SEMA 2015
Las Vegas, Nevada
Las Vegas Convention Center
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Welderup was the first shop that we stopped at and it was so cool!
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Hoover Dam was so amazing to see in person! The Dam is 726 ft tall. More than 8.5 million pounds of dynamite was used to blast the foundation for the dam and 8 miles of tunnels through the canyon walls. At its base it is as thick (660ft) as two football fields end-to-end. There is enought concrete in the Dam to build a 2 lane road from Seattle Washington to Miami Florida. The peak electric periods runs enough water through the generators to fill 15 averaged sized swimming pools (20,000 gallons each) in 1 second. Lake Mead is the largest reservoir in the USA & contains enought water to flood the entire state of New York with 1 ft. of water (26 million acre ft.). Every state in the USA furnished supplies and materials for the construction of the Dam.
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This year for the first time we got to go to the Velocity Live Show. We saw many guests on the show. Barrett Jackson CEO Craig Jackson, Gas Monkey Richard Rawlings & Aaron Kaufman, & Chip Foose are just a few that were on that night.
For the second year in a row we also got to attend the HRIA Industry Awards Reception. What a nice time was had by all. Troy Gudgel was given the Goodguys Trendsetter Award. Steve Tracey was awarded the Industry Recognition Awared. Others who received awards that are not pictured are Danny's Hot Rod Shop - Business of the Year, Bill Mullins - Hall of Fame, George Packard - Chairman Award. Thank you to Rick Love for the invitation!
As the show came to an end on Friday SEMA has the famous cruise leaving the show for anyone who would like to cruise out of the show. Just a short distance away in what they call the Gold Lot the SEMA Ignited event begins and the Builder of the Builders competition continues with the semi finalists. This year's winner was Bobby Allaway with his 1933 Ford Roadster built for Larry Olson of Sioux Falls, South Dakota.
Some spectators took advantage of the ride along on the road course at the SEMA Ignited event.
In all the years we have went to SEMA it seems we never took the time to see body shops or some of the sights outside Las Vegas. Thanks to Bill & Denny Schultz they convinced us to take the time and to visit some things outside the Las Vegas Convention Center. Below is what we did this year and completely enjoyed ourselves.
The next shop we stopped at was Counts Kustoms, Danny"Count" Koker shop. If you ever get to Vegas be sure to visit his shop. There is the free tour or the VIP All-Location Tour experience. We only had time for the Free Tour. We still enjoyed the experience!
The third place we visited was the Hoover Dam. Bill and Denny had been there more then once and had lots of facts to tell us about the Dam. We always saw it from up in the skys. So it was nice to finally see it on the ground and up close.
If you stop the Hoover Dam on the Nevada side you will see the Winger Figures of the Republic. They are 30-foot tall statues. They have weathered to a patina green with the toes a burnished soft gold by the numerous tourist hands touchig them. This is said to bring the person touching the feet good luck.
(51) The white mineral stain you see in the image is showing the obvious that Lake Mead's water level is shrinking. All of this is caused by the many years of drought out here in the western states. The upside is this problem reveals the ghost town, St. Thomas, that was submerged by the government after purchasing the land to build Hoover Dam. Another popular site is for divers, which is the wreckage of the B-29 that crashed in 1948 that went down in 240 feet of water. The depth is now about 102 feet. This increases the tourism.
(52) On the side of the dam is the Black Canyon Water Trail, which is 12 miles of kayaking through that beautiful area of the Colorado River. You have fresh water with campsites and hot springs to stop off for a nice week or weekend adventure. Visitors can also go for the tours ranging from float trips near the dam to day trips to full exploration tours.
We decided to take a tour of the interior of Hoover Dam. Our guide showed us a diagram of the Dam.
(61)Because of the drought many marinas have either closed or moved the docks further out into Lake Mead. You can see the receding of Lake Mead by the mineral stain on the one ridge above the water. Most of it is white with just the cap brown.
We also went down to the old downtown Las Vegas at Freemont. We'll hopefully have images next year. Well will leave you this last image which is the night life of the City of Las Vegas. This was a great time this year at the SEMA Convention and seeing some of the sites thank you to Bill & Denny Schultz!
