With the cost of travel going up and up we have had to look into more domestic vacations or should I call them “staycations”. My wife had planned a trip to Greece for her birthday but thanks to Expedia.com and British Airlines they screwed that up big time.
So late July we decided the grandson wanted to go visit his uncle in Arizona, with the cost of airline tickets we thought it would be a better idea to make it a Grandpa and Grandson road trip. Now to save fuel I chose to take my 2011 Mini Cooper at 45MPG this would be best for fuel mileage.
Things I had to think about,it had 80K miles plus miles would it make it, the cooling system had just been rebuilt and I just put new tires on it so I said let,s give it a try. From Reno, I knew it was going to be getting hotter the farther south we drove.
Plan was Reno, Tonopah,Las Vegas,Phonix then Tuson AZ. My daughter came home from work with the covid so it was a pack and go so we didn’t get it. If you have ever driven from Reno to Vegas you know there is not much to see.
Our first stop was the clown motel and they have the option of getting an EMT device to look for ghosts. After looking around the town we waited for the sun to go down to go to the cemetery they have next door to the motel. Donta was looking around with the device and saw that there was a ghost nearby and all the adults nearby watching yelled”because you are standing on his grave” that was funny.
Our next stop was Las Vegas somewhere Donta had never been, I let him know it was going to be boring until he turned 21. I like Freemont St for the light show and the Casino so we stayed down there. It was not planned for us to leave so early so we had a few days in Vegas. He was not that impressed with the light show on Freemont ( teenagers ). He did get to ride on the “Deuce” the double-decker bus while surfing on his phone so he liked that.
The next day we took the “Dam tour” and just like my kids he liked making the “Dam jokes”
Now we had been in Vegas for 2 days and I still didn’t need gas in the car that I filled up in Reno, but on the way back from the Hover Dam we fueled up. It’s been anywhere from 106 to 110 degrees since we got into Vegas. We tried the pool at the hotel but the white tile around the pool was so hot we couldn’t get to it.
After talking with the wife ( Grandma ) she said it would be ok to do the night Helicopter tour of the strip before we left. I don’t know why I have never done this before but it was so cool. Youtube video can be found at https://youtu.be/pfK0B_KcE4w
Next stop Williams AZ, oh and have I told you the roads in AZ suck, potholes the size of my car. Now I have never driven this route before and leaving Las Vegas for Arizona was just what I expected, desert and a lot of nothing. As we passed Kingman AZ we started to climb and once we got up In the hills everything started turning green. The temperature started to drop, and I was wondering why anyone would anywhere else in Arizona. The town was so small and cute and route 66 is right in the middle.
After this it was into more heat and Phonix to drop him off at my son’s house for a week.
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