In The Case Of Man V. Nature

2007-2008 290, originally uploaded by emily gingersnap.

In my mind, no trip to Las Vegas is worth its salt if you don't sneak away and visit Hoover Dam. I've been there at least five times, at this point, which is kind of weird, because I'm super familiar with the layout and such. Don't usually get so intimately involved with national landmarks.

But this thing is amazing. It is a kind of almost-inconceivable feat of engineering and human spirit and brute force that defined an era and determined the future of the entire Southwest. Built in a time where there was still something to conquer in the United States, when people could and did suffer and die to conquer it.

It's comprised of enough concrete to build a four-foot wide sidewalk around the entire equator. Over 400 people died while making this bridge, along with at least one dog.

Lake Mead sits in the desert like an impossible mirage, this gorgeous mediterranean blue green between brown, rocky mountains. It shouldn't even be there, but for pure human will.

We marveled at it for a minute, quiet, awed.

Christine, a landscape architect, pragmatic idealist, and delightful person overall, breaks out a most lilting declaration:

"We win."

(Still can't find my effing photo cable. So Here's Em's photos.)