Thursday - January 22, 1998: Las Vegas, NV to Los Angeles, CA
What a long strange trip it's been...
It was with a good bit of sadness that we checked out of Circus, Circus in Vegas today, knowing that it would be our last home away from home before heading back to Oz...We delayed as much as we could; another stop at Starbucks, another hour or so at the Blackjack table (Hey, it's easier to gamble a left over 5 dollar chip than actually cash it in!). And then it was back onto the lonely highway...

The ride from Las Vegas to Los Angeles after rush hour, is a brisk 4.5 hours, happily so we can make the occasional return trip at a moments notice. There is a lot to see and do in Vegas, that costs little or no money, that we didn't even get to. So we've got plenty of reasons to return.

Just before crossing the NV/CA border, we made a quick stop for a late breakfast at Whiskey Pete's, a large last chance/first chance casino on the border. In the coffee shop there, Desi was startled to see what could have been an old old boyfriend of hers...but she wasn't sure since it was so many years since she'd seen him. After stalking around the edges of the room trying to get peeks at him and summon up the courage to actually walk over, she just decided to go for it and ask. Turns out, it wasn't him! But an astounding look-alike. Later verified by Brad that evening upon returning home and seeing the Christmas card photo that had come in while we were gone. The first card/photo from him in years. An astounding coincidence.

The traffic was light on the 10 as we drove through the San Bernadino valley and there saw Los Angeles rise out of the desert before us. Brightly lit, and just as we had left it. Like we had never left, for Brad, like we had been gone forever, for Desi. But for both, it was home, and we had a great sense of accomplishment and many memories under our belt that we'll hopefully be able to hang onto for a long long time. If not, we can always come back to these pages, and reminisce and relive it as though it was happening now. Much as we hope you did throughout our journey. We hope that it was at least half as much fun for you to follow as it was for us to both live it and bring it to you here...

With any luck, we'll do it all again sometime in the near future. B&D's Alaska or Bust!? Who knows?...It could happen...Stay tuned...