Wednesday, February 27, 2019

Running From the Cops in Texas After Buying Meth in Albuquerque

After a good night's sleep, we woke to a winter wonderland in Albuquerque.  Not as heavy as Flagstaff, but still flurries that stuck and made the roads slick.  In fact, the interstate was closed in the direction we were headed. The elevation of Albuquerque is about the same as Seligman, Arizona, so that shot my elevation theory of the weather we were experiencing all to pieces.  It now appeared the colder weather was just coming along for the ride.


It was also here that we met "Buttercup".  While in Albuquerque, we met a friend who lived there.  She gave us Buttercup to keep us company on the road.  I'm not known for my green thumb, but the tag gave care instructions, and the internet said the biggest problem was over watering.  Considering how good I am at neglecting plants, I decided we might just get along pretty well.  When we checked out of the hotel, I tucked Buttercup in in the back seat and wrapped her base in a blanket to help her stay warm.



Because the interstate was closed, we decided to have a leisurely breakfast at Cracker Barrel before heading to our first sight of the day.  Bruce was excited.  He loves Cracker Barrel, and since they don't have any locations in Washington, he hasn't had a meal from there for over a year.

After breakfast, we went in search of that commodity of which Albuquerque has become known, thanks to Walter White and Jessie.  So, we headed to the Old Town, to see the major distributor, The Candy Lady.




The Candy Lady sells fudges and multiple other types of candy (including some that may be considered x-rated in some circles).  In the back room, Walter and Jessie stand by as you inspect and package your special candy.



We picked up a few dealer packs and some smaller user packs.  It's actually cotton candy flavored rock candy.  There's so much more to see in Albuquerque than Breaking Bad stuff, and all we saw was the Candy Lady, so we'll definitely be back.  Because of the snow, we missed what I was looking forward to as one of the highlights of the area - the musical highway - which is a section of Route 66 that still exists parallel to the interstate just east of Albuquerque.

By the time we finished with Walter and Jessie, the interstate was reopened, so we got back on the road, heading east.  We didn't make Amarillo by morning, but we did get there in the afternoon.  Just before getting there, we pulled off the interstate and onto the frontage road for the Cadillac Ranch.  We had picked up some spray paint just so we could add our contribution.

Cadillac Ranch sits probably a little over 100 yards off the road in the middle of a dirt and grass/scrub field.  When we got there, it was still spitting snow and the path to get to the cars and around them was a giant patch of mud.  Knowing we'd be back, we took a few pictures out the window and went on down the road.



At the first cross roads, there's an RV park that is definitely capitalizing on the ranch.  According to information on Yelp (which you have to believe because it's on the internet!!), the RV park is not owned by the same guy or formally associated with the sculpture garden in any way.  But, they make their presence known and sell spray paint in case you forgot to pick some up before coming.  There's supposed to be a gift shop in there, too, but we didn't stop except to take pictures.


By the time we got to the other side of Amarillo, it was still cold, but the snow had stopped.  The ground was still damp, but around the Slug Bug Ranch, it hadn't been churned up nearly as much as at the Cadillac Ranch.  Plus, it's right by the road.  We got out here and used our spray paint.





Be careful if you stop here, the abandoned gas station on the corner is apparently haunted!


Soon after we got back on the interstate, we came across some police cars parked on the side of the road.  It was my turn to drive, and in keeping with the move over laws which are probably in place in Texas, too, I moved over the left-hand lane and slowed down to right around the speed limit.  There was hardly any other traffic on the road at that time, so I slowed down a little more, and we did some rubber necking.  Just as we were getting up close to them, one of the officers reached into the back seat of his SUV and pulled out a shotgun.  I hit the gas when he pumped that bad boy up!  The last thing I wanted was to be in the cross fire if people started shooting at each other!  Especially after seeing the Candy Lady in Albuquerque and having our stash measured out in little distribution baggies!!

Hoping we had gotten far enough away, we pulled of the interstate again close to Grooms to check out the Leaning Tower of Texas.  The story goes that back in the day, there was a little sundries store and restaurant, and people were passing it by.  The owner decided he needed a gimmick to get people into his little diner.  Once he got them in, he could make some sales.  So, he took some concrete and raised the legs on one side of his water tower next door.  Worked like a charm.  People stopped to tell him his water tower was about to fall over, and while they were there, they bought something, even if it was only a cup of coffee. The diner has since closed and been apparently abandoned, but the water tower still stands - or leans.  Definitely a sight to see, but as we were sitting in the parking lot of the abandoned diner, a policeman in an SUV started driving down the frontage road, so we high-tailed it back on the interstate and on down the road to Oklahoma City!


Tuesday, February 19, 2019

Standin' on the Corner at London Bridge and Eating Roadkill

Contrary to the song, London Bridge is NOT falling down.  It was, at one point, but they dismantled it and moved it to Arizona.  That was our first sight of the day after spending the night in Lake Havasu City.


And yes, that is Santa's sleigh boat being pulled by low flying reindeer.  There was a Christmas boat parade the night before.  We saw it.  I tried to get some shots of it, but we had to park too far away for me to be able to get the camera to focus right on the lights in the dark.  I got a decent video of the Christmas lights on the bridge, though.  Bruce is pretty awesome when I'm trying to get certain shots or videos.  Traffic wasn't really light (though it wasn't bumper to bumper), and he drove over that bridge multiple times.  Something distracted me every - single - time.  This one is the best.  At the end, I was distracted by the boat parade on the lake.  After that, it was all over for driving back and forth over the bridge!

Lake Havasu City, Arizona, is a neat little town that was built around London Bridge.  The developer bought the bridge and had it reassembled to his new real estate development to attract tourists and home buyers.  He was soundly roasted for this scheme, but apparently, he had the last laugh.  The town appears successful, and people (like us) do come to Lake Havasu City to see London Bridge!  There's not much else there, though.  It's one of those towns where everything looks the same, and signs can't be high enough to read.  It's a beautiful lake, and we talked about coming back sometime to play on the lake, but we probably won't.  On the way out of town, we found the local Wal-Mart and got a new SD card.  When I put it in my camera the camera worked!!  So happy it was just the SD card and not the camera itself!

Our next stop was Seligman, Arizona.  We stopped for lunch at the Roadkill Cafe.  This place (both the town and the cafe) will require multiple stops to do it right.  Let's start with the food.  That's how we did it when we were there.  The menu is awesome!  In fact, it's so awesome, I had to pick up a copy of it to take home.  I had the No Luck Buck, which is just a really good French dip sandwich.  Bruce had the Surprise Burger (an Ortega Burger).  According to the menu:  "This burger recipe was smuggled over the border by Mexican bandidos so long ago nobody can remember.  Served on a fresh ciabatta roll, this Black Angus burger is covered with a big Hatch green chili, Havarti cheese and pico de gallo.  Feel free to ad some fresh jalapenos if you dare.  (Rolaids sold separately)."


Big Bad Jerry Bruce Adams has gotten rather complacent with the mild jalapenos we've been subjected to in Washington recently.  He decided to just take a big bite of that green chili!


Can you tell how that worked out for him?


I tried to get the tears that were welling up in his eyes from that hot pepper!  He wasn't able to eat anymore of the burger.  Nibbled on some fries, but mostly, he watched me eat and took his burger to go!

The whole place is really neat.  There is a room off the dining room that houses the bar (the OK Saloon) and gift shop.  I had a bite of Bruce's burger and ate my French dip.  Bruce ate his for dinner.  Highly recommend the place.  We'll be stopping by here again!




After lunch, we explored a little bit of the town.  There are loads of interesting places here, including the Snow-Cap Drive-In, which was closed for the season.  Lots of places to eat and stay, including this tipi!








As we pulled out of Seligman, one of us satisfied from lunch, the weather turned once again.  We went from shirt sleeves to snow and cold in Flagstaff.  What a difference about 1,500 feet of elevation can make!


Back down about 2,000 feet, it was a beautiful day in Winslow, where we stood on the corner for a little while.

On the corner across the street, the one from which this picture was taken, has a store that sells Eagles paraphernalia.  It also plays Eagles music all the time so that it can be heard throughout the square.  They have a squished penny machine outside the door.  Bruce had to have all the pennies!!


And I had to have a bathroom, so I went in to get change.  The guy gave me change, and we searched through all of his pennies to find the shiniest ones.  When I got the change, he pointed to the bathroom, where a tip jar was conveniently placed on the back of the toilet!  I used them both!


While I was actually standing on the corner, some locals came by, and I'm sure it amazes everyone, I spoke to them.  Winslow is the one place I have ever been where they say they love their tourists.  Not only do they say it, but they practice that.  The Route 66 logo is painted in the middle of the street on the corner.  As I was taking pictures, traffic would stop until I put my camera down.  Granted, there wasn't much traffic, but I did stop two cars while I was taking pictures.


There are all kinds of things along the interstate marking Route 66.  Interstate 40 was laid parallel to Route 66 in some places, but in many places, Route 66 was replaced by the interstate.  That makes the portion of I-40 from Santa Monica to Oklahoma City packed with kitschy statuary and things.  We had to stop near the Arizona/New Mexico line to see the dinosaurs eating an Indian village!  It was the Painted Desert souvenir shop, which was cute as could be.


After checking things out here, we ran from the dinosaurs all the way to Albuquerque!

Tuesday, February 12, 2019

Heading South to COLDER Weather and the Bagdad Cafe

Just days after getting back to Washington from China, Bruce and I took off by car for Tennessee.  I did have an appointment with my physical therapists between times.  I came clean to them that I had not done my exercises the whole time I was in China.  One of the first nights, I started to do them.  I pulled out the red Theraband, hooked it around my foot, laid on my back with my arm at my side, and started lifting my arm, trying to get it to lay on the bed over my head against resistance.  I was so tired, I fell asleep after a few repetitions, not even a full set.  I woke up a couple of hours later with the loop of the band around my ankle.  My physical therapist took measurements, and we learned that in spite of not doing my exercises, my range of motion had increased while I was overseas.  Most likely, it was because of how much I was using it.  I was putting weight on it, steadying myself for all of those steps, using it to lean on Chrissy while trying to keep up with the group, getting assistance from group members who helped pull me up the steps to get on the bus, reaching for things, and many other normal, daily activities.  My therapists also gave me "permission" to rest a few days before starting them back up.  In fact, they encouraged it.

So, in keeping with "resting up", a day or two after my appointment, Bruce and I loaded up the car and headed to Tennessee.  Of course, this trip was a much slower pace.  We had right around a month to get to Tennessee and back, wanting to be back in time to spend Christmas with Chrissy.  Because the forecast was calling for snow in Montana and South Dakota, we decided to go south through California before turning east along Route 66 and miss the snow.  Egg on our faces when we hit Mount Shasta!



They were still trying to clean up from the fires in the Shasta National Forest.  Seeing that they were clear cutting and stripping the areas of the burn, I was beginning to get upset.  I mean, yes, you need to clean it up somewhat, but stripping out every bit of the debris would prevent new growth!


I felt much better when we came upon the section where they were replanting in those areas.  Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of that.  In most parts of the Shasta Trinity Forest, visibility was poor and the roads were getting a little slick, and Bruce asked that I keep the camera down so it didn't take his attention off the road.


We made it just south of Sacramento on the first day.  Until Chrissy moved to Washington, Bruce had not spent much time on the west coast, definitely not enough time to get familiar with the fast food places that haven't migrated east of the Mississippi River.  I knew that and took advantage of it.  I suggested eating at the Weinerschnitzel close to our hotel.  The only exposure Bruce has had to weinerschnitzel is the actual veal cutlets on the menu in German restaurants.  He's not overly fond of German food, but he's a good sport and eats German with me relatively frequently.  He mentioned that he didn't think he really wanted anything that heavy, so I told him he could probably get a hot dog there, so he agreed to go.  I thought he was gonna kill me when we went in and he found out it's a fast food place for hot dogs!!

After a good "gourmet" hot dog dinner and a good night's rest, we headed south again.  It seemed the further south we went, the colder it got!  In fact, somewhere between Bakersfield and Barstow, we stopped for gas.  The wind was whipping, the air was cold, and the raindrops felt like they could have been mixed with sleet.  It was miserable!!  It's been a loooooong time since I've felt so cold!

Fortunately, the weather cleared up by the time we got to Newberry Springs, where we stopped at the Bagdad Cafe.

There was a movie shot here in 1987.  It's one of those "day in the life" type pictures, shot in English by a German film maker.  Along with the German actress, it starred Jack Palance and a much younger CCH Pounder.  It won a few awards in Europe, and it's clear that the movie has a much bigger audience in Europe than the US.  I found it on YouTube and watched it for free.  It was better than I expected, and actually was pretty nuanced with issues about immigration, growth of business, relationships, and how to run a coffee shop with no coffee.  They said this was the actual yellow coffee butler from the movie!


I had the Jack Palance burger, which was pretty good, but nothing really special.  I took lots of pictures, but I didn't get to keep more than a few.  It seems the SD card I had in my camera picked that time to malfunction.  At the time, I was just hoping it my camera hadn't broken.  Most of these were taken on my phone, some of them after I learned that the camera wasn't saving any pictures. The food was average with decent portions for the cost.  Aside from having the memorabilia from the movie, the best part was Mike.  I called him Chef Mike, but he said he's probably better known as "Talking Mike".  Mike had a bit part in Erin Brokovich.  He said his boss gets a little upset when he talks about that movie more than "Bagdad Cafe".  He was planning to go home for the day because there wasn't any business, but then we came in and ordered food. We talked about the movie and the area, and some other folks came in.  Some knew of the movie.  I never quite figured out why the others stopped.  It really doesn't look like much from the outside or the inside.  I would definitely recommend watching the movie and stopping in for a cup of coffee or even a bite.  Here are some of the shots I did get, including us with Talking Mike.  It was such fun, we'll probably stop again sometime later.






After a late lunch, we headed on down Route 66 toward London Bridge.







Wednesday, February 6, 2019

The Final Destination - Shanghai

The changes we had made in cutting some attractions in Wuxi, giving us time to see everything in Hangzhou in one day gave us extra time in Shanghai.  Honestly, I would have been just as happy to spend that extra time in beautiful Hangzhou, but even with the extra time, there is still more to see in Shanghai.  Our itinerary is, by now, pretty much out the window, and just a list of suggestions that we may or may not do.

We got to sleep in a little bit (maybe 30 minutes) before another buffet breakfast and getting back on the bus.  The drive from Hangzhou to Shanghai was rainy, but as usual, the scenery was lovely.  There were a few times that we saw the stereotypical Chinese farmer in the conical hat (not just on this drive), but I wasn't able to get a picture of any of them.  The rain started clearing up as we closed in on Shanghai.

Shanghai is the business and financial center of China.  As the modern city that Shanghai is (as compared to the more traditional Beijing, the center of government), it did have the obligatory giant ferris wheel.  There's apparently another one mounted on the roof of a shopping center, but we didn't see that one.

Lots of traditional and modern buildings interspersed with each other.  As in Beijing and the other major cities in China, housing is in short supply.  Our guide, George, said he rents a single room with no bathroom.  I don't recall how much he pays for it, but for not having bathroom facilities available to him in the building, he's paying way too much by my thinking.  He said it's not so bad.  There's a public bathroom within half a mile.  I think I'll pass on moving to Shanghai, but visiting again?  It's a distinct possibility.

Our first stop was the Bund, otherwise known as the boardwalk in the US or the malecon in many Latin countries.  In front of the Bund, they had lovely topiary in the median.


The Shanghai Bund goes along the Huangpu River with many buildings housing brokerage and trading houses.  The area is known as the equivalent of Wall Street in New York.  The scenery was lovely walking along the Bund during the day, but it's breathtaking at night, so I'll only give one shot just yet.


After walking the Bund, we walked a few blocks away to the City God Temple Bazaar.  This was yet another shopping center,  housed in traditional buildings.  After walking the Bund and to the Bazaar, I was ready for some sitting time.  I walked through a few aisles and took some pictures.  Then I found a McDonald's on a corner with one seat open at a counter where a bunch of young adults were sitting just reviewing the phones.  I chose that opportunity to join them and act their age while Chrissy did some more window shopping.  I'm not sure why the traffic lights were still functioning.  The roads were closed to vehicle traffic while we were there.


After hanging out there for a while, we headed to the port for a night cruise on the river.  Many people said you could see the lights from the Bund, so they opted to not pay the extra for the night cruise, deciding to just hang out on the Bund and look at the lights.  I don't think we would have enjoyed the lights nearly as much on the Bund as we did on the river itself.  Mostly because I'm still having some issues with balance and such, but also because the idea and price were excellent, we opted to take advantage of the VIP section of the ship.  It came with outdoor/deck or lounge seating (instead of standing on the deck) and included a bottle of beer or water and a box of Chinese pretzels per person.  The pretzels reminded me more of crispy grissini breadsticks than pretzels, but they were delicious.  I think the cost of this was something like $5 per person.  I highly recommend taking the cruise with the VIP room.  It was hard to choose what to post, so there are a lot of pix and videos.  Just FYI, most of the still shots that are actually well focused were taken by Chrissy. 









For some reason, Blogger isn't allowing me to upload videos.  I hate loading them to YouTube and then embedding them here, but that's apparently my only option right now.  Hope that glitch gets fixed soon.  Hope it's not "operator error" and actually a glitch that will get fixed.

After the cruise, we headed to the hotel we would be staying in for the next two nights.  This time, it was a Howard Johnson.  Very upscale as compared to the same chain in the US.


Once we got settled in and had supper, Chrissy went out with some of the younger people on the trip with us.  I had a quiet evening to myself, but still didn't have the energy to pull out the computer, ergo the delay getting these posts finished.

The next morning, we headed to the museum.  Chrissy had a headache and didn't feel well, so she did the sitting on the benches and in the coffee shop this time, though I had my own sits time, too.  Most of the other kids on the trip slept in and just met us at the next stop.  I do love a museum, and this one was no different.  I ended up having to rush through a couple of exhibits and missed a few, so a second viewing wouldn't be out of the question.  The museum covered everything from the history of Chinese money, to traditional clothing for various regions, to weaponry and navigation, ceramics, imperial seals and furnishings, and so many other things.  Here are just a few shots.







After the museum, we headed to the train station to ride the MagLev. Magnetic levitation trains are known for their speed, but this one is supposed to be the fastest one in the world.  It only runs at top speeds during rush hour, so we were there for the afternoon rush.  It was really awesome.  When the trains going opposite ways passed by each other (on separate tracks, of course), the momentary disturbance in pressure was startling!  I took some video to show how fast the scenery was going past, but the reflection on the glass ruined the effect.  They display the speed over the doors separating the cars.  Chrissy still wasn't feeling well.



After the train, we all headed to an underground flea market type of place.  It wasn't on our itinerary.  George said it also didn't have a name because it is supposedly a true black market.  As George was fond of saying, the government watches with one eye closed.  At the market, Chrissy got some glasses for super cheap and a pair of Adidas sneakers.  I found a folding video drone for about a quarter of what we were looking at in the US.  The had an entire section of tailors for making various types of clothing.  George said a tailor-made suit runs approximately $100.  He didn't know how much women's clothes were.

By this time, I was feeling worn out, and instead of getting better as the day went on, Chrissy was just going downhill.  By now, she's running a pretty serious fever, just based on the feel of her skin when I hugged her.  We didn't get any pictures in here, but it looked like a normal flea market.  Apparently, there were some other folks on the trip who had been feeling poorly on and off during the trip, and some of them offered some remedies for her to use.  When we got back to the hotel, Chrissy just went straight to bed.  She was feeling a little better in the morning, but she was still dragging when we went to the airport, and she slept through most of the flight home.  After a few days, she felt better, though.

As I said before, this trip is definitely worth the price, but be aware that the pace is grueling, and there will be many hard sales presentations.  But for $399 per person for air fare, accommodations, transportation, and some of the attractions, it was worth it.