately climbed up the stairs to the 109th floor. At the same time the broadcast was shouting, "we'll be closing in 15 minutes."

Soon after I started taking photos, a security man stopped me using the tripod. Well, then I needed some handhold tricks, and I still got some good shots.

On the left of the picture is the 2nd highest thrill ride in the world. It dangles you over the edge of the tower and then spins in a circular pattern at approximately forty miles per hour.
Refer to the 5th photo in this post to see the 3rd highest thrill ride in the world.

...

Read the whole topic