All That Sparkles

Reno, NV

 

The long slog through the Utah and Nevada deserts had left us tense and cranky. Fear of a breakdown in the middle of all that desolation, with no cell signal most of the time, gnawed at the backs of our subconscious. The heat was miserable adding to the crankiness level and anxiety.

 As the sun went down we hurtled onward toward Reno. We then discussed sleeping arrangements for the night. I said, “hell with it, let’s get a hotel.” R. agreed. We’d been camping out in the van, showering at truck stops every-other-day for about ten days. We got into Reno about 10pm. We started looking for rooms, I started making calls to the different hotels in town looking for a deal. At the Sands, I hit the jackpot--$55- a night, two people, no reservation required, so I got directions.

 

 

This was a really big hotel. I wouldn’t call it luxurious, but it was very nice. We stayed on the other side of the hotel, in a different wing on the west side. We parked the van in the fenced, security-intense lot near the casino, grabbed our luggage, my train case—leopard pattern, which, over the years we had nicknamed “the leopard case,”—all my good drugs go in there; we grabbed our laptops and headed up to the eighth floor. The room was very nice—one king-size bed, TV, and a huge bathroom. I called dibs on the potty. My husband collapsed on the bed, and I, while sitting on the toilet, began to peel my sticky, sweaty, dirty clothes from my tired body. I threw the stinking mess into a pile on the floor.

 

I came out of the bathroom and. R. had essentially done the same thing—as soon as we had hit that room, we had both stripped out of our yucky clothes. We pointed at each other and laughed.

 

I then took a very long shower, drew back the covers of the bed, and lay on the cool, crisp sheets. Aaaaah. I steel felt like I was jiggling a little from having been in the car for so long. I had a similar sensation after coming back from a week-long sailing trip to the Channel Islands off Santa Barbara, CA with our church the summer before my sophomore year of high school. I felt like I was still on the boat about a day-and-a-half after returning home.

 

My husband came out of the shower and had the same “aah” reaction to the clean sheets and the non-moving bed.

 

It was midnight, California time, and we both passed out and slept the sleep of the truly tired.

 

The next morning, we both took a shower, again, just because we could, not because we needed it.

 

We then drove around Reno for a while just looking around touristy-like, and also for a place to have some brunch. We had both slept until 11pm, and after showering and packing we didn’t leave our room until noon, checkout time. In addition to being tired, after checking in so late, we wanted to enjoy every minute of that room possible.

It threatened rain all day with those dark, menacing clouds, but it never did rain. Not really.

 

We drove by the University of NV, Reno, around the suburbs, and found some cheap gas. It wasn’t the $1.09 we’d paid in Iowa just over a week earlier, but it was cheaper than downtown Reno.

 

 

One of the things Las Vegas, Laughlin, and Reno have become famous for over the years are their cheap buffets, and that’s where we were headed. Unfortunately, no one had their prices listed on their marquees, so we just picked one. We picked the Silver Dollar. Oddly enough, it turns out the gleaming silver dome we had driven by a couple of times is the Silver Dollar casino. Well, part of it.

 

That had a huge parking garage, a walkway over the street directly into the casino. We held hands and walked through an assemblage of lights, sounds, and activity slack-jawed like a couple of country rubes who had just fallen off of a turnip truck. We were in grownup Disneyland.

 

We were pretty hungry, too, so we headed straight for the buffet. At $9.95 a person, it was a steal. After we were seated, I sent my husband to get some food before his head exploded and to scout out the food-lines.

 

He came back with a glazed-over look on his eyes like he’d seen something truly unbelievable. “They have a really nice, I mean, nice, spread here. It’s unbelievable. Go, get something.”  So I did, and he was right. Man alive, they had everything. And the coffee was outstanding. Really good, and prompt waitress service delivery of the kaffe.

That big white domed building is actually where we ended up having brunch.

 

As we sat there in our post-meal stupor, I started to feel weird. Really weird. Like I was drunk. Dizzy. Then the light came on: I had forgotten my insulin before we came in. Stupid. I rarely forget it. Very rarely. I looked at R. “I’ve done something really stupid,” I said.

            “What? What?” he said, concerned.

            “I’ve forgotten my insulin.”

            “Where is it, I’ll get it?”

            “It’s in the van, in the ice chest.”

So he ran down to get it while I sat there feeling crappy and really, really dumb. I couldn’t imagine what my BG was—it had to be between 300-400, if not more.

 

The insulin I take has two aspects: It is a slow- but long-lasting insulin, and the first stage doesn’t kick in for 45 mins – 2 hours. I’m supposed to take it at least 45 minutes before I eat. The second stage kicks in after about eight hours. I had just eaten a big meal. And I had made a very bad mistake.

 

R. showed up with my kit, and I staggered over to the ladies’ room to shoot up, nearly falling from the dizziness as I went.

 

On my way back to our table, I remembered something:  Alochol. It can reduce blood sugars very quickly. I knew there was a bottle of vodka in the car that a friend had given me before we left town. We hurried down to the garage and I pulled out the bottle of Absolut and poured it into a to-go cup of Diet Coke I had, and I started sipping. Within a few minutes the dizziness abated and I started feeling much, much better. I also needed to keep an eye on my blood glucose now to make sure it didn’t fall too far, that’s almost worse than too high. Argh. We had snacks in the van just in case of an emergency like that.

 

I couldn’t believe I had done that. Just really dumb.

 

Regardless, we cruised around Reno some more….

 

 

…and then we headed for Carson City, the capitol of Reno.

 

Here is the capitol:

 

The capitol steps—the whole property is surrounded by beautiful trees so it’s hard to get a glimpse of the actual building—I was lucky to get this one:

 

Then we saw this lovely little neighborhood near the Capitol. It reminded me of my childhood. Just a very sweet neighborhood with charming front-porched homes.

 

 

Then we cruised on downtown…

 

 

…and then into the mountains headed to this place:

 

 

 

Wendover, East and West

After we risked life and limb to drive through the central and western Utah salt flats, we arrived at the Utah/Nevada border. After seeing no civilization, nothing, literally, for hours, this eensy little town on the border came as a breath of fresh air.

 

In addition to being famous (and infamous) for Las Vegas and Area 51, Nevada is also the toxic dumping grounds of the United States. With of state-wide population of about 2.6 million, (just 2 million over Alaska), there is a lot of empty space in Nevada. You can see that just from the pictures I'm posting here, alone. There are vast, vast, vast desolate areas of empty space in Nevada. If there is a master planner for the universe and the Earth, he forgot to do anything with Nevada. Granted, I'm biased because I am NOT a desert person. It makes me feel empty inside, anxious, and eager to get out of there. I could never live in a desert climate--I would definitely be on more drugs than I am currently for depression, anxiety, and insomnia. I would have to make a ton, and I mean a TON of money to live there, even in Vegas, which I am not overly fond of. I am more of a Laughlin, NV kind of gal--less frat boys and party girls in Laughlin. I'm not a recreational drinker, I hate big crowds and lots of noise--Vegas is not for me. I would never make it there, or anywhere else in Nevada except perhaps Tahoe. More on that in another post.

So West Wendover, Nevada is just over the border from East Wendover, Utah. There is an actual line painted in powder blue on the pavement in the center of town where the the border divides the two towns. This is important for two reasons:  1. there are casinos on the Nevada side where gambling is legal and 2. there is free-flowing liquor in Nevada due to the same laws. In Utah, one must go to a state-run store to procure alcoholic beverages. We went to one in Moab, UT earlier on our Road Trip.I wanted chips, but they only sell booze, unlike liquor stores in Calif. that sell, well, almost anything.

I don't have any pictures of the town or the painted border-line because our camera was charging. We bought this cool little device in Ft. Riley, Kansas at a Best Buy. It's a car electrical-device charger. It has a standard two-prong outlet. After my BlackBerry charger died, and having little access to outlets because we were driving so much, we decided to get the converter, worth every penny at $50, to charge both our phones and the camera. It did not charge as quickly as say a regular, land outlet, it took longer, but it was a long way from better than nothing. It was one of the smartest purchases I've ever made.

In the meantime, the camera had died and it would not be charged up enough to take pics before we left town. I did, however, take some pics for R. with my BlackBerry because Wendover is famous for this historical item:  The Enola Gay was housed at the base there and is where it departed from when it left on its missions to bomb Hiroshima and then Nagasaki. 

It's in a state of decay now, and IMHO that's the way it should stay. Although we should remember the awesome and terrible power of those two bombs, I believe we should remember more those who died in those bombings. Housing a memorial here would, I feel, give a sense of celebration to what should really be a more somber event. I'm not going to debate whether dropping the bombs were wrong or right, it's a fact of history and cannot be changed, I'm just saying we should just remember the human cost of these weapons, and of all military killing devices.

My mother was in an assisted living facility in Southern California before she went rogue. One of her facility-mates was a tiny Japanese woman who had been in Nagasaki as a girl when it was bombed. She had been significantly burned, and at that time, in her 80s, was fighting cancer that is speculated was triggered by the radiation. That was about eight years ago, my mother moved out, but I've often wondered how that sweet, elfin lady was doing.

So, regardless, I give you pictures of the now closed Air Force base at West Wendover.

 

Sobering, is it not?

So after my hubby got his turn of the AF base, I asked him to try to find me a post office. I had been purchasing and sending postcards to a list of about ten-twelve people from interesting spots along our trip. I had pre-made labels with addresses for each person enough, I hoped, to cover all the postcards I would send. I didn't, but I just handwrote them instead. It was just a little messier and took longer.

We didn't find the post office in Wendover, both east and west, although we drove back and forth through the town and over the painted border several times. Finally we just gave up and we headed for a Pilot to potty and re-fuel, i.e., cold drinks and ice for the ice chest which had melted going through the desert very quickly, even with the A/C on.

We came out of the Pilot, I dumped out the melted ice in the ice chest, repacked it with drink cans, and snacks, put in fresh ice while I waited for R. to come out of the rest room. Once he did, we both got into the van, R. started backing us up, and I realized at that point that I couldn't find my phone. It was a red BlackBerry Curve, the one with the full qwerty keyboard. I had purchased it, very cheaply, from a friend who had upgraded to an iPhone. It was compatible with my T-Mobile SIM card and it worked so well, that while in Denver, I upgraded to full net access program from my e-mail only account so that we could be online, including Google for directions if needed, almost everywhere across the US.

My phone was not in the van. Not in my purse, the door of the van, or my bra, where I'll sometimes put it if I don't have pockets and I need both hands. It wasn't on the floor, the dash or in the center console, either. I checked the ice chest, twice. I bade my husband stop the van!! And I ran back into the mini-mart bathroom to see if it had been left there. If it had, it was gone. I checked with the cashier who went in the back. I waited two or three long, long minutes when he came back out, smiling saying, "I got it!" except that it was a black Samsung flip-phone, not my red BlackBerry Curve.

I asked him to look again or if anyone had reported it missing. I checked the chip rack by the register to see if it had fallen off the counter while I paid for my drink. It wasn't there, either.

Finally, it became apparent that it was not there or, if it had been, it was now gone (stolen). I was dejected. This also meant that we would have no phone as we continued across the Nevada desert--my husband's having been stolen in Illinois earlier in the week. This was not good.

Then I remembered that my husband had made a pit-stop at the local information center to use their bathroom--it was urgent--so I stayed in the van while he ran inside to take care of biz. I thought we'd be there a few minutes or I would have gone inside and enjoyed their A/C.

Minutes turned into more minutes turned into thirty minutes, and still n o R. I was reading a novel that I had been reading all morning. I noticed I was starting to get hot, clammy, and sweaty. I had left the door and window closed to keep the A/C in. But it wasn't meant for long term coolness. So I opened the van door for some air. R. eventually came out and we drove over to the Pilot.

I wondered if it had fallen out, then. It was a possibility. I asked him to drive back over there, a couple of miles away, to see if it was still in the parking lot. I would stay at Pilot and see if anyone turned it in.

No one did, but R. came back and through the windshield I could see him holding the BB Curve up for me and smiling. It had fallen out of the car. I was SO relieved!!  I jumped in the van and snatched it out of his hands. The red light indicating I had an e-mail was on, but the phone wouldn't turn on. Then I noticed that the screen was badly cracked, like spiderweb cracks, and it had a black mark down one side. We had run it over after it had fallen out of the van.

Oh my poor beautiful toy!! The humanity!!  So I whipped out my old BlackBerry Pearl, I had brought it on the trip to put on eBay at some point but never did--I took the SIM card out of the Curve and put it in the Pearl. So, we had phone, I could still access e-mail, the net, and Facebook, but the QWERTY keyboard was gone, and I was back to intuitive typing--the BB tries to guess what you're spelling because every key has two letters on it. It makes for some odd combinations, sometimes. Like OHUNE instead of PHONE. And Hey and Get are the same three keys. *sigh*

I killed it. I had been absorbed in my book and it hand fallen out of the car when I opened the door and I never even noticed. *guilt*

So fighting back tears (yes, over a phone), we got back on the 80 and headed for Reno on the other side of the Nevada desert.

Salt Lake City, UT

OK, less crazy today, more road trip.

We're almost at the end. This part of the trip I don't even like to think about. It was fraught with tension and anxiety that was exacerbated by the high heat of the western Wyoming and eastern Utah deserts. Our money was dwindling, our patience, too, and a sincere desire to quit being so hot and sweaty hovered over everything.

I have no pictures of the road from Rawlins, WY to Salt Lake City because I spent that entire time with my face  buried in a novel. I was hot, tired, cranky, and sick of looking out the window at the same dang landscape and scenery, for miles. I don't like the desert--it depresses me on a good day.

We arrived in SLC late in the day. Before we left for the Road Trip in June, we discussed places we wanted to visit. After reading a post from Tabitha on June 18, 2009 at From Married to Single, (one of my favorite blogs), about a trip she made to the City Library in downtown SLC, I said, "I want to go to that library."

So we exited the freeway and headed to downtown SLC. That's the capitol in the background. (And how many pictures like this have I taken on the Road Trip? Deja Vu, man. Maybe I should have dubbed this the "State Capitols and Campuses Tour. Argh.)

Tabitha's pics are better than mine--she had more time, a better camera, and, well, she's just a better photographer. Make sure you look at her pics of the library, too.

Then we saw the library, looming up on our right. My heart started to speed up, my breathing became shallow--yes, libraries are my rock stars--and we circled the building looking for a parking spot.

Here is the back side of the library.

We opted to park underneath the library simply to leave the van in the shade--it was hot, and the sun was still burning down on us, and the inside of the mini-van was like an oven. The air conditioner could only do so much. We had to pay $3- to ransom ourselves out of the parking garage, but to me, that was $3- well spent. The van was nice and cool after our two hour respite in the library. Free A/C and wireless Internet, dontcha' know. ;^D

Here is a pic of the library's lovely outside relaxation area.

This library has shops inside of it. Stationers, The Library Shop (good thing that was closed--like I needed more books), flower shops, gift shops, all those cutesy little shops women (or men) who love to shop enjoy hanging out in, oohing and aaahing--and they were all closed. We had just missed it. *sigh* I pressed my nose against the shops' glass like a child dreaming over a bicycle  in a toy store window. "Tchotkes," I exhaled. I could see them, but not touch. *sigh*

And I'm kookoo for nice stationery. I still haven't found my box of stationery and fancy thank you notes from our move--I expect I won't until I move somewhere big enough to unpack everything.

Above the shops are reading/relaxation areas accessible from, and belonging to, the library. We found a quiet area on the third floor (fourth?) next to a window and surfed the net, enjoyed the A/C and the view until they closed at 7pm.

This is a view of the plaza facing east, from the western side. I am standing more-or-less directly under the mobile, and the glass elevator is to the right.

 

There were some great views where we were on the 3rd floor of the library. This view of the low rust-colored hills looks like Southern California to me, particularly of the San Fernando Valley.

This next thing is also a big part of why I wanted to visit this particular library. It's a huge mobile hanging from the high ceiling in the walkway between the shops and the actual library.

From the above angle, it isn't exactly clear what the mobile is supposed to be. The next photo it is clearer what the mobile is. Can you see it?

 
It's a human head. Isn't that cool? I stood there and stared at it, snapping pics, for the longest time. It's even more fascinating in person. People were staring at me staring at the mobile. I wanted to say, "Hey! Don't you see it, too? Look up!" But I kept my thoughts to myself.

 

The above is a great view of the mobile from the glass elevator. As someone who is not fond of heights, I generally skip glass elevators. But this was the best way to get to the top floor (upper left corner is the nook where we hung out for a few hours), and the view of the mobile at this angle, with the sun setting on it, was worth not looking down to get.

And then I got this close-up of what the mobile is constructed of:  Make-believe Monarch butterflies each carrying a book. Delightful!! I have looked all over the net to find the name of the artist of this wonderful mobile with no luck. If anyone knows, would you please pass that along to me? Thanks.

I could spend a lot of time in this library if I lived there. If I ever go to SLC again, the City Library is totally on my "to do" list.

After the library closed and for all intents and purposes kicked us out, we headed north to take a look at the capitol building. It is one of the finest capitols I've had the pleasure of viewing this entire trip. It's situated on the top of a hill overlooking the entire city and the lake itself. Stunning

 

Across the street is the Council Hall, the original SLC Capitol building, built in 1864.

This cute buffalo statue graced the lawn of the Council Hall.

Again, our camera doesn't do night shots too well, and this is the best of the shots I took from the hill where the capitol resides. That shimmering blur in the center/right of the photo is the Great Salt Lake. And due to a communications problem, that's as close as I got to the lake.

We then drove back down North State Street, past the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Days Saints Temple. It was also just closing, and hordes of tourists were exiting from Temple Square. I wish I could have gone in and walked around, viewed the gardens, and admired the architecture of this stunning building, but once more, timing was just bad.

This next photo is the clock tower of the courthouse buildings downtown.

As hunger was kicking in, our mediocre breakfast/lunch having worn off, we started the search for a dinner place that was not fast food but that wouldn't bust our budget, either. We also visited Utah State University's campus (yawn); no pictures of that. I mean, college campuses were all starting to blur together for me.

We found a restaurant we both agreed on, Wingers, and we settled in for some din. The food was ok, not terrific, not terrible, service was excellent--they had closed but they let us continue to relax until we noticed we were the only ones in the restaurant, except staff, and they said for us to take our time. So we did. Our dinner came with a free slice of mint chip mud pie--mint chip isn't high on the list for either of us, and we left most of it uneaten.

My husband wanted to camp overnight on a small island in the Salt Lake. I questioned why we had driven all over SLC looking for dinner (gas prices were rising the further west we went, so we were trying to keep fuel costs low), if we were going to go back up north to the lake where we had already been?  By this time my energy was failing, and as most nights on this trip, I fell asleep in the passenger seat. When I woke up, we were parked outside of a grocery store main entrance. That's where my husband wanted to "camp out."  I flipped my pancakes (after a debate ensued), and we ended up parking behind a mini-mall (the only place to get some shade from the early morning sun). Why we didn't go to the campground at the island is beyond me.

The next day, we got back on the 80 and headed for Nevada. That is a brutal, brutal drive. It is truly desolate, and in the summer, raging hot. This is not the place to break down. No joke.

 

Those are salt flats. After winter rain(s), the water evaporates and leaves salt flats behind for miles.

Here's an up-close view of some of that evaporated ground. The white stuff is salt. Although it appears wet, this spot, and the whole desert here, is completely dry.

 

There is a salt industry here, also. See the mounds of salt in the distance?

Here's a close-up of the salt mounds.

We looked at these bright white salt flats for miles. Sunglasses NOT optional.

Bored and nervous, I stuck my nose in a book until we reached East/West Wendover, a border town with a side in Utah, and a side in Nevada. And where my new-to-me BlackBerry Curve, unbenownst to me, was to meet its untimely death.

Rawlins, WY

Never heard of it? Neither had we. But we spent the night a few miles outside of Rawlins camped out at a rest stop. We had been going to bed about 1am, eastern time, and getting up when the sun woke us, generally between eight and nine am. Of course, we were no longer on eastern time, so when the sun woke us, it was an hour earlier than what we'd become accustomed to.

On this morning, it wasn't the sun that woke us. No, it was a van-load full of, what we would later come to discover was, Canadian youths. There were about 50 or more spots at the rest stop, nearly all of them empty, yet they chose two parking spaces away to park, disembark their clown-car full of teenagers and then, then.....the driver, who looked not much more than seventeen, proceeded to grace us with musical selections from his Irish Flute, and no, that's not a euphemism for something else. If you've ever heard music from the film Titanic, then you are familiar with the Irish flute.

He proceded to play, what sounded like assorted variations of the Lucky Charms theme song, for over a half-an-hour. By that time, we were wiiiiiiiiiide awake.

Since my husband was in his unders and I was in not much more, we didn't want to begin dressing or exit the vehicle until they had moved on. But evidently they had no intention of doing that. We were trapped.

My husband has the boyish ability to belch on command, and he began doing so with alacrity and frequency with the side door cracked open slightly. After one of the larger ones, the van full of teens loaded up and headed out. We looked at each other and asked, "WTF was that?"

I don't think I can ever hear the Irish flute again without cringing a little.

Anyways, once we got up, watered, and dressed, we headed toward Rawlins. We kept seeing signs for some historical penitentiary. It was right off the highway, so we figured, why not?

As it turns out, it was an extremely historical peniteniary with a little museum store attached run off donations and prayers.

Opened in 1890, Butch Cassidy had evidently spent some time there as a young man, and so had Bill Carlisle, the infamous "Great Train Robber."

The prison itself is what is called Romanesque architecture, looking somewhat medieval and castle-like.

 

Here's a different angle of the same location.

We passed on the $7- per person tour, but we did hang out in the gift shop/museum which had an odd assortment of things such as executed inmates' death masks; black & white striped prison outfits; manacles; bones; confiscated weapons, aka shanks; old newspaper articles; and other assorted things. It was bizarre, sort of like being in a Ripley's Believe it or Not museum. We wandered around in there for about an hour.

We gave a donation to the museum fund and bought a magnet ( I collect fridge magnets ), and headed out.

We got back in the van and drove around the prison to see what we could see. We saw this old guard tower:

Directly across the street from this were residential homes. Homes that looked like they'd been there since at least the 50s if not longer. It just seemed a strange place to put private homes--I wouldn't have lived there. Maybe it was prison guard housing. I don't know.

We drove back toward the main part of town to find a place to have breakfast. We ended up at a restaurant who's name escapes me, and perhaps lucky for them. It was one of the most over-priced, crappy meals of our whole trip. I got two eggs, two slices of bacon, some toasted Wonder Bread and coffee; my husband had a chicken sandwich with fries and iced tea. The food was lousy, the service wasn't much better. And the meal was $25- not including tip!! We could have had a more satisfying and cheaper meal at a fast food place. We vowed if we ever returned to the town, we would never set foot into that restaurant again. It's on the far west side of town. If I were sure of the name, I would put it here, believe me, it was just awful.

By this point of the trip, I was getting tired of traveling and was eager to be at home. I started reading a lot while in the van. I road from the point we left Rawlins until we saw this a few hours down the road:

Well before dusk we would be in Salt Lake City, a city R. had never been to and I hadn't been to since I was a girl.

Laramie, Wyoming

It's only 50 miles from Cheyenne to Laramie, so we were able to visit it before the sun went down. Laramie is even smaller than Cheyenne with about 27,000 people. It's another "old"  western American city, at least comparatively with other western American cities, dating back to the mid-19th century. The University of Wyoming, the only UofW in Wyoming, is located there.  In keeping with all things college-related that fascinate my husband, we took a look.

Here is the football stadium at the university. They are the Cowboys (or Cowgirls).

This cool Native American statue graces the lawn on the southern perimeter of the university.

We drove around and looked at the college for a bit, but I won't bore you with any more photos of it, except this one:

That's right, the beautiful University of Wyomin.  Budget cuts are hitting everywhere I think.  Notice the lovely neighborhood right across the street.

We drove through the old downtown. Most everything was closed up because it was getting late.

We saw some strange and funny things there, too. Like this sign--it just made us laugh.

Maybe we're too easily amused.  Ok, how about this next one. This isn't our first time seeing it, but we still can't believe that someone actually named their stores this:

That one was taken with my BlackBerry. That little quickie mart was right across from the gas station where we were getting cheap gas. We paid $1.09 in Iowa in July, and the price kept going up the farther west we went until we got back to California where it was over $3.00 a gallon. I still don't get that.

Here's one last thing that I found amazing:

A First Interstate Bank. I haven't seen one of those since the 90s when they were bought by Wells Fargo Bank. And this FIB seems to be in operation. I'm astounded. I wonder if it is a privately held bank? I'll never know.

And lastly, on our way out of town, trying to make some headway before it got too late, I saw this cool cloud. It looked, to me, like Captain Nemo's submarine from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.  Don't you agree? This was a favorite film from my childhood. Kirk Douglas was so handsome and dashing in this film. Anyway, here's the cloud...

Here's a close-up of the same cloud:

Pretty wild.

Anyway...we eventually found a campsite, parked, moved all the luggage around, brushed teeth, changed into sweats, and got under the covers in the back of the van. Then the wind started. It was a really, really windy night. Gusts were pretty high and at one point, I thought the van might tip over!! But we didn't, and eventually the sound of the wind became soothing and we fell asleep, safe, warm, and cozy in our little mini-van.

The next morning we had a truly weird experience. And annoying. Very annoying.

Going to Wyoming

Well, we done been, that is. Last July. And we had great weather, too. I know they call Montana "Big Sky Country," but Wyoming has a pretty big sky on its own. Take a look:

I fell in love with that sky and that landscape. Although I spent most of my life in Southern California, i.e., Los Angeles, I am a city-girl no more. I love me some space.

Here is downtown Cheyenne as we exited Hwy 80. With just over 53,000 people, Cheyenne, although the biggest city in Wyoming, is still 35,000 people smaller than Chico, Ca. Chico . . . the home of my heart. Cheyenne reminded both R. and me of Chico, so it's no wonder we fell in love with this town.

 

That pointy-spired building in the background, south, is the train station, and right next to hwy 80 where we exited. You can see the huge trainyard from the hwy bridge. Lot's of trains.

Cheyenne is also Wyoming's capitol. You can see the dome there in the background.

A beauty of a capitol building, it was undergoing some refurbishing.

I had to pee, suddenly, as my bladder likes to do, and there were all these port-a-pottys parked around the perimeter of the capitol building from the construction, so....I took advantage, hopped in and took care of biz'ness before I wet my pants. Convenient! But back to our tour *ahem*.

The capitol had a lot of wonderful statues on the surrounding lawn. Like this one:

And this one. Another couple was taking multiple photos in front of this statue, so not wanting to interrupt or wait, I just took a pic of the statue itself leaving them out. But it doesn't really give you a perspective of how big it really is. The marble stand that this is mounted on, and which you cannot see here, is higher than a person's head, if that helps. Also, note that this entire statue is balanced on one of the horse's hooves. That is hard to do.

This is Depot Plaza, right next to the train station building. They were having some kind of frontier days during our visit and they were just taking things down for the night. In the background, you can see the hwy exit where I took that overlook shot.

Notice the big cowboy boot to the right? These big painted boots were all over town. I thought they were cool.

Here is a good shot of the actual train depot from the bridge.

 

 

 

The local newspaper. I love newspapers.

As we drove around sightseeing, we were also looking for a cheap dinner spot. I had a buy one, get one free coupon to Quizno's, so yes, that's what we had for dinner in Cheyenne. It may not sound like much, but it was a moral victory for me because it wasn't pizza, hot wings, BBQ, or spaghetti (what my husband eats). I love deli sandwiches. Probably my favorite meal.

So we ate, got gas, drove around some more and looked at Cheyenne--lovely farmhouse- and Victorian-style homes--and then we got back on the 80 to head for Laramie, just down the road. Home of the University of Wyoming.

In the meantime, we had some gorgeous landscape to look at as we drove. (Not a stalk of corn to be seen!) We were driving toward a small break in the Rockies, a valley between mountain ranges, but we could see the mountains to our left and right. The ground rose a little, but didn't get as high as a mountain. These awesome rock formations are just west of Cheyenne.

See the mountains? To the left?  Those are the Rockies.

Here's a better picture:

I wish we could have spent weeks and weeks exploring Wyoming. If you ever get a chance to go, don't pass it up. Yellowstone is in the Northwest corner and is pretty fabulous, I hear.

Next:  Laramie, WY.

My Own Town!! Julesburg, Colorado

Julesburg, CO

 

I did not realize that there was a town in Colorado, just over the Nebraska border, named after me! Imagine my joy after we discovered it on our Road Trip. I'm not sure who to send a thank you note, to, however. Dilemma!

 

We pulled into to town that morning looking for a place to get some cash without wracking up numerous ATM fees.

 

It’s a cute, cute town. The homes are craftsmen-like, the churches small and quaint, the sky blue, the air fresh, children, riding their bikes.  It’s the kind of small town that lives in the stories of Ray Bradbury (Dandelion Wine) or Stephen King (“The Body”). The kind of romantic small town we imagine belonging in the Donna Reed Show, or Leave it to Beaver. Of course, we were basing our opinion wholly on what the town looked like and not what it was actually like, but we were both charmed by it, certainly.

 

 

We found a small grocery store where we knew we could get ice for our ice-chest if not cash back from our purchase with the ATM card. It was very small, and very old inside. I was somewhat surprised to find that the items displayed on its counters and shelves were not equally old, but new, contemporary items like Biscotti and Starbucks coffee. I felt transported in time and it felt very dissonant to encounter those 21^st Century products.

 

We picked up a 3-lb bag of crushed ice, a box of strawberry Pop-Tarts (we didn’t know when breakfast would be or where), and got some cash back. But while we were in line, and then being waited on, we encountered the surliest, I mean Surly with a capital “S”, cashier I have ever encountered. And the manager and store visitor’s tolerate her the way people tolerated Floyd in the Andy Griffith Show. 

 

Her name was “Mary*,” and she sighed, huffed, puffed, rolled her eyes, and it was all she could do to summon up the energy to ring up your purchases and give you change. Look you in the eye? Say thank you? Are you high?  *sigh*  Whatever.

 

She was a textbook case for customer service surliness. If it was feigned, it was brilliant. If it was real, it was unintentionally funny.

 

We took our ice, our Pop-Tarts, and cash and got back on the road to head north, back to the 80, and hopefully some breakfast.

 

We found a place called Perkins Restaurant & Bakery in Sidney, Nebraska that had THE best pancakes I’ve ever had with incredible apricot syrup. I do love apricot anything. Crabtree & Evelyn used to make a wonderful apricot bubble bath—it was so fragrant and lovely without smelling soapy. I wish they would bring it back. *sigh* But I digress. The pancakes at Perkins Restaurant & Bakery are incredible. Too bad (or maybe fortunately) there aren’t any in California.

 

Outside the restaurant we saw some Canada Geese, taking a rest on the lawn outside of the restaurant. They are so beautiful. We saw a lot of geese on our trip, and there are geese that live in various coastal waters year-round here in Monterey Bay, but these geese were the closest I’d ever been to any. They were big and fowl-tempered *wink*—if you got too close, they would hiss.

 

After our pancakes, we headed to Mal-Wart for a bar of soap (we’d been showering along the way at various truck stops, usually $5- to $10- for the two of us to share a shower, or the occasional campground shower—not too many of those). My husband dropped me there, he went to get gas, and was supposed to come right back for me, but he went to the library instead, so I spent some money at Mal-Wart in my spare time *ahem* and I bought a novel, a lipstick, and a thank you card for one of our hosts.

 

When my husband finally deigned to come pick me up, we headed for Wyoming. On our way out of Sidney, NE, right next to the freeway, we saw this giant ice cream cone.

 

There was a house next to it and lot's of farm equipment--tractors, trucks, etc.--so we thought perhaps it was a rental or sale of equipment place. We pulled in to the driveway so I could walk over to the giant ice cream cone and have my picture taken, but we realized that we were in the driveway of a private home! And we were sure they would not appreciate trespassers no matter how tempting that giant cone was. So I snapped, and we backed out, drove down the road a bit, took a second snap (for perspective)...

 

...hopped onto the 80 and headed back down the road, west to Wyoming.

Why was there a giant ice cream cone in their yard? We have no idea. It's one of those big mysteries like who shot JFK, what happened to the library at Alexandria, and was Mary Magdalene married to Jesus or not? We'll just never know.

Off we went to Wyoming. Wyoming is Wonderful. You must go sometime. Wyoming is a do-not-miss destination.

 

 

 

 

*A pseudonym.

Lincoln, Nebraska

Lincoln is a red city. When I say that, I mean literally, not politically (I'm not sure what their politics are.) Lincoln is home of the University of Nebraska Cornhuskers, and their team colors are red and white. And red is seen everywhere in this town. People are as single-minded about this college sport as any city I've ever seen. Part of that has to do with having no professional football team or other colleges large enough to seriously be competitive in the Big Twelve. Football is big and serious in Nebraska, and the Cornhuskers are everyone's team there.

I didn't even want to go to Nebraska, truthfully. I wanted to go north, through Minneapolis, through South Dakota and its Badlands, Mt. Rushmore, then down through Yellowstone to Colorado. My husband counter-argued the fuel costs and time loss we would incurr by taking that route. In a country as big as the United States, swinging up four hundred miles looks about like an inch on a map. I was disappointed, but I understood. But Nebraska was the last place I wanted to go.

When I was a child, we moved from California to Illinois, then Illinois to Colorado, then Colorado to California. We went through Nebraska for two of those trips. We were stranded at a motel in North Platte, Nebraska for several days, during a blizzard, on that first move to Illinois. I vaguely remember that time as I was about six, I remember a lot of snow, and whiteout conditions, but I can vividly picture the horror that would cross the face of my father whenever anyone mentioned North Platte, Nebraska. It became part of the family mythos. Mention North Platte and make my dad cringe in horror, and then we'd all laugh.

Evidently, in 1969, there wasn't much going on in North Platte. I'm not sure that there's anything going on there now LOL. I just remember that driving through Nebraska was boring and depressing. This trip, forty years later, was no different than that first trip.

Nebraska is full of corn. Mile after mile after mile of corn. Corn is used for human food, animal feed, oil, syrup, ethanol, you name it, there might be corn in it. And so the US grows a lot of it, primarily in Iowa and Nebraska. The problem with Nebraska, in my view and based on what I saw, is that Nebraska's small towns are dying or dead. The people we encountered there didn't look too happy, either. The days of the family farm are ending, and the corporate farm is the rule of the day, now. The people looked, for the most part, drawn and tired, pale and exhausted. As if they had surrendered to their fates'. We were tired and exhausted ourselves and we fed off their fatalistic vibe. Nebraska made us depressed and we couldn't wait to get out of there.

Lincoln, however, is a very nice city--we enjoyed our time there, even if we did end up at Wendy's because we couldn't find a restaurant we thought we could afford until after we gave up searching and just went to Wendy's by default. (And real quickly:  We saw so many Applebee's and Wendy's restaurants, and often together, either in view of a highway or right near the off-ramp of a highway, throughout the entire trip, they were so ubiquitous that we started calling them Wendelbee's. I can't afford to eat at Applebee's and their food is just okay. Who the hell is eating there?)

Anyways. Here are some pics, with commentary, of Lincoln, NE., a really charming mid-western city.

And just in case you weren't clear on where you were...

Lincoln is also the Capitol of Nebraska. They have a very unique and interesting capitol building.

Again, as a former Angeleno (from Los Angeles), where a building over 100-years-old is rare, I love old buildings. Lincoln had a few.

I took this snap of a Duffy's Tavern because there is one in downtown Chico, Ca that staff and sometimes students like to visit. Both appear to be grimey, comfortable, Bukowski-esque dive bars.

I found this church, downtown, very architecturally interesting.

 

I spotted this screaming eagle perched on the roof of an office building . It was the size of a Volkswagen, I mean, it was really BIG. It was so beautiful and SO American.

High rises downtown.

 

The historical part of Lincoln, The Haymarket, and what we wished we had found before we gave up and ate at Wendy's.

 

The University of Nebraska, the flagship university for the state.

The football stadium.

 

 

Up Next:  Actually, I'm not sure. I'm going to have to check on that.

Omaha, Nebraska

When I was a child, on Sundays after the Disney Hour we always watched Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom. I loved it more than Disney, because I've always loved animals. My child's ears heard the show name Mutual of Omahog, and for our family, it has remained that ever since.

After we left Des Moines, we drove on through the night, me with a book and trusty book light, my husband with his maps as we headed for Omahog right over the Iowa/Nebraska border. My husband had a college friend he wanted to meet with who live[s] there. When he got into town, my husband got on the phone (mine, since his had been stolen two states previous) and got directions. He stayed on the phone with him as we drove around.

After driving down the wrong street, making a U-Turn, making a left, and then a right, I noticed a guy stumbling in the street. "Hey," I said to R., who was driving. "Watch out for the drunk homeless guy!"

My husband slowed down, and the drunk guy banged on the driver's side window and screamed, "R! Dude, how'reyaman?"

The drunk homeless guy was his friend, staggering in the streets, trying to bring us in for a landing, cellphone to his ear. We parked, introductions were made, and walked over to his home, a giant wood frame house on a street full of giant wood frame houses--evidently Warren Buffet lived only a few blocks away--and we hung out on the gianormous front porch. The friend, M., only rented a room in the house, so he could not offer us accommodations. That was all right because we had brought our own--the van.

We sat out on the huge porch, the two guys drank beer, then more people joined us on the porch--now keep in mind that it was about midnight while all this was going on, and we could hear more parties going on up and down the street--then a woman came out with another guy, and M. claimed the woman as "his," so I'm guessing his girlfriend? But then she and the guy who had came out to the porch with her had some type of "tightest butt" contest/bet going, and they asked R. and I to judge. We each felt both of their butts--I felt I had no other choice than to go along with the drunks by then--and we both concluded that the woman had the tighter of the two. Yay her. Whatever.

Then the smoking started. I can't take smoke, not with my (self-induced from smoking?) asthma, so I excused myself, claimed exhaustion, and went out to the van to go to sleep. I was fairly tired and I fell right asleep. R. was free to party with his friend as long as he wanted. Just don't get it on me, that's all I asked.

I give you, M. and R., college friends, one night in Omahog, NE summer 2009. Keep in mind this was taken shortly after we got there:

R. showed up at the van about 2am, claiming he could drive--and he did, so--and he took us down the road to a rest stop where we camped out for the rest of the night. I was barely coherent by this point and don't remember most of that drive.

Next day, Lincoln, Nebraska home of the Cornhuskers.

Less Kvetching, More Road Trip: Des Moines

Des Moines, Iowa. The "S's" are silent. Pronounced: Duh Moyne. After we visited my great uncle's gravesite, we headed for Des Moines, and a Costco we had looked up days in advance because I would be needing Insulin right about that time.

We parked, went in, R. turned in my poor, raggedy wet and limp RX box (it can't get over 85 F degrees, so we kept it in the ice chest next to the Coke Zeroes and snax. It still got wet even through a Ziploc bag.) and I headed to the ladies room, which I urgently needed.

They told R. it would be about 20 minutes, so we got to wandering. Oh lord do I love to shop. Books, snacks, booze, clothes, doesn't matter--I just like to look at it.  We each picked out a giant bag of snacks--I believe R. had fruit gels in handy-packs, I had some sort of trail mix with cranberries thingie. We walked back over to the pharmacy, only to have the pharmacist come out and tell me that they were out of that particular Insulin, but that she had called around, and the Hy-Vee had it for $5.00 more and Wal-Mart had it for $2.00 more.

First question out of my mouth?  What's a Hy-Vee? Turns out it's a grocery store just like Safeway, Ralph's or Piggly-Wiggly. We didn't know where it was, but we had passed the Wal-Mart on the way to Costco, and they were cheaper, so we asked her to transfer it over there, which she very kindly did.

We drove over to Wal-Mart, perhaps 2 miles away, parked, I went and stood in line at the pharmacy and it was ready for me in that short time. The pharmacy-tech looked at my information and said, "California, eh?"

"Yes," I said. "We're on vaction."

"And you came to Iowa?" she asked, incredulously.

We both laughed quite heartily at that. I explained about all the places we had been, family we had visited, and my uncle's grave in the small town east of Des Moines.

"Ah," she said. "How fun."

And it had been, but this going home part was more of a sprint than a leisurely road trip-type vacation. Money was running out, and I had been told that there would be work for me in late July, early August. I didn't want to miss that opportunity so the pressure was on to get home. And we all know how that turned out.

But anyway . . . I don't think I'll forget that "And you came to Iowa" comment for as long as I'll live.

No photos of Des Moines. The light was fading and the pics just weren't coming out, so I didn't bother. It is a lovely city, however, with a river through it, a downtown arts scene, restaurants, and very clean. That was my overall impression of Des Moines as we whipped through it. We drove on into the night until we reached Omaha, NE where my husband had a college friend he wanted to visit.