Cue Obese Chanteuse

We left Las Vegas around 11am, and proceeded to drive through the Mojave desert. This eventually turned into hills, and we saw a bunch more windmills, which Kacey once again demanded that I photograph. We stopped at a ridiculously windy gas station, where the wind blew the car's gas cap fuel door thing closed repeatedly. EXCITING!

At some point along the way, we realized this was it. There were no more fun stops, no more diversions. We probably should have realized it a lot sooner, but the point was this: we weren't on vacation any more. There was no turning back and driving home to Orlando. Across this unfamiliar land full of new sights, we were driving home. For Kacey, it was a home she hadn't seen before, except for a picture or two on craigslist. I was somewhat worried that she wouldn't like the place I had picked out a few weeks earlier on a trip to San Francisco. But I still had an enormous half of an enormous sandwich to keep me from worrying too much. Alternating comforting bites of turkey, pastrami, coleslaw and rye, I listened intently to election results on NPR as each mile brought us closer to our new home by the Pacific.

Between adjustments to the radio tuner to keep NPR audible, I made a phone call. We arranged to meet our new landlord at the new apartment around the new 9pm, and we arrived in the new city around the new 8:00. Presumably because of the extra hour, Kacey told me that she had developed some sort of instinctual navigational system and wanted to try to find the apartment by feel rather than having me navigate for her. This may very well be the craziest thing she has ever said to me, but I stopped keeping track a long time ago. We ended up in the Castro, San Francisco's most fabulous neighborhood, where there were numerous people celebrating Obama's victory in the streets. The resulting commotion and unexpected pedestrians, combined with my lack of faith in Kacey's mystically acquired navigational skills, transformed her from a small, docile and adorable creature into a 5'3" ball of white hot rage. After about 25 of the most challenging minutes of the trip, we eventually set a course to the new apartment. At about 8:57pm, we reached our new home. Barren, dusty, and with repairs scheduled for the next day, the apartment welcomed us.

We had reached the end. But in many ways, we have reached the beginning. Between jobs, between homes, and between destinations, being on the trip was like existing in limbo. As much fun as we had, the prospect of standing on firm ground again is kind of appealing. Until the earthquakes start.

Saying goodbye and packing everything up in Orlando was like closing a chapter of our lives. Or mine at least; I don't know what kind of crazy stuff goes on in Kacey's head. The trip was full of new experiences, but also reminders of the past and visions of the future. As we begin the next chapter of our lives, we want to say thank you again to everyone who has helped us along the way, whether by taking us in, helping us out, or simply making us smile. We hope to see or talk to all of you again soon, and we hope that you have enjoyed following us on this journey. We've enjoyed sharing it with you.

What manner of zany adventures await our heroes? Find out on the Hav-Wartz blog. You're already on it; just come back in a few days or so and there will probably be something new. Oh, and here's a hint: it's likely to involve working, sleeping, or eating. All of which mean raw, unrestrained adventure and excitement.

Sin City

So we checked into the Mirage hotel around 4pm and spent about an hour wandering through the lobby of the hotel and casino. We had tickets to Cirque du Soleil "Love" (choreographed to the Beatles) at 10pm, so after grabbing a couple drinks we went for a walk on the strip. We watched a "peformance" of the Bellagio fountians, walked through Caesars Palace and were asked (while holding hands), "whether we were married or just practicing" two different times by the same person. Apparently marriage is really just a question of whether or not you are holding your partner's hand just right. Gentle with a protective grip maybe? I'll ask my parents later.

We returned to the Mirage and ate dinner at Carnegie's, a deli which is popular in New York City. Chris, after a fair warning by our waiter, ordered this.

Everyone stopped to stare when the waiter brought this monster out of the kitchen. Half of that sandwich tagged along for the remainder of the trip.

After dinner we took a brief nap and woke up to go see "Love." I bought a 5 dollar Sprite, which Chris wasn't too thrilled about; but it was sold in a commemorative cup and now we have something to cherish the experience forever:) The show was fantastic. It wasn't a typical cirque performance because it had a little more singing and dancing than flipping and flying, but it was a great balance of acrobatics, music, and theatrics. Plus the visuals were stunning. We both really loved "Love."

After sleeping in our seriously amazing beds, we woke up the next morning ready to gamble! We each started with 25 dollars. I know it sounds lame, but we were playing the nickle slots and it would have taken forever otherwise. Chris won 71 dollars at one point on a quarter slot machine and of course I lost all of my money. In the end we broke even, which happens to be the key ingredient for an uninteresting blog post.

Lets do a final recap of our trip through sin and back:

Scandalous attempt number one: Get Wasted!
We each had one drink.

Scandalous attempt number two: Gamble all our savings away!
We broke even.

Scandalous attempt number three: Dessert for breakfast!
Score!!!

So in the end, it was for the best that our worst offense was a sweet breakfast, because on our way out we saw this guy. And no one wants to offend him this time of year.

Las Vegas Photos

Dam you, Colorado River!

We were driving down the highway in Arizona when we saw a sign that said something about a security checkpoint we had to pull through. When we stopped, the following exchange took place:

Security guy: "Do you have any food?"
Kacey: "Not any more." (I have no idea what this meant, or what cataclysmic event she was alluding to)
Security guy [looking at a container of rice in the back seat on a stack of food packages and baking supplies]: "What's that, rice?"
Kacey: "Oh, yeah."
Security guy: "Go ahead."

I'm not sure if I should be more concerned at Kacey's apparent inability to classify food items, or the security guy's lack of interest in her blatant lies. In any event, this is how our Hoover Dam experience began.


So the dam is like... big and stuff. We weren't initially planning on stopping there, but we were a little ahead of schedule so we decided to do the basic self-guided tour. Kacey quickly read through the exhibits and proceeded to take pictures of the dam itself, while I leisurely filled in the gaps of knowledge from middle school about how electricity is made. Oh and muckers. They are important. I had no idea how wide of an area is served by the water and power provided by the dam. Seriously I think next year they're going to start irrigating the moon with it.

In all honesty, I never thought much about the dam before I got there, but it was pretty cool and interesting, so much so that I annoyed Kacey by slowly reading almost everything I could and just staring at the vastness of it. Sometimes I like to pretend I know things about engineering, which is completely untrue. But seeing stuff like the dam makes me think that engineering could have been a fulfilling career path. Then I remember that I like seeing dinosaurs move. And shiny objects.

The Hoover Dam is a triumph of engineering and the human spirit. Kind of like a Turducken.

Hoover Dam Photos

Alien insurance?

Leaving Carlsbad we had originally planned on camping at Bottomless Lakes State Park and visiting Roswell the next morning. But because our visit to the caves was shorter than anticipated, we decided to stay the night at a hotel in Roswell instead. Of course this drastically increased our chances for an alien encounter, but a nice bed with blankets will always win over a cold desert floor(at least when one's camping gear is buried in the depths of their trunk). Additionally, I think most of our warm blankets were waiting for us in a box at the greyhound station in San Francisco.

We arrived at a hotel around 5pm and when they asked how much we wanted to insure our belongings for against alien abduction/destruction, I didn't know what to say. Do aliens use laser beams these days or mind powers? If lasers, the damages would be irreparable. I can afford a little emotional therapy for my toothbrush but if the bristles are burnt to ash I just can't work with that. This involved way too much research so we decided to just try our luck. Besides, isn't it true aliens want to abduct your body, not your toiletries or feather pillows. At least this was my understanding. Maybe I would learn different at the museum the next morning.

The museum admission was 5 dollars a person. We each got to wear a neon green sticker which would allow us to return all day until 5pm!! It is hard to believe that the whole Roswell phenomenon began with one man's discovery of some unfamiliar metal on a farm. Mac Brazel, you are a legend.

The museum was a spacial time-line, including pictures of UFOs and crop circles, various gov't attestations, and plenty of pop culture memorabilia(this is for Becky). And as the grand finale to our self guided tour, we found ourselves facing a reclined prosthetic alien being! Good show UFO museum. Good show.

The true spirit of this small town could not possibly be captured within the walls of this museum. If anything it was a barrier to the real and true Roswell. Stepping outside one could see this was a town of acceptance. Look at the Arby's photo above. They will serve aliens, and probably with a smile.

America voted for a black president this year, and I imagine Roswell would have no problem voting for a green one either.

Roswell photos: http://flickr.com/photos/kcjane84/sets/72157608802547551/

Carlsprettygood

I read this cool essay by Ansel Adams while we were at the Carlsbad Caverns park, in the Chihuahuan desert in New Mexico (which apparently has more biodiversity than the Everglades). The essay was enlightening and inspiring. Unfortunately, college trained me too well to forget everything I read after a few days, and I'm writing this post from the future. I contacted the park to ask them what the title of the essay is so I can find it again. I'm waiting to hear back. I think it was about the fragility, connectedness, timelessness, and beauty of nature. Which seems typical of something you'd read at a national park, but somehow I thought it was special. So there.


The Big Room is something like 700 feet underground. Before we got there, for some reason I thought I had read that the underground chamber was 700 feet tall. And I had seen an image that I thought was enormous natural stone pillars leaning on each other. Which I also thought were 700 feet tall. It kind of reminded me of the Mines of Moria from Fellowship of the Ring. But somehow I was wrong on both counts. Although the chamber is quite large (I think the largest in the western hemisphere in some category, like a natural limestone cave or something), its ceiling is nowhere near that high from the floor. And I have no idea what image I had seen, because I didn't see any such enormous natural freestanding pillars.


What we did see, though, was still pretty spectacular. There was one quote from an early explorer of the cave (or maybe it was Ansel Adams) about it being both creepy and beautiful, and just about the most alien-feeling place on earth. That seemed fitting. Almost everthing was a pale off-white color, with some very faint hints of colors in different areas (I guess the lighting they use is supposed to reveal the natural color of the formations). You can read all about how the caves were formed online, I don't know if it's something I should bother getting into here because I'm bound to omit or misquote something. Well... I'll try real quick. Basically, acid and acidic water carved away the limestone to form the caverns, and then trickling groundwater slowly deposited minerals and created all the "decorations," or stalactites, stalagmites, columns, draperies, popcorn, and soda straws. A lot of the decorations look like specific forms, like lions' tails, people, and gothic architecture. There were other cool things too, like huge blocks of gypsum, fallen boulders, and lots of bat guano. Apparently the caves were discovered by following the thousands of bats that make their homes their in the summer. Discovered in the Christopher Columbus sense I mean. I guess we missed the bats' nightly exodus from the cave's natural opening by just a few weeks, which is something I'd definitely want to see if I make it back there again.

So... not quite what I expected, but pretty cool. If you are ever in the area, I'd recommend it. Apparently the guided tours are pretty good, but we didn't end up doing one.

Our Carlsbad Caverns photos
Also, if you are feeling like a traitor, you can check out some of the National Park Service's photos.

Texas poop-rise.

After a fun night in Amarillo (as described below), we embarked on a long drive through Texas to reach our next destination. During about 90% of that stretch manure air filled our car like one would expect gas to fill any small gray 2005 chamber on four wheels.

In addition to the foul scent, this section was probably the least interesting of the entire drive (aside from a new found ability to see past vast land expanses). With that said, no one will probably bother clicking any photo link I make now...so I will just force you to look at pictures by including them in this post.

Interesting Picture One: Cotton Field.

Interesting Picture Two: Damn, I think the cotton was about all I got.

Don't think we will be seeing you again too soon Highway 62.