An Unexpected Journey

A week ago, R's college roommate G half-jokingly floated the idea of going to watch NBA Summer League in Las Vegas, in particular to see the Chicago Bulls' 2nd round draft pick and fellow Illini, Ayo Dosunmu. Despite the short notice, R found someone to switch work days with him, G was able to rearrange his daughters' schedules, and my colleague graciously offered to tend my lab experiment. By Monday night we were a go for launch!

Unfortunately, the bummer was that it wouldn't be all 8 of us. G's wife just started a new position and couldn't play hooky from work, and J had already planned a trip to Seattle with his buddies. 

And what about M?  Having turned 21 at the end of last year, of course he was all in from the moment he heard "Vegas!"

Since we couldn't check in until after 3PM, we took our time getting on the road this morning. And with the knowledge that the Steak 'n Shake in Victorville was back in business (it was closed when we tried to eat there in 2018), naturally we stopped for an early lunch.

Continuing my quest from earlier this summer, after lunch we hit the Mojave River Valley Museum and the Route 66 Mother Road Museum in Barstow for Mojave National Preserve and Old Spanish National Historic Trail passport stamps. Even though they aren't official units in the NPS, it's still fun to visit these little museums and learn about local history.

The Route 66 Mother Road Museum is housed inside the Casa del Desierto, a Harvey House which opened in 1911 and closed in 1971. Harvey Houses were restaurant-hotels which catered to passengers traveling by rail in the western U.S. Seeing the Route 66 memorabilia inside the museum was also a nice way to complement our visit to the Route 66 Museum in Pontiac, IL earlier this summer. In the course of our family road trips over the years, I think that we have managed to cover a good portion of Route 66 - one day we'll have to drive it end-to-end in one shot!

Due to the decrease in tourism during the pandemic, the hotel/casino where we usually stay in downtown Vegas was closed, and the rates for its sister property were unusually high. So we booked a room at Downtown Grand, a few blocks away. G and his daughters arrived about the same time we did, but since they wanted to go to the pool, we decided to walk around and see what kind of freebies M could get by signing up for various casinos' players cards.  

Then we headed over to the Golden Nugget to meet up with R's cousin and his wife, who just happened to be in town this weekend, too. In fact, two more of his cousins are also here, but we're not sure if our schedules will allow us to get together. It's probably a safe bet that we could find someone from R's side of the family in Vegas on any given weekend, even when we're not having a reunion!

Love our ʻohana!

We met G's family for dinner at Market Street in the Cal - no pics of the saimin, loco moco, and butterfish because we were hungry! And yet another casualty of the pandemic is that Aloha Specialties and Lappert's have limited hours, so we didn't get any ice cream after. But we have plans to get donuts in the morning...