Mancation Fall 08

After leaving Amarillo, TX in my wake I headed west to more exciting and scenic lands.
Stopping only in Albuquerque at the Costco for gas and a frozen yogurt, I made it to Flagstaff just before nightfall. The next day I drove around Flagstaff a bit, and took a scenic dirt road up and over a mountain pass. Then I headed for Las Vegas. I took my time in driving stopping whenever I saw some neat scenic point. When approaching Hoover dam, I had previously stopped the car to shoot a spare .22 round at a shiny bottle placed in a sinfully precarious location in the desert. I had simply tossed the gun on the seat next to me for most of the drive. Then I turned the corner on the way through Hoover Dam, and there was a security point searching random vehicles. I scrambled to lock the firearm in its case while driving up to the officer. I got it tucked under the seat just in time. During this maneuver, and a few minutes prior to the security encounter, I had a van behind me riding my tail, even though I was exceeding the speed limit slightly. Anyways, at the security point the officer simply waved me through, and made the tailgating van behind me pull over along with several other vehicles for a thorough inspection. Ha!
I made it to Hoover Dam, pulled over and decided to check things out. I was amazed that they wanted $7-$9 for parking. I simply got around that by parking FAR away, and taking a nice scenic 30 minute walk. I got several pictures, and read all the panels around the dam, then made my way to the visitor center. They wanted $15 for simple admission. Then a tour was another $33 on top of that! I didn’t see the point of going on a tour when I’ve been told that they don’t even take you through much anymore due to increased security measures. I looked around, and soaked in everything I could that didn’t have a pricetag on it.
I got to Vegas, found a McDonalds that had free WiFi, and booked a hotel at the Luxor. My Vegas experience wasn’t so great. It was worth seeing once, but that’s about it. I hit up an expensive buffet and ate near my body weight in crab legs and claws. Afterwards, I had enough energy to climb Mt. Stuart again, so I had to move. I walked the strip, and almost got into several fights with the slime who were flicking porn cards in my face the whole walk. Since I was a single male walking unattached to crowds of people I was heavily targeted with these assholes.
The next morning, I got packed up and went to meet Brent at the Vegas Airport. As I was about to grab some lunch for us, I got a text from Brent saying that his flight got delayed. Since we were on a tight schedule already, I was doubtful that we’d make it to our first ride. The flight was delayed about 2.5 hours, and since the delay pushed us further behind, the traffic was terrible in leaving Vegas. We met up, and took off northbound to St. George. The drive was pretty neat through that last little stretch going into Utah. When we arrived at the condo resort, nobody was there, and no note describing where people went. It didn’t really matter because within 10 minutes, the crew arrived back from their ride.
We met up, and went out to eat at a Chinese buffet as tradition demanded. There we met up with Bryan and Trevor who also arrived late. We returned to the condo and kicked back with a movie.
In the morning we left to go hit Goosberry Mesa. We all jetted off on the trail with only a few minor endos and scrapes at first. One bike had a spoke failure and David went back to retrieve his spare. They eventually caught up with the main group, and we continued onward. The mesa was excellent, and plenty of good bike terrain, drops, climbs, etc. We stopped several places to admire the views. The temperatures were perfect. I had the camera on standby to capture rapid shots of people going up/down slopes. Plenty of pictures and good times playing on the Goosberry. When we finally returned, sore and exhausted, there was a sneaky McEntire stash of cold Mt. Dews that were covertly distributed. We headed back to the condo to unpack and relax some. David, Trevor, Brent, and I still had some energy in us, and we departed again, chasing daylight to go visit the Acid Drops. After a lengthy ride up, we were generously rewarded with plenty of steep drops down along a network of biking trails and jumps. We made it pretty far out, and began to return as the sun had completely set. The headlamps came out, and I consulted with the GPS to find an easy way back. David blew out a tire, and swapped his tube out in record time even with limited lighting conditions. We made our way back to go soak in the hot tub. When we gathered back up with the group, we made our way to the hot tub and intermittently and noisily jumped into the cold pool. The idea surfaced about playing watermelon football. Damion and others went to the nearest supermarket to buy a watermelon, vasoline, and a cucumber… just to make the cashier raise an eyebrow. Also, I had thought that if we attached fins, we could use it as a torpedo similar to the use of the famous, “ultimate torpedo”. When they returned bearing fruit, we greased up the melon and played a few minutes like crazy fools in the cold water during the night. The melon exploded however during a toss up mishap.
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