Tuesday, March 23, 2010

536 Miles on US 93 and one Jackpot

This FJ journey has three parts, Seattle to Las Vegas, 8 Days in Arizona, and San Francisco to Seattle. The first part was to commence on Thursday, March 11, it was to include a leisure visit in Walla Walla, a day on the slopes in Park City, and another day in the warmth of Zion, followed by a night in Las Vegas. I was being nice and riding along with the Old Man as he drove the FJ down to Spring Training. Good plan. I liked it. I was even looking forward to another trek down the 84, well, sort of looking forward to that.

All of a sudden, computer issues at Curt's work, a snow storm, and a few other things later, we were leaving on Saturday morning. With a plane ticket in hand to fly home from Vegas, I decided to ride along anyway and keep him company. We left Seattle without a solid plan (a theme that will continue to cause problems later in March) and finally decided on tackling US 93 instead of the 15, as the weather forecast for Utah travel was labeled "treacherous" by our good friends at NOAA. After several mind numbing hours on the 84, we turned south at Twins Falls. We had finally decided Jackpot, Nevada would work just fine for the night.

Jackpot is your classic border town that offers a vice that is not available in the neighboring state. After 50ish very dark miles, we crested a hill, and were hit neon lights, last seen on the Strip in the early 1960's.

I noted that Curt was paying way too much attention to the time of day throughout the trip, what was he in a hurry for, I wondered. Could it the famous hair band, Night Ranger, maybe it was the 9.99 prime rib dinner that was only offered until 9:00pm, nope it was some ridiculous boxing match, he drove us from casino to casino looking for a sportsbook that had it on. Apparently, the casinos in Jackpot don't buck up for pay per view boxing.

Next chore, find a room, should be easy right ? Nope, not when Night Ranger is in town and the annual Jackpot high school football coaches convention has descended from all nearby states. We managed to secure one of the last rooms available, across the street, up the dirt road, back by the atv trails, and of course we were free to smoke in our fabulous smoking room.

With a warm room in our possession, we headed out to find a decent beer before the masses descended on the only bar following a night of hair raising hair nation rock and roll from Night Ranger. While in the Saloon, we were treated to the absolute worst Karoke host and perhaps the most quintessential rural nevada character either of us had ever seen. Sorry, no pics.

But tell me, if you saw this guy any where in the world, wouldn't you just know he was a security guard in a rural Nevada casino. . . . Late 20's, about 5-10, 280 lbs, belt on too tight, large belly hanging down a several inches below that belt, hair slicked back like and NBA ref, and classic elvis sideburns. We were also shared some pleasure in seeing some of the worst singing ever, but then again what to you expect when people pay 5 dollars to enter a singing contest where the prize is a 6 dollar buffet coupon?

Back to the coaches convention, does anyone find irony in the fact the sportsbook was littered with college coaches who were in town to instruct their high school counterparts? One last note on Jackpot. Curt was obsessed with setting his satellite radio to record the over night F1 car race from Bahrain. It was comical watching him trying to figure what time it was. We had several things working against us . . . first, we were in the Pacific time zone, but in a town that observes Mountain time, and it was the night to move clocks forward. It was 3:00am on one clock, and 1:00am on another, and his satellite radio is scheduled in Eastern time. In the end, he failed.

The rest of the trip . . . We skipped breakfast in Jackpot, and set our sights on Wells, where we enjoyed a great breakfast in a bordello. Okay, not quite a bordello, but the place was owned and run by a bordello just up the street.

Hour and hour after hour of US 93, flanked with snow under brilliant blue skies. Finally in the late afternoon, we descended the high desert to Las Vegas. We settled on the Hilton because it was 50 bucks a night, it's monorail friendly, and we can park the over loaded FJ very close to the elevator.

Nothing much to report from Vegas on the gambling side, we made a little, lost a little, but we did discover a new trick . . . get away from "Vegas" during the day, and suddenly "Vegas" at night is more fun. We went golfing. I took full advantage of the rock hard fairways and chalked up my best score ever, 102 for 18 holes, and I only cheated about 4 or 5 strokes, and Curt only beat me by 3 strokes, but I think he cheated more, so I consider this a victory.

On Tuesday morning, the Old Man dropped off his wife and picked up his husband at the airport. Paul joined Curt for the drive to Phoenix, and I returned to Seattle, quite thankful I don't live in Ely, Nevada.

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