Journey

Tene and I got to Mountain View, California last night around 6:00 PM. I know the exact time because the storage center where we're keeping our stuff until we find an apartment closed at 6:00, and we barely made it in time to get our unit.

We decided to leave on Friday, and our plan was to travel through the night until we got to Mountain View at Ungodly Early O'Clock, whenever that ended up being. So, around noon on Friday we hopped into our rented U-Haul and started driving.

The first part of the drive was rather uneventful - no surprise, western Utah is little more than desert. Tene was at the wheel, and I was spending my time listening to my iPod (we have a radio transmitter) and singing. Somewhere around the Great Salt Lake we entered the first of many high wind areas. That was a little scary - U-Haul's are basically giant metal kites - and I was glad that I wasn't the one driving. It also started storming a little - rain was falling pretty constantly throughout the trip.

Utah's west desert area is desolate. There's nothing out there. I mean, there's sage brush, and a lot of dirt, and some tumbleweeds, but it's overall pretty empty. That's probably why it's called the west desert. But while we were driving we saw this weird thing in the distance. I took some pictures of it, remarked that it looked like a tree, and puzzled over what it was. Turns out it's something called "Metaphor: The Tree of Utah." So .. yeah. Utah has some random abstract art piece just sitting out in the middle of the desert. No real reason for it.

Shortly after the random artsy tree (which is what I searched for in order to find out what the heck it was) we got to the Bonneville Salt Flats. This is where the high-speed-mile tests are conducted (or, so said the placard erected at the rest stop). Tene and I got out and stretched our legs, and walked a ways out onto the salt flats. I don't believe I've ever seen them in real life before (and if I had, I don't remember it at all), and I was surprised at how un-Earth-like they look. It was also interested to be shown so clearly that salt - in all its deliciousness - is nothing more than a type of rock. I took a hard chunk of the salt flats (Tene pulled it up for me), and filled a water bottle with some loose salt/sand from the edge of the rest stop. Then it was my turn to drive.

I didn't drive long - I think I was behind the wheel for maybe an hour. I drove from the salt flats to Wells, Nevada, where I realized I was far too tired to keep driving. Tene took over again, and we had more uneventful driving between Wells and Winnemucca, Nevada - a 3 hour drive. At Winnemucca I took over and drove to Reno Nevada. Another 3 hour drive. Nevada is big ...

At Lovelock, Nevada I had my first hit of culture shock. It was pretty mild, all things considered, but it was still a little surprising. We stopped at a gas station - I needed some caffeine (thank you Starbucks Mocha Frappachinos - I realized after I started drinking it that I had wanted a Vanilla Frappachino, but ... oh well), and the truck needed to be refueled - and when I entered it I was hit by the very distinct smell of cigarette smoke and the distinct sound of gambling machines. This would never happen in Utah ... so it surprised me.

Lovelock had an interesting (and cute) romantic culture. At the gas station there were a bunch of locks available to buy in order to connect them to a chain somewhere - which is apparently stolen from a Chinese custom. I thought it was cute, and started thinking ways to implement it in a fantasy story. If anything comes of that, I'll put it on Truth in Lies.

So, I drive to Reno, Nevada. As we approached Tene and I discussed whether to push on through the night or if we should stop. We ended up deciding to stop for the night, and stayed at the Sands Regency hotel.

The girls had a bit of an adventure here. We weren't certain we could take them into the hotel with us, so we decided to keep them out in the truck. Had it actually been warm, I would have felt a lot better about this. We ended up putting them in their smaller temporary/training cage, and wrapping it up nicely with a blanket and some pillows, as insulation. I guess it worked out, because the girls were just find in the morning (if a little chilly to the touch) and two of the pillows, and the blanket, had been chewed a bit (and there was cotton in the nesting box that wasn't there the night before).

The next morning, Tene and I set off again at around noon. And the last leg of our adventure began. We soon crossed the Nevada-California border without trouble, and had to stop shortly thereafter so that our truck could be checked by the Agricultural department. The woman who was checking our truck seemed a little concerned when she saw my large cage in the back, but she made cute noises at the girls and we were sent on our way.

The drive through California was pretty uneventful. I was glad we had waited the night out - the mountains as we came down were beautiful, and I would have missed them had we gone through the night.

Then, as I said earlier, we got to Mountain View at around 6:00. It took about an hour to unload the truck with the help of our friend, Bancus, and then we dropped off the U-Haul and trailer.

I'm glad we're here, safe and sound, and I don't think I want to make another trip like that again. Unless I'm in my own car, then it might be okay.