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Day 1 - May 15 - Redwood City to Las Vegas
We left Redwood City at 8am and managed to find Harris Ranch at Colinga (the GPS lady knows everything) around 10:30am and ate breakfast. Temp was 85 degrees and climbing. I got in the passenger side and let Marilyn drive the next 1 1/2 hours until we reached Bakersfield. I slept most of the way congratulating myself for having the foresight to bring a confortable pillow to support my neck and head while in the reclining position. We found a brand new Costco gas station to fill up ($2.35 gallon)and we were on our way. We stopped at Tehatchapie (? only Louise would know how to spell this name)for a MacDonald's ice cream. Back in the car we continued our boring drive up the grade to Needles and switched to the freeway that takes us to Las Vegas - another 135 miles of nothing to see except dry desert scrub. We passed Baker, home of the Mad Greek Restaurant, my buddy Ron's favorite, where the temp was 102 degrees. On and on and on we drove on this seemingly endless quest for Las Vegas. Our only salvation was the CD we had of stories by the NPR guy about Lake Woebegon - they're hillarious. Finally, the GPS lady announced that we should turn right onto Flamingo Drive and within minutes we were parking in the Flamingo's garage. We lugged our bags to Reception, it seemed like a 2 mile trek, and checked in. We like the flamingo's value, $109 for a double queen room on the 9th floor)located on the "strip" across from the Bellagio. As I flopped on the bed I looked at the clock - it was a few minutes after 6pm. I was tired, but not too tired. The 8 hour drive isn't hard, it's just hours of 70-80 miles an hour boredom. We got a phone call from Pat and Ron wanting to know if we were "there" yet. Them M called Judy (our unofficial LV travel guide) for dinner recommendations. "There's not much to recommend in the Flamingo - so walk over to Paris and eat dinner there," she said. We walked through the 90 degree heat, found the cafe and ate a pretty good dinner. We were sagging and decided to go back to our room to watch some TV. I changed into my sleeping clothes, put in my earplugs, kissed M good night, looked at the clock, it was 9:30, and fell immediately to sleep.
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Chuck Cooper
non-member comment
Redwd-Vegas
Well Congratulations, you and your wife now know why the Thunder Valley Casino (no. of Sscramento) bills itself as the "Vegas of the West". They may be reached by a drive that sstarts in the Bay Area, as did you, and gets hotter as you approach, The differewnce is they are only (approx.) 139 miles and twoand a half hours away. Perhaps that's why I haven't been to the NV Vegas in over 15-20 years. Reno is also closer and more to my liking, temperture-wise. Enjoy the Southwest, it's B I G !