Las Vegas Bound

Day 16, Wed Oct 27th  (Santa Cruz - SF)

After spending a quiet day in Santa Cruz, we got word that our friends from Tsawwassen were making a road trip to San Fran, being about 70 miles away we drove back to meet up. It was also game 1 of the World Series between the SF Giants and the Texas Rangers. So we went back to the exact same parking garage and the exact same hostel we stayed in the first night in SF with relative ease. We went downtown to watch the game and there were people everywhere and I proceeded to get split off from the group and with no means of communication my night was over. At this point I really missed my cell phone and decided to from this point forward, I'll keep it turned off but on me in case of emergency.

-Jason

                                                           TEAM TSAWWASEN

Kent, Mark and Pete

Day 17, Thurs Oct 28th  (SF - LA)

We decided it would be a good idea to drive from San Fran to Los Angeles today and have a night out on the town. What we didn't realize, was that we would be driving all day and arrive into LA around 12 am and it would be too late to do anything. The night turned out into all of us hanging out in the hotel room before going to sleep. Not really a lot more to tell about today other than we saw a few cool views along the coast.

- Taylor





 Day 18, Fri Oct 29th (LA - Vegas)

Woke up this morning with a new brilliant idea, since the other guys were taking a detour to Vegas why don't we join them? It was only a 4 hour drive out and since we powered through the drive down the California coast to LA we thought we had a couple days to spare and we didn't really want to spend them in Los Angeles. So we headed on our way to the desert. We were just out of the suburbs of LA when we all felt this huge shutter in the van. We had to pull onto the shoulder of the I-15 where we discovered that we had blown a tire and the exhaust had come apart a little bit. Half an hour of our own road side assistance on the busy highway we were back on our way to the bright light city. We got into Barstow and decided that the outlets would be a great place for us to pick up some new clothes for our big night on town and grab some lunch and that's when I began to feel the terrible symptoms of food poisoning. Spent the entire time hunched over the bench while the boys did all the shopping, which could have been more painful for me then the actual sickness. Got a little bit out of my system then slept the entire drive to Las Vegas. Thought that since we were there might as well do it up and we stayed in the extremely over priced and un glamourous Luxor hotel. Once we got settled into the room, the boys got all dolled up and headed out and I went for a nap. Not the most ideal situation when you're only planning to be in Vegas for a couple days.

-Lisa

Day 19, Sat Oct 30th  (Las Vegas)

After a wild night in Las Vegas, finding out that they still use the standard 11am check out times I was amazed. We were forced out of the room and because there were 6 of us, we were separated in Vegas. We were using the 'turn your phone on and send one text, then turn it off for a bit, then turn it back on again and check later for a response' method so communication was moderately slow. Myself and Lisa being separated from Taylor and the Tsawwassen boys headed to the Hooters Hotel and Casino located just off the strip for lunch. We headed back to Luxor to meet up with the gang to find out the boys had left town. After having a few drinks and not really being done with Vegas I went on my phone and was able to book the Hooters Hotel and Casino for $90 a night which is a bit cheaper then a night in a US hostel. We spent the day checking out the strip, not really doing much, just being around the festivities got exciting. Saturday being the big Vegas night for going out dressed up we were a little upset that we didn't have costumes. We headed back to the room for a nap/shower then at about 9pm headed down for dinner, having a mad brain storming session we pretty much drew blanks. We finally came up with the idea of going as hooters girls, we b-lined it for the gift shop to see if they sold the hooters girls out fits and they did. So we all bought one and were ready for a night out on the town. I don't really think that I could explain the night... so I'll let the pictures do the talking.

-Jason

Day 20, Sun Oct 31st  (Las Vegas)

Well after an eventful night of dressing up as Hooter's girls on Saturday night, we all needed to do some poolside recovery and get ready for the real night of Halloween. After the retreated from the pool, we walked the strip some more checking out what was happening for Halloween that night. Finally, we ended back at the Hooter's casino where we thought we test our luck on some slot machines. Slots get pretty boring after a while and I was about to call it a day when I had 75 cents left in my machine. The slot machine was in credits of 25 cents and a 75 cent bet was the max bet one could make at a time. I decided I would just max bet my last pull and what do you know, I hit the jackpot! We didn't realize that I had won anything that good at first and it told us to get an attendant to retrieve the winnings. Turns out I won 6750 credits of 25 cents.... $1687.5, not bad! Back up to the hotel room it was to get ready for round two in our Hooter's costumes, but I ended up going for a nap while waiting for Jason and Lisa to come back to the room and just never woke up. All three of us took the option and stayed home for Halloween.

- Taylor

Day 21, Mon Nov 1 (Las Vegas - Jean)

After missing Halloween, we all decided that maybe it was time for us to slowly leave Vegas. We did a bit more walking around the strip and ended up at New York New York, where the boys took a ride on the roller coaster. It was  a little more intense then they had expected, so now it was recovery time for the ride and we decided to go the only place we felt comfortable and welcome in, the Hooters hotel. Me and Taylor snuck into the pool for a little r & r while Jason thought he would try his luck on the electronic black jack. His day ended with a huge win of $3. By the time me and Taylor felt rested enough to take on the rest of the day it was already dinner time and since we had yet to experience a buffet dinner on our trip we thought this would be the perfect night. We strolled on over to Mandalay Bay Hotel because the Hooters valet highly recommended it, but once we got there it was kind of a disappointment. They surprisingly had a lot of vegetarian options so I was happy, but the food was all pretty boring. We decided that with our full stomaches it was time to let go of Vegas and head on with our way.

-Lisa

Day 22, Tues Nov 2nd  (Jean - Las Vegas - Death Valley)

After spending the night at a random $29 casino hotel in the middle of no where we checked out with no hidden fee's. The hotel was about as nice as any we stayed in during our Las Vegas so we were a bit suspicious, so we paid cash. The reason we spent another night was because we were afraid of breaking down in the middle of nowhere after losing a tire on the way out and being without a spare tire. So we headed back to Las Vegas to track down a used tire store in the middle of no where which turned out to be a good move. Some nice Latino gangsters gave us a brand newish looking front right tire for $35 including installation, too good to be true, we paid cash once again. We were excited to get out of Las Vegas and onto the rest of our trip. We about two hours into the desert into the middle of nowhere, literally and stopped for lunch. Upon leaving 'death valley' we noticed a banging sounds as we accelerated. We diagnosed one of the rear axel u joints was cracked. We did a few 'mainers' listening to the noise to see if it'd go away until the drive shaft gave way and landed neatly on the exhaust. Everything else being intact, we set out to search Baker California for a u-joint. About 50% of the businesses on the main strip had been abandoned but it has about 6 of the nicest gas stations I've ever seen. They have two garages, 1 unfortunately isn't working because the owners are in jail for operating a meth lab. The other is one guy that is now charging absolute max price on everything because many people get stranded here (the most famous being Gene Simmonds) and are forced to pay whatever. We asked him for a quote for a u-joint and he claimed it would be $400USD just for him to get the part delivered here. We exercised about every other option (getting a tow using BCAA would of costed about $350) before we settled on waiting a day and using UPS to deliver a part from Napa. During all this, I think I had the same stomach flu Lisa had during the ride to Las Vegas and was bent over attempting not to spew. The free andy van tour has taken a turn for the worst.

-Jason

 Day 23, Wed Nov 3rd  (Death Valley)

So after spending the night in Baker (The gateway to Death Valley), we finally got a hold of UPS and NAPA to order the new U joint for andy. It took forever to finally arrange the two companies to pick up the parcel and send it on its way. We were not really sure why this was so difficult to figure out, it seems that no one has ever sent out anything from Barstow to Baker before. After talking to UPS, we received some bad news that the parcel could not be delivered the same via road but would take another day because it was being sent by air. It was too bad that we had to spend an extra day in Baker because now our trip to San Diego is going to be cut out, but it was nice to have a day where we literally had nothing to do but sit around. Hopefully tomorrow the part actually comes and we can fix the van and be on our way.

-Taylor

 Day 24, Thur Nov 4th - Death Valley-?

After another exciting night in Baker, watching countless hours of police shows, we were all pretty slow getting up today wondering what the day would have in store for us. With no hotel room and nothing else to do in the town while waiting for UPS to hopefully show up, we spent the day by the green pool in the 30 degree desert heat. You never really appreciate having a pool in this kind of weather until it's right there in front of you, teasing you and you can't actually jump in it. We found out our package information and figured that we had tracked the package from Barstow to Ontario California to Las Vegas, not the way you would have expected the package to come from. We were all sitting around when we noticed a brown UPS truck drive right by the hotel, not stopping. We were pretty crushed and confused because how many UPS trucks would actually be coming through Baker after all we had learnt about shipping packages and how it inconveniently isn't done ever here, when half an hour later the truck was back with our package! Now the boys are off working and making Andy Free again.

-Lisa