I hadn't realized the American Road Trip is an institution but I was about to be initiated....  Brendan, Courtney and I had opted to drive from Boulder to San Luis Opisbo instead of fly, to save money and we also needed Siri's car down there for her to get about.  The drive would take us over the Rockies in Colorado, into Utah, through Nevada (including Las Vegas) and finally to California, over 1300miles away.

The trip got off to a good start with a heavy snow storm the night before, someone blocking the car in and Peaberry Coffee Shop opening late but finally we pulled out of Boulder at 6am. You have never seen so much stuff crammed into a station wagon and to think Siri thought we would be able to fit a treadmill in as well is beyond me!  I had the hot seat in the back with all the gear including two boxes of food we couldn't bear to leave behind and you never know.....we just might get stranded and hungry athletes was not something any of us wanted to deal with. 

Brendan took the first driving stint through the mountains in the snow, which came as a big relief to me (& probably the others!) as I have never really driven in snow.  This gave me ample opportunity to hang out of the window and take photo's....I still can't believe any of them came out as we were traveling about 60mph but then again, technology is pretty amazing these days although I did managed to loose my favorite Rudy Project sunglasses out the window! To me, the time seemed to fly by as it made a nice change to be sitting on my butt, watch the scenery fly by and chat with the others...Oh no subject got left unturned!  Glenwood Canyon was awesome especially in the snow, as you can see from the picture. After about 4hrs we pulled over in Glenwood Springs for breakfast #2....how good did that coffee and egg/bacon wrap taste as you can see from the smiles on Brendan & my face.

We had one other stop that day to collect some Colorado wine for our home-stay. I had little expectation, so we decided tasting was a must.  I was pretty surprised to find a really good Chardonnay & Merlot, but of course we had to taste everything just to make sure we got the best one's....God life as a triathlete can be really trying sometimes!  We also managed to polish off their beautiful display of cheese and biscuits before hitting the road again.

This was the only stop we made that day except to fill up with gas and swap drivers, so by the time we pulled into Las Vegas at 7.30pm (which was really 8.30pm for us) we were exhausted.  We stayed in the luxurious Howard Jones Inn specially selected for it's cheap room rates and the fact it offered a pool. A super quick transition saw us back out the door in 20minutes, (Siri would have been impressed) to catch the shuttle up to the strip. We were all starving, so opted for the all-you-can eat buffet at the Luxor (Egyptian-style hotel). One thing you have to understand is that Siri worked us to the bone in the 4days leading into this trip. I remember being in tears for our last swim workout it was so hard and I my body was in bits, and she had said, "If you guys get through this, you can do whatever you want for 2days."  WOW, I didn't need to hear that twice........
After eating way more that I thought was humanly possible, we all ended up sitting (well lying really) in our booth sipping coffee trying to sum up the energy to actually move.  I sat there looking at people carrying plateful after plateful of food to their tables and wanted to stop them all saying, "It's not worth....you will feel so sick if you stuff that much in."  Would I have listened an hour ago?  Probably not, so I don't think I had a hope of saving any of them from the feeling I was going through. It would have been so easy to slink back to the hotel and go to sleep but we had a one night special in the gambling city of the world.....no time to waste, off to the casino we go. 

I have never really been much of a gambler, except for the horses if I ever went to the races but it would be fun to try something new.  Knowing my addictive nature, I should of know better as I soon became fed-up with the slot machines and ventured further into the labyrinth in search of the promise of free drinks. The casino Gods must have been looking down and chuckling to themselves, another one falls into the trap.....it's like leading lambs to the slaughter.  We all opted for an empty table playing a kind of Chinese Roulette wanting to avoid an big first-timer errors.  I felt so proud of myself as I managed to make US$10 last for an hour and started to feel more confident.  Courtney was keen to give Black Jack a go so after trying to sit ourselves at a $100 minimum bet table and making a hasty exit, we finally got a seat at a $5 table.  Now we were worthy punters and the free drinks started to flow.....excellent, maybe this wasn't going to be such an expensive night after all.  Courtney was definitely the Black Jack queen and made $30 last an eternity.  We all had a load of fun and ended up heading back out the door at 1.45am after being up for 20hrs....just in time to catch our shuttle back to the hotel.

We feel out of bed the next morning and with the great idea of a swim only to find the pool about 12m long and below 50F......why is it pictures on the web can make it look like a 30m tropical pool with palm trees?  We piled into the car in search of coffee and were soon back on the road as we still had about 7-8hrs of driving.  Are next port of call was a small town of Baker, where we decided to stop for our long run, sample some fresh jerky & grab lunch at the Mad Greek Restaurant.  I never thought I would ever be able to say, that I had run in the Mojave Dessert.  It was pretty cool running across the sand and dodging the cacti and not as hot as I expected but then again, it's winter time here.  Later that afternoon, the stress of the trip was starting to show although we didn't have any major toys out of pram episodes but would all be glad to see SLO on the horizon. We eventually pulled into our home-stay at 10pm barely able to hold our eyelids open to find Joel had made the most heavenly chocolate brownies for us.....OK, I was ready to go again!

More from SLO soon.

Cheers Claire