Losing A Grip On Reality

Sometimes as you journey through life, you find that occasionally the whole world seems to morph into a state of surrealism. Like you are in a movie or the character in a book. You wake up not really sure of what is real and what is fake, not sure of where you are or where you are going, not even sure what you did last night...... Or is that just what happens in Vegas?

They say time flies when you are having fun. I often find that time seems to go fast when you are procrastinating. Now I'm not sure whether I've just been having fun, or whether I have been procrastinating on writing this blog. Maybe both. It's been 4 weeks since my last post, yet it seems like yesterday I was in Colorado. Since then I've not only visited 4 states, but 3 different countries as well.

We finally managed to get T-Rex registered thanks to the reduced amount of bureaucracy in Boulder. A 20 minute visit to the Department of Motor Vehicle in Boulder and we had some official plates to put on the van. Not that the temporary tags had given us any bother since we were pulled over in Montreal in June, but at least it gave us an identity and piece of mind. Fresh with our new tags and a week to get Dale from Colorado to Los Angeles Airport, we made tracks to Las Vegas via the Grand Canyon.

I was pleasantly surprised to find the North Rim of the canyon much less populated than I'd expected after fighting for a car park with the thousands of others at Old Faithful in Yellowstone NP. In fact for the two days we spent at the Grand Canyon, we found ourselves alone for a good part of the time as we hiked a number of short day trails around the rim, in particular a rewarding 3 hour hike from sunrise to mid morning. We had talked about hiking down to the bottom of the Canyon, but with temperatures in excess of 40 degrees C we decided against it. Spectacular views of the canyon at sunset were rewarding and of course getting up for sunrise also worth it... even getting up the earliest I'd been up on the whole trip (that is except for the times I've been getting home at sunrise!).


Ah, Vegas, Las Vegas...... where dreams become a reality. Or more to the truth, where reality becomes a dream. Not sure what I expected here either. Probably to laugh at the development of a city in the middle of a desert, have a few free drinks and win or lose a bit of money in the process.

After a successful 1st night including all of the above and a 2nd night that consisted of much of the same our 3rd night in Vegas showed so much promise. Enter free drink and no food, a little too much confidence and a separation from reality. Point is, we left Vegas with our tails between our legs and a realisation that no one is safe from the city of sin. I mean, I left there with more than I went with, but looking back, I'm really not sure what we actually did. Sit in a hotel, sit in a restaurant, sit in a casino... Maybe that's all you're supposed to do? Especially when the mercury's at 42 degrees C.

So, with a nasty headache and lack of sleep, what better place to go than Death Valley? It had to be done. We had no thermometer but we estimated the temperature at Badwater Basin, the lowest point in the USA, was somewhere close to 48 degrees !! Not the place you want to breakdown or even stop for a picnic. A photo was good enough and we were on our way.

LA gave us one day to try to sell the van before Dale flew out. One day would have been enough had we had the title for the van in our hands. Of course even Colorado didn't have it all together to give us the title on the spot, you have to wait for it in the mail. Every dealer said, without title, no sale.
It's fair to say I was not a happy camper.... With Dale flying in less than a few hours, the options were not looking good. Leave the van as a gift with someone - who? Drive it back to Kentucky to a friend - 5 days straight! Drive it off a cliff and take the insurance - believe me it was an option!. In the end, we cut our losses, decided that the best was to drive back to Colorado to leave it with friends there and try to arrange a sale before I had to leave. After saying farewell and thanks for the good times I left Dale at the check in line at the airport, jealous that he would be seeing friends and family in a little under 24 hours, while I would be somewhere on the interstate in outback Utah!

It wasn't an exciting two days driving back to Boulder but I did meet some interesting people at the motel in small town Utah and saw a pretty fearsome rainstorm through the mountains in Colorado. Also managed to turn the odometer passed the 200000 mile marker on the van, at the same time pushing the total miles driven on the USA road trip passed 12000. I drove 40000 km around Australia in 03/04 and somehow that seemed shorter!

Safely back in Boulder, to some more warm hospitality from Christine and Greg, after discussions with more car dealers, the resulting decision was to leave the van in Boulder to be sold once the title arrived in the mail.

Somehow I managed to get a smile out of all the little challenges that have been thrown at me over the last 4 months.. sometimes I go looking for them, sometimes they just come unexpectedly. Back in Los Angeles for 1 more day before flying to Ireland, I considered all of my options. Unexcited by what Hollywood has to offer, and without transport (ironically) to get myself to somewhere like Beverley Hills (not that I wanted to anyway), It almost seemed appropriate to round off the tour of the States, the same place it started - Santa Monica Beach. I don't know, somehow amongst all the freaks and weirdos, all the traffic and pollution, all the try hards and hard tryers I thought it amusing to go back down to Santa Monica on the Big Blue Bus, and just walk and watch... people... I love watching people.... You see, you never really know what that person is doing there and I find that mysteriousness exciting... I often want to just ask some random person to tell me their story because I'm sure it's interesting....

Anyway, my point is, wandering around Santa Monica, I could be anybody and that makes you forget all your troubles for a while, just imagining what might be. I could have been a local for all they knew.... and as I stood at the sign "Muscle Beach " - the home of the fitness revolution of the twentieth century, I found that wanted smile, chuckled at the vanity and said thanks for the memories....

So now I'm in Bristol, England after a couple of weeks in Ireland to catch up with some friends. I've been to the Ireland equivalent of the Melbourne Spring Racing Carnival, The Galway Races. I've seen beautiful countryside in Connemara and at the Cliffs of Moher. Fun times were had in Dublin with pints of Guinness at the Guinness Storehouse, a round of golf at a spectacular local course, the quarter final of the All Ireland Gaelic Football Competition between Dublin and Derry at Croke Park and wandering around Dublin Town enjoying the Craic!



I'm going to try to maintain a grip on reality from now until I arrive in Finland. My brain needs some work to do and I'm looking forward.....