This summer, my wife and I took a road trip through the southwest USA. Our journey took us through New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, Nevada and Arizona. I've lived in the US for nearly four years now, but this is the first opportunity I've had to travel extensively and really see some of the country. Despite the fairly grueling 4000-mile round trip, I'm glad we drove. It's pretty amazing how quickly and dramatically the landscape changes between states (or sometimes even just within one state), and I doubt we would have been able to appreciate this as much had we flown.

Below are a few shots from the trip. The scenery was spectacular almost everywhere we went, but most of my favorite shots came from Moab in Utah. While I don't think I'll be posing a threat to the National Geographic photographers just yet, I'm pleased with the images I came away with. I would've loved to have spent more time there. And also Las Vegas, but that's more for my crippling poker addiction. I kid, I kid, although I did take part in my first ever live poker tournament while I was there. I made it to the final table and got third place. I didn't win that much (which didn't stop me feeling like James Bond, incidentally) but it did cover the cost of two Cirque Du Soleil tickets. We saw the original Mystère show, and I'll be honest, I wanted to hate it. I had always thought it would just be a bunch of pretentious dancing, but I absolutely loved it. Seriously, go see it. Turns out there's not much dancing at all. Instead, it's a bunch of very talented acrobats doing very dangerous things very high up. I think I actually gasped at one point. I never gasp.