Sunday, March 28, 2004 San Antonio to Van Horn, TX For us, we left fairly early, starting about 0915. We always take turns driving so it was an easy day but we were both tired and stopped about 5pm, before reaching El Paso, our proposed goal for the day. On the way we stopped in Ozona to have lunch at the Hitching Post Steak House. We found it a couple of years ago and really enjoy the food and atmosphere. It is located in a renovated sheep barn! This time we went downtown to the town square to see the Davy Crockett memorial (20 tons of white Texas granite) and the really interesting Gothic Victorian town hall. This is Crockett County, after all. Our next stop was Ft. Stockton to refuel and to see the 20 ft. long statue of the roadrunner, Paisano Pete. Coincidently, a real roadrunner half flew, half raced in front of our car as we exited the interstate. Lots of bluebonnets and other wildflowers although most were not out this early as we drove further west and north and gained about 2,000 feet in altitude as well. The Davis Mountains to our south provide lots of unusual shapes silhouetted against the sky. Van Horn is a wide spot in the road with lots of hotels and Chuys, a Mexican restaurant made famous by John Madden, who stops here several times a year for their chicken picada. Each TV sports team has left large, autographed banners on the wall, along with a few pictures of sports greats and autographed pix of practically all the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders from over the years. We’re not sure whether the owners have their priorities right or if the newsmen who stop here along with Madden have more pictures of cheerleaders than players. The restaurant was across the street from our hotel. Since we had just read about it in this month’s Texas Highways, we couldn’t resist stopping. Worth the visit, even though their cooking style differs from San Antonio’s (less cheese, more chilis). The Delawares, interestingly eroded sandstone hills just north of the rail line, added to the local charm.
Monday, March 29, 2004 Van Horn, TX – Wickenburg, AZ Three miles outside of Van Horn we gained an hour by crossing into the Mountain Time Zone. Two hours later we drove through the break in the mountains, which gives El Paso its name and entered New Mexico. At times, thousands of Joshua trees lined the highway, resembling forlorn sentinels of an earlier age. Just before reaching Arizona, we stopped at Steins, a ghost town which at its peak (in 1880, when its quarry provided the rocks for the rail bed) had a population of 1,300, but lost its last business in 1955. Most of the town burned in 1962; a few key spots have been restored to their 19th century glory (the general store, the blacksmith, a bordello, a couple of log cabins, and a wall of the hotel). The donkeys and goats were fenced off, probably more for their protection than for ours. Since there’s no running water, a visit to the outhouse is not recommended. In Arizona we traded in the Joshua trees for Saguaro cactus and an even drier climate. Some of the rock formations were awesome, though. The temperature reached 95 degrees and the price of regular gasoline passed $2.00 a gallon. All the hotels we checked in Phoenix were full (something about Spring training for baseball teams), so we ended up 40 miles north in the town of Wickenburg. The locals say that anyone who drinks the local water is no longer able to tell the truth, so now we have an excuse…. The Best Western we stayed in is one of the original 4 Best Westerns. The room we stayed in was built in 1946! However, it has been renovated since then and is quite comfortable. The aroma of the orange blossoms outside our door is wonderful; the shrieking cries from the dovecote behind our room less so.
Tuesday, March 30, 2004 Wickenburg, AZ – Las Vegas, NV We got up early and went across the street to the Golden Nugget for breakfast. An interesting place, with about 6 small dining rooms, all with different wallpapers, and good food. We stopped for a picture of the statue of the founder of the town, Henry Wickenburg. We also passed the original town jail, a mesquite trees where prisoners were chained until trial. The scenery between Wickenburg and Las Vegas is quite interesting, with tall mountains always in the distance, although no sign of snow on the mountaintops until we got near Vegas. There are lots of scrub brush, Joshua Trees, and Saguaro cacti on the sides of the road. The Joshua trees were magnificent. We stopped a couple of times to take pictures. They were very old with lots of branches and many twisted together. Part of the trip was on the Joshua Tree Highway. We tried a Subway for lunch and Beth tried one of their new low carb wraps - good and quite filling. The whole day was very hot with a strong wind blowing. Nearing Las Vegas we began to climb hills and mountains and near Hoover Dam we encountered a police roadblock checking all trucks and RV’s for explosives because of the terrorist threat to the dam. They are also building a bypass bridge south of the dam that should be ready by 2007. We bypassed Las Vegas and went straight to Nellis AFB to check on information on shows and then to AAA to get information on sights around Las Vegas for the weekend. Then we went on to the Luxor where we found Karen Phillips, hard at work and as lovely as always. She showed us to our room (we received a lovely upgrade and thank her for it). The Luxor is as beautiful as always, with its black pyramid and fantastic statues and artwork. We had dinner with Karen at the Café in the casino and caught up on all her news. Afterwards, we took the new walkway/shopway to Mandelay Bay to look around a bit before calling it a night. This month Vegas is very busy because of Spring Break, which explains the excessive traffic but adds to the energy level of the city.