Needles to Albuquerque

What a long day of driving!  Left Needles at 7:15 and between stopping for gas and pee breaks and to walk Cooper and to hunt up a mechanic for some over-the-phone advice, we didn't pull into Albuquerque until a little after 4:00, so 9 hours in the car.  Crazy.

I have some free travel advice:  never get a motel room when you really have to pee.  I should have stopped yesterday at Mcdonalds and peed and then found a room.  I also should have noted that on the big, tall motel sign (visible from the freeway) it noted "Vending Machines Available."   I honestly didn't see that in my urge to get a room and pee, but I can now say with great certainty that if a motel is advertising vending machines, it's a safe bet that it sucks.  And it did.  After I was in the room for a bit the negative aspects became quite apparent.  For one thing the TV was on one of those black trays that stick out of the wall and the screen was smaller than that of my laptop.  For another thing, there was one hand towel, one bath towel and one wash cloth and one teeny bar of soap.  So generous.  I didn't take a shower (too scary) so the towel situation wasn't too important but still, come on.  The beds were remarkably uncomfortable and the pillow was like sleeping on something stuffed with clumps of wadded up cardboard.  The person or persons in the room above me must have been insomniacs because they paced from one side of the room to the other all night long.  It was the sort of motel that has permanent "guests" and they all had tin foil on their windows, quite the charming decorating technique.  But hey, it was $39 plus tax!  What a bargain!  That should have been another clear indication of its worthiness.  No wonder we were out of there at 7:15 this morning.

The ride was mostly uneventful.  The speed limit in these parts is 75 mph so you can easily go close to 85, although I limit the Honda to 80.  There was some beautiful scenery, going through the mountains at about 7500 feet elevation and then in New Mexico some of the red, sculpted hills were quite nice.  One of the lights on my dash came on and because the Honda instruction manual warns you to never disregard those lights, I had to find someone in Winslow, AZ that had knowledge of Hondas, a task that was a little trickier than I anticipated.  Seems the locals are much more infatuated with American trucks and vans instead of small Japanese cars.  But I was persistent and eventually successful and was assured that the engine would be fine without emergency repair. 

We are in a fine hotel (i.e. motel) tonight with real pillows and nice sheets and good towels.  Cooper is already sleeping, being that he is exhausted after a long day in the car.  My decision for the evening is what to have for dinner, since I did not venture out of the motel room last night and am therefore a bit hungry for something other than cheese and crackers and peanut butter.  Too many peanut M&Ms were consumed in the car today so my stomach is asking for some kind of food that was actually grown, not produced in a factory.  Salad, perhaps.

Onward.

.