When Granny Met Vegas

"Hey, Mom, how'd you like to come to Vegas with Feliena for Thanksgiving?" For someone who'd spent the last 40 years or so in the kitchen from Thanksgiving Eve until everyone was drowsing on the sofa/chairs/beds the next afternoon, that came as quite a shock. Could I really step out of my accustomed roll and travel four to five hours on the road to spend Thanksgiving in Las Vegas? I had to think about that one for a while.

My son had moved to Vegas two months before, and was waiting for his fiancee to finish her semester at Porterville Junior College so she could move over there to be with him, so I wasn't surprised that he wanted her to spend the holiday with him. However, choosing me to make the journey with her.... now, that was unique, to say the least. I figured it was because my youngest daughter had moved to North Carolina three weeks earlier and there was no one else who could go with her, but still, it was an interesting idea. I mean, I had one son and an ex-husband to cook for here, and it really wasn't feeling like a day to be thankful for, so why not? They both agreed, so off I went, to explore the world beyond the Sierra Nevada mountains.

We had to wait until late Wednesday afternoon to leave, since Feliena had some exams she had to take, and just as I'd thought, that was our first mistake. While the trip from my home in Exeter to her home in Porterville, and then down highway 65 to Bakersfield wasn't bad, as we topped off the gas tank and took a restroom break before we joined up with the traffic on 99 we had no idea what we were driving into. We certainly found out in a hurry.

According to the directions I had dutifully downloaded from Mapquest earlier that day, we had to take the Exit 24 turnoff to Highway 58 East. Piece of cake, we thought. However, when we got to Exit 29, we stopped dead in our tracks because everyone else in front of us had done the same. We spent close to an hour creeping, stopping.....creeping, stopping, the five exits until we got to 24! I was never more happy to finally get to an offramp as I was when I turned the 2005 Chevy Colorado we were driving onto it and headed up the hill. Arriving at the top, we thought all our problems were over. Little did we know that we would spend the next six hours doing the same thing, over and over again.

As a child, my family spent a lot of time traveling the 99 from Los Angeles to Visalia and back, then up to Oroville and back, and finally up to Burney and back several times before we finally settled, once and for all, in the Visalia/Exeter area, but I had never experienced anything like this. True, when we lived in Long Beach and had to commute to L.A. and back there was the occasional accident that would cause us to have to stop and creep for a few miles, but this was a four to five hour trip that ended up lasting almost 8 hours. We thought that was the worst trip either of us had ever been on, and were very grateful when we finally drove into Las Vegas at long last.

Now, for anyone who's ever arrived in Vegas after dark, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about when I tell you I thought I'd died and gone to Christmas heaven. You come over this rise, and all of a sudden, down there below and all around you, there are lights that won't end. I was dumbstruck at the sight. Being from a very small town, this was a sight that filled me with awe, and I don't think my mouth closed the whole time we were driving through town to get to my son's work place. Maybe it was the sudden change from the dark desert to the most lights I've ever seen in one place that did it, but I can't think of another sight that beautiful anywhere in my memory. And once we got to the main part of town, with all the casino lights, etc......well, I was in sensory overload. I truly believed that all the hassles we'd gone through to get there was totally worth it for the chance to see this.

Once we arrived at Danny's work, he was ready to get off and go home, so we got to follow him there. I don't know how many miles we traveled, but it took over half an hour of steady driving to get there, and I'm not totally sure that wasn't due to the fact we were traveling in circles. I know to get to his work we turned off the highway onto Craig Street, went a couple of blocks until we passed Lamb, and then turned into where he worked, but on the way to his house, we passed three road signs telling us the offramp would take us to Lamb! I still don't know how that could be possible, but it was, and I found out on Friday that the normal rules of navigation mean nothing in Las Vegas. It's the weirdest city I've ever been in when it comes to driving, that's all I know.

Danny took us down the strip on Thanksgiving evening, a beautiful and awe-inspiring journey, to say the least. The lights, the people, the displays all work together to make you feel as if you just stepped into Wonderland and might run into Alice or the Mad Hatter at any moment. We didn't get to stop and visit any of the casinos because of the crush of people and the traffic, but just riding down the street and trying to take in all that flash and brilliance was enough for me. Little country girl that I am, I was in hog heaven. We had to cut our excursion short because he had to work the next day, but not before we took a trip up the Stratosphere. That, however, is a story for another day.

The next day, after my son had left for work, Feliena and I decided to go exploring on our own. Now, I am one who loves to just get in my car and drive, taking new roads and ending up God-knows-where. I never get lost and always find my way back home, because I have a good sense of direction and I know the basic laws of navigation: if you want to go back where you came from, just turn around and drive in the opposite direction from whence you came, and if you take a wrong turn, just turn right at the next street, then right again, and there you are, back where you started. It's simple, and it always works.....but not in Las Vegas. I have never been as lost as I was that day, and I never want to do that again.

It started out fine, since we'd been out with Danny a few times since we'd arrived and I had a vague idea of how to get back home. I knew the main streets around his house, and recognized the stores and signs around there, so I felt very confident as we started out. We left his house and got to Ann, turned left and headed off to find a WalMart or a mall we could explore. We got to Decatur, turned left, and headed toward the Strip area, but it was a four lane street and I got stuck in the left lane and ended up going around a curve that took us off Decatur and in another direction entirely. No problem, I assured Feliena. At the first street I turned right, then right again at the next street, and began looking for Decatur, which should have been the first street we came to, but it wasn't there. I drove on, and still no Decatur. I drove on, and found Ann. Ahhh, we're safe, I thought. Well, that's what I got for thinking!

We drove down Ann, further and further, and found nothing we recognized, and no sign of Decatur, either. We turned around and drove back, going the other way, and still there was nothing. I found another street whose name I recognized, so I turned on it, thinking we'd find something somewhere. We did.....we found Ann again. Now, how we could turn off of Ann, drive a few blocks, and cross Ann again I haven't a clue, but we did. I turned on Ann, of course. Nothing. I stopped at a fast food drive through, got an iced tea, and asked where I could find Decatur. "Oh, it's a couple of blocks that way", she said, pointing. I thanked her and headed that way, and found.......nothing. I turned around and headed back the other way. Still nothing. By this time I was at my wits end. I told Feliena to get the directions out of the glove compartment and we'd get on the highway and follow the directions to Danny's house. Sounds easy, don't it?

We got to the offramp we needed to be on, drove to the stop sign, and looked at the street signs on the light posts, trying to find Rancho. We did - on the "Northeast" and "Southwest" poles. However, on the "Northwest" and "Southeast" poles, it said Lone Mountain Rd. Is this confusing anyone else? Feliena said go right on Rancho, so I turned right, and started driving, looking for the next street we were to turn on. Never found it. After a mile or so, I looked at the street signs and noticed we were on Lone Mountain, not Rancho. At this point I'm thoroughly convinced someone out there is going ahead of us, switching the street signs along the way, just to confuse us. I drove along, wondering how to stop them, when I realized we were climbing a mountain! I knew that was totally wrong, so I turned around and headed back the way we came. Believe it or not, that worked just fine. We arrived back at the confusing corner, realized the instructions were "bear right", not "turn right", and ended up on Rancho finally, and from there we made it all the way back to Danny's house. We were saved!

Needless to say, we never got to the store, and we were so thrilled to have made it home in one piece that we didn't want to leave again, so we turned on the TV, sat on the sofa, and silently thanked God we hadn't ended up in Utah or something. As I said, the normal rules of navigation simply don't work in Vegas, or the streets go in circles, or imps keep switching the street signs.....I don't know what it is, but driving in Vegas is an adventure all by itself. After that, everything else we did seemed tame, and we did thoroughly enjoy ourselves - that is, until we headed home Sunday. The ride home made all the other traffic problems we'd had seem tame by comparison.

Everything started out OK, with fairly light traffic, beautiful weather, and the gorgeous desert in daylight to marvel at. Not too far out, however, we hit the stop-and-creep traffic again, and this time it lasted all the way past Barstow, with a few exceptions along the way. Honestly, the traffic was so bad we couldn't even get off to visit a rest stop or one of the little towns along the way, as all the exit roads were bumper-to-bumper, also. The stores, restaurants, and any other parking spots were jam-packed full, making it futile to even try to do anything but stay on the highway and hope traffic would ease up soon. Two hours after we left Vegas, we finally arrived at Primm....yes, two hours. By then I was beginning to realize I would need to stop and visit a restroom before long, but the fact that doing that was an impossibility by then was very clear, also. I kept seeing signs for "Gas, food, lodging, restrooms", but the traffic jams on the off ramps let me know they would do me no good, so I just kept going.

I began to notice there were a lot of cars out in the desert, and wondered what was going on out there. Finally, nearing another packed offramp with the buildings in sight of the road, I realized they had driven off the highway somewhere along the way and were speeding along, passing us all up as they headed toward the buildings. I kept wishing I could just pull over and go behind one of the bushy trees we passed every so often, but I knew if I did, I'd never get back on, and I didn't want to chance that. I just kept driving, and five hours later, a few miles before we got to the Old 58 turnoff, I saw an open offramp (only three other cars were traveling on it) and a couple of stores, so I stopped. Now, I'm still hoping I didn't pick up something gross through the paper towels I lined that filthy seat with, but at that moment, all I could think of was finally giving my bladder the relief it had so badly needed the last three hours or so. Desperation makes us do weird things, you know?

Once we got onto the Old 58, parts of which included some of Route 66, which I found very interesting, we stopped for gas and actually had room to drive, at least for a little while. When we got to Four Corners, Feliena stopped for a rest break, and then it was bumper-to-bumper again until we got up on the hills by Tehachapi, and from there on home it was normal traffic. By the time I got back to Exeter, it was 11:30 pm. We had left Vegas at 12:30pm, so it had been an 11 hour trip back, trumping the trip over. I tumbled out of the truck, made my way into my house, and fell onto my bed, not wanting to move again until morning. I had enjoyed my time with my son, I had loved my time in Vegas, except for our misadventures in driving, and I would recommend visiting there to anyone. However, I would tell them to make sure they don't go on a holiday unless they can go a couple of days early and stay a couple of days later. It's a beautiful ride, and the view of the city itself really is worth the trouble of driving there, but I wouldn't wish our trip home on my worst enemy. Other than that, it was all good!