Las Vegas

Day 15 – June 24, 2009
We rode through Death Valley today. As soon as we entered the region we began to descend like a roller coaster into a furnace. As we went deeper into the belly of the earth the heat climbed and was registering 125 degrees on the bike thermometer. The whole area was one pile or mountain of ash, desert, rock and dead tumbleweed. About the time I decided nothing was living in this God forsaken place a small critter ran across the road. I felt as if I was riding through the bottom of a huge furnace twisting and turning climbing and descending among the burning cinders. But we were still at 2000 feet elevation and then the roller coaster dropped to sea level and to our right and left were sand dunes just as you find at the beach back home in Delaware. For the first time on this trip I was wondering what I had gotten into. Leaving Death Valley was not much better – more desert, heat, blowing sand and dead tumbleweed but with one added feature – the wind was back. It was as if the ‘wind switch’ was turned on the minute we crossed the Nevada state line. We planned to spend the night in Las Vegas giving Shirley time to visit her sister and the guys wanted to get the oil changed in their bikes. Glenn, Kathy, Roger and Ginny wanted to get a hotel in the old downtown Vegas and I had no desire to wonder around downtown or the strip so Bernie, Shirley, Don and I stayed at Patsy’s house (Shirley’s sister). Immediately Don and I headed for the closest Honda shop and Glenn and Bernie headed for a Harley shop 10 miles away in the downtown area. The Honda shop was very busy but worked us in with a 3 hour wait and then when they finished we noticed oil leaking and they had to do a little more work to get it right. After getting the Harleys serviced Bernie headed back to Patsy’s while Glenn headed for their hotel. Bernie became so turned around in the busy streets and he said he saw several skeletons of people who got on the freeway and just never found their way off! He tried to call Patsy’s cell phone – no answer – he tried to call Don’s cell phone – no answer because he had the number wrong. He stopped and asked someone on the street but they had no idea. He continued to ride round and round hoping something would look familiar. Finally after about an hour or two he was off the bike and Shirley called his cell and asked where he was and Patsy’s daughter gave him directions to get back to the house. Poor Bernie – he was within a block or two of the house all the time. Patsy was laughing her head off. In Bernie’s defense I must say the traffic is crazy in Las Vegas.