Capítulo7: Mountain Top Blizzards

4/14/12 Richfield, Utah  - We had breakfast at “Big Daddy’s” These sandwich artists have a very large chalk board with over 30 sandwiches to chose from. 

I was very tempted to order “the hippie”. In Utah vegetarians are considered hippies because hippies do not eat meat with the exception of eggs and baby octopus. I was craving a sandwich with avocado inside it (or aguacate in spanish, or palta in Chilean) and hippies in Utah do not eat avocado either. I ordered a turkey sandwich which did included aguacate. They ask your name here when they take your order. The old lady was marveled as she pointed out how unusual my name was. I felt special and confused. 

Adolfo

They do not toast sandwiches at “Big Daddy’s”  but they do have side dishes as part of the combo: potato chips, macaroni salad, potato salad and a pasta salad. I had the pasta salad. Everything was delicious and the ingredients where surprisingly fresh tasting. 

I strongly recommend this joint for your sandwich needs 

even if your name is Adolfo, or Alfonso, or Alfredo, or Apple, 

or it just starts with an “A”. They will serve you here as long as you pay. 

When we checked out from the hotel in Richfield, the guy at the front desk told us that only one last set of big mountains remains between here and Vegas. He was wrong, we climbed at least 3 times before reaching flat land. Never trust a male front desk-ist. I learned the hard way. Driving through Utah was interesting. It is a similar drive compared to Colorado but add “snow storm” to the mix. 

Snow

We where so high up in that mountain that it was actually snowing - blizzard style. Some people do not understand the concept of friction when driving on ice. Some are too slow others are very fast. The consequences can be devastating and we witnessed it as it was happening. Lucky for us it occurred on the opposite side lanes where an accident had completely stopped traffic. 

more snow

Visibility was limited to approximately 80 to 100 feet in front of you. Traffic jammed + snow + inclined road + zero visibility + crazy gringos = Car after car sliding downhill as they slam on their brakes from 90mph. We saw how incoming traffic collapsed with idle vehicles, trucks, camper trailers, you name it. It was like dominoes falling. Some cars dove into the road side ditch to avoid the idle cars in front of them. As we continued driving we could see the cars on the opposite lane flying down hill oblivious, with absolutely no clue of what incredible chaos awaits them. 

yea, more snow

 I thought of taking video. I almost did. But it was probably some one taking a video who caused the accident in the first place and I’ve  just had enough with our previous incident to risk it. 

After a few hours the snow stopped and it transitioned into rain. Yes, rain. It was raining in the desserts of Nevada as we finally approached the flat sandy roads that would take us to Vegas. Baby.

We arrived at Las Vegas around 4pm. Checked in at a cheap hotel in the Arts District.

 We took the deuce bus to have dinner, walked around and explored. 

Capítulo6: PuertoRicans in High Places

Denver, Co - 04/13/2012 Was the morning of Friday the thirteen and we woke up with one mission: Drive to Vegas.

We packed our stuff and left that filthy hotel behind us. My friends Matt and Roberto warned me about the hardcore steep roads of Colorado-Utah but what we saw was something else. Eduardo was behind the steering wheel when we first drove up these hills.

As soon as you realize that you’ve been climbing up for miles it hits you: “What goes up…”  Exactly. Poor Eduardo’s face was white like a ghost as we began descending and passing by altitude road side signs that read 10,000 feet.

When you begin to go down these mountains you have a combination of fast drivers, slow drivers and truck drivers. All of a sudden you see yourself trying to keep control of a vehicle while traveling on a downhill obstacle race. It is hard to ignore the thought of the possibility of your brakes failing as you come down. “The number of accidents due to brakes malfunction in the USA is…” Never mind, I said to my self as I contemplated sharing some road trip statistics with my already nervous brother behind the wheel.  

You kind of get used to it after a while and once you get to that comfort zone you can actually begin to enjoy the magnificent landscapes of this route. This scenery was my favorite part of the road trip. So amazing that is hard to keep your eyes on the road. We stopped at as many sight seeing exits as we could.

After sunset we took an exit into Richfield, Utah where we spent the night.

Capítulo5: The Roots are Radical

04/12/12: Day two in Colorado. We woke up,  checked out from the hotel and went to have breakfast Downtown Denver at the Delectable Egg. 

They have really good food and the coffee is ok. I highly recommend this place for your breakfast/lunch/brunch needs. We devoured our food and decided to drive up to Boulder, CO. Eduardo and I where born in Boulder when my parents where completing their post graduate degrees at the University of Colorado. We called Mom and asked for the address of their old place at the student residency apartments.

We walked around the neighborhood for a while then drove to see the Flatirons from Chautauqua Park.

Eduardo and the Flatirons

We got thirsty from hiking around the park so we contacted Eduardo's friend Chalie who is an expert in the art of brewing. She recommended several microbreweries in the Boulder area. From her list we choose to visit Avery Brewing Company because I wanted to try their Maharaja Imperial IPA beer. 

On Tap at Avery 

Avery Brewing Co. - Front Patio Area

So good!

Damn' that's good beer!  So good that I missed the 3pm tour of the brewery and I was not happy about that. They say the altitude makes you drunker quicker. That is why the pro's train in Colorado.  Our Boricua friends Chalie and Joan met us at Avery for a beer but left early to have dinner with friends. We had a few more beers and departed Avery to go see Downtown Boulder. Had dinner at Five Guys. It was Eduardo's first Five Guys Burger experience.

Not 5guys

After dinner we stopped by Chalie's place to hangout. We shared our DonQ Puerto-rican Rum and tried their Bourbon Whiskey.

Bull...

Joan - Dog wrestling

2 cats 

We looked for a hotel in Denver to stay an extra night. The hotel we found was the nastiest hotel of the trip. The room was not that bad. It was the lobby and surroundings that looked like the stage for a horror film. The receptionist looked like a female version of Hulk Hogan. I almost pointed out the resemblance after she told me I looked like Fabio. Seriously, Fabio? WTF?!

Fun times in Colorado. It was our favorite state of the trip.

Play me off Rancid...

Capítulo4: Mile High City

04/11/2012  Bye-bye Lincoln, NE hello Denver, CO. The drive was a bit boring. Nothing but flat orange and golden fields.

Finally arrived at Denver Ramada Hotel around 5pm. After settling in, we prepared to go out around the Lodo district in Denver.

Teddy's Rest. was having a happy hour next door which included free food (hotdogs, fries and onion fires).  We had some beers and ate some franks while we waited for the shuttle to take us to Lodo.

Eduardo Kicking Back 

The Rockies where playing. We arrived and walked around the Coors Field.

Coors Field

We had beers, watched the game with the locals and ate guacamole & chips at the Falling Rock Tap House. 

We left the bar around the 6th inning. It was raining. We stepped inside the Lodo Bar and Grill. I had a whiskey on the rocks. The altitude was affecting me. I walked it off. The streets of Denver are quite spectacular at night.  

We took a taxi back to the hotel for $10 including tip. Our female taxi driver is from San Diego and she was awesome. 

Capítulo3: The Rise of the Undertaker

TUE 4/10/12: Woke up at 7am in Urbana-Champain. The plan was to drive to Lincoln Nebraska, our third stop of the trip. After having breakfast, we stopped at a gas station to freshen up and to check the camper. After our previous incident I was paranoid about driving it around. I grabbed some screws and added additional reinforcement to the trailer door. We drove away from the station and I could not keep my eyes on the road. Every 5 minutes I would look back with the rearview side mirrors to "check" the camper was holding itself together.

During one of these "checks" I saw it happen. The camper door broke off the lock piece and flew back into the middle of interstate 74-W traffic. We are lucky the door did not caused any accidents.

We parked on the highway shoulder, got off the car and ran to go pick up the door from the middle of the road. We where freaking out. Eduardo almost convinced me to detach the trailer and throw it in the road side ditch.

We took the nearest exit and found an abandoned wear house area that had an empty trash dumpster. We parked in there to ponder.

We decided to remove the remaining top section and keep the flat bed that I could either repair or sell in Los Angeles. 

When I was looking for the tools I hear a "bang". It was Eduardo with his kick boxing skills passionately destroying  "el fish". What took 5 hours to patch, took 10 minutes to destroy. We call this day The Death of "el Fish": The Rise of the Undertaker. 

El Undertaker

fish skeleton

After spending a few hours in the road dragging the flat bed (a.k.a undertaker) we decided that the best thing to do was to leave it behind. In the afternoon of 4/10/12 we took an exit in Omaha, NE, removed the trailer licence plate and gave the trailer to a random stranger. The undertaker will  be missed.

We arrived at our third stop in Lincoln, NE. We stayed in a very stinky hotel.