Las Vegas Motor Speedway, March '07

This is the first time we’ve planned a Nascar Race weekend with other people. We’ve always gone to the races alone, as Nascar fans are scarce.

This race we’ll be meeting with Rob & Louise of El Dorado Hills at the track, who are leaving a couple of days earlier than us.

We will caravan down with Les & Laurie from Folsom.


We’ll all be camped together at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

We plan on leaving this morning at nine. Right -- left at 9:40am, but I had the attitude if we got out by ten it was cool. We drove over the Sierra’s and got to view the vast amount of snow we have just received. It was a nice day to be on the road. We met up with Les and Laurie in Boomtown. We had lunch there and headed towards Highway 95 to go south to Hawthorne Nevada.

It was an uneventful trip to our overnight stop in Hawthorne Nevada. Although, it was an odd occurrence when we stopped for fuel in Fernley. Patty went inside to pay the $2.77 a gallon for the 160 gallons we took on. The cashier said to Patty, “I know your bus. It’s from Citrus Heights”. She had moved from there to Fernley recently, and had previously seen it going through town. That was fun for the ole girl (the bus not Patty) to be recognized so far away. She said she thought this is how Brittany Spears must feel.

Arriving in Hawthorne, Les & Laurie broke out a veggie tray and we snacked on this and beer before going inside and checking out the El Capitan Casino. The place was fairly busy with live music on a Wednesday night. We did a quick walk through stopping for a couple of dances to the music of the band and went back to our motorhomes. We’ve stayed here before. They have free RV parking with a dump station so here we are and we turned in for the night.

Leaving Thursday morning we stopped about 12:30PM in Beatty. We had a very good Mexican lunch at the (I can’t remember restaurant) – it’s on the north end of town, east side of the road. The Salsa was so good we bought a couple of pints to take with us, along with some corn chips.

Coming into Las Vegas we came across the Thunderbirds practicing air maneuvers directly over us. They swooped across our bow in a formation of four followed by another two. We hear they’ll be entertaining us at the track this weekend. We continued on to North Las Vegas arriving late in the afternoon. We had realized along the way I forgot all my riding gear, including a helmet. Just before arriving at the track we came across a large motorcycle dealership. We pulled in and bought another helmet. That’s three I have now. Maybe I should just leave one in the bus full time. Without spending too much time in this store, we got to the speedway. We’re staying in the Hollywood parking lot where we met Rob and Louise who were already parked in their brand new 34 foot 5th wheel made by Carriage. It’s a nice setup, and they are real happy to have it. This is its inaugural run.


We jockeyed our vehicles into place and unloaded the bikes. Les was gracious enough to trailer our bikes down behind his pickup truck with a camper. Les and Laurie lost their practically new motorhome last month in a horrific accident. The motorhome is probably totaled but fortunately they weren’t hurt. However, four others lost their lives in that wreck. So he jumps up and buys this camper to get him through until he figures out what his insurance company will decide. It didn’t take us too long to get all setup for the weekend.





Then we spent the evening snacking on BBQ chicken and warmed up pizza, and turned in before midnight.
Waking up Friday morning we’ll be leaving on our bikes about 10:30AM heading north for about an hour to ride through the Valley of Fire. This is Nevada’s oldest state park having been established since 1935. This isn’t a large park, but you could spend a whole day here at least. The rock formations are incredible and just take you back some. Much like Bryce National Canyon in Utah does if you’ve ever seen it. Only here we’re riding through it! There are those so strange patterns of rock formations created by the erosion of sandstone.

We did a short hike to Mouse’s Tank. It’s a pit that holds rain water and was named after a renegade Indian that hung out there. Afterwards, we hiked back to the bikes and did some more riding through these spectacular structures of rock on great well-maintained twisty roads.

Exiting the east side of the park, we headed south along the banks of Lake Mead. These are beautiful mountains, but missed by so many that come here due to being lured and sucked into the casino trap. It was a ride to be taken if you get out this way.
Coming back to the speedway, I discovered my bad sound coming from my transmission is actually my clutch going out. It was failing and on today’s return trip and I had to shift without using the clutch at times. I was worried if I stopped at a light I might not get going again. But, we hobbled back to camp and will park it for the rest of trip. We had planned on going into town one night on the bikes, but now we won’t be doing that this year.

We spent the evening chatting and drinking a few beers. We BBQ’d a steak for dinner. Lots of people walking by stop and admire the bus. Many take pictures of her. She’s pretty decked out in Nascar décor this trip. Even had a visitor stop by that we had met at the Beulton Bluebird rally last October. He recognized the bus and stopped by to say hello. The evening ended about midnight. The old bus has been center stage on this trip, flushed with joy at all the admiration received.

Got up Saturday morning and fried up some potatoes with warmed up leftover steak and a couple of eggs for breakfast. After breakfast, we walked about a mile to the track.

Today is Les' birthday. We expressed to him how sorry we were about that. Happy Birthday Les!


Stopping at one of the vendor trailers, Les and Laurie bought a radio scanner and headsets.



Rob and Louise were in the grandstands when we arrived there. We have great seats just before turn one, row forty-eight. We view the start/finish line and most of pit road. We’re high enough we can see the entire track. Nascar may be the only sporting event you pay more to be further away from the game than any other sport. You pay more for the higher seats, and we have great seats. It was a great finish to the Busch series race with Kyle Bush crashing into Jeff Burton trying to hold him back as Burton won and Bush taking second in reverse. This all unfolded right in front of us.


After the race we came back and fixed up some hot links, Turkey, nuts, veggies, chips and avocado dip, tortellini and marinara sauce.



A little later a young women comes by and said she was from a web-based company filming a documentary about Nascar and it’s fans. They are going to every race this year to create this documentary. The company is called Trackside Nights, “the original site for Nascar Party Animals”. She asked if we minded if they shot some footage of our bus. Of course we agreed, and then ended up in about a half-hour interview.




. It concluded with them telling us they were going to have a contest at 9:30 and could win up to $1,000 playing this TV game called “Deal or No Deal”. So we showed up at their motorhome later for that and we’re standing with crowd when they asked a Nascar trivia question. I knew the answer, but was reluctant to just blurt it out, but no one in the crowd knew the answer, so I just stepped forward and answered correctly. Unbeknownst to me, that’s how one ends up playing the game for the grand. So now I’m playing this game, and Patty along with the crowd is helping me play it and we ended up winning $200. That was cool, and sure helps defer the high price of beer these days. So they said we’d be on their web site in about thirty days from now at http://www.tracksidenights.com/


Sunday morning, and we’ve set our clocks ahead one hour. It’s supposed to be 80 degrees today, which is about ten degrees higher than normal here. Although it a bit windy, it sure feels nice to be in the desert after a winter season. We’re headed to the track today for a 1:30PM start time. Today’s the Nextel Cup Race. With this being a brand new track you can expect a wreck-fest. They refurbished this track over the winter. Completely gutted the old track and put one in that went from 12 degree banking in the corners to twenty degrees. The track is very fast and quite slick. The drivers are complaining that the Goodyear’s tires are a bit hard for the surface so we expect there will be many cautions. Cautions are not a good thing for race fans.
We got to the track around 11:00AM. We walked through the many vendors and commercial displays to collect our free stuff like we always do. The pre-show started at 12:30PM. We were entertained by the Blue Man Group. They were good percussionist, but the sound system wasn’t that good.




Then these fools (Para gliders) came flying out of the sky at mach I pulling up to land on their feet graciously.

Next the Air Force Thunderbirds put on an exhibition that made you oooohhh and aaaawww, followed by an aerobatic helicopter. They actually flew this thing upside down. Robin Leach (Life Styles of the Rich & Famous) introduced the drivers. The race was really good, and won by Jimmy Johnson who we would have bet on if we’d gone into town like planned on Friday night, but losing the clutch on my bike prevented that. Jeff Gordon finished 2nd. A good day for my guys! I think there were nine cautions. Not too bad actually, and certainly not as bad as many of us thought it might be.



After the race with trinkets in hand we went back to camp and commenced doing what we’ve been doing everyday. Eating and drinking, but we did get the bikes loaded up on the trailer early in the evening, as Les & Laurie are leaving early in the morning to make it back in one day. Patty and I will take two days, and Rob & Louise even more.

We continued to have quite a few people stopping in to check out the bus throughout the evening, and one of them dragged us off to his camp. We ended up there for the night and got back sometime after two in the morning. As it turns out, these guys are from Vernal Utah. Thirty-five miles from where I used to live in Neola. So we exchanged personal info to look them up when we’re there this coming July to celebrate the Mormon Pioneer Days in White Rocks Canyon, on our way further to Colorado Rockies National Park. Small world as they say.



We woke up Monday with the area looking quite empty. Most had left by now. Glancing around it is remarkable how there is no loose trash. Everything is bagged and stacked on the road for the trash guys to pick up. Good to see your fellow fan being responsible regardless of the environment we’re all in. So we get up and get things put away to leave ourselves. Les & Laurie are gone. We take a look at the map to help R&L figure out their way, and everyone changes their plan. Rob & Louise were going to go through Vegas and up 395 to Mammoth Mountain. Instead they decided they’d take 95 norths. We were going to take 95 but changed it to 93 towards Ely Nevada. We got ourselves on the road and about an hour into the trip Rob & Louise called and said they’d changed their mind again and had taken 93 instead of 95 and would catch us soon. Well they didn’t catch us and down the road, Patty and I changed course again ourselves. Then we thought we’d better let them know it. I called on the cell phone and Louise answered saying, “I was going to call you as we changed directions and decided to go to Ely instead”. I said, “that’s funny because we were calling to let you know we changed our mind and are going to Mammoth”! This is what I call scattered planning.

I’ve not been on 93 through Nevada before or least don’t remember doing so. It is another beautiful way to get across the state. The colors of the mountains are in part created by the sunlight glancing off the clouds that gather moisture from the Pacific Ocean. They stand boldly and yet are softened by the light. Nevada is just a good way to go.


It was a good plan to go this way. This took us to the 375, known as the Extraterrestrial Highway over to 6 East. Leaving hwy 6 to 120 was a bit nervy, as I’d heard this is a tough pull for a bus, but it is the Tioga Pass part of Hwy 120 going into Yosemite Park that’s to be warned about and this section of 120 east of 395 is twisty, but a good road and beautiful mountain passes with tall pines. Going west it takes you through “The Craters”. These are mountains created by volcano’s. The ground is like a Southern California beach. All sand and yet the trees are tall pines. Kind of unusual eh? This road drops you into the backside of Mono Lake. A side of the lake I’ve not seen before. Speaking of unusual, it’s Mono Lake.

Anyway, we get to Hwy 395 and turn north and soon we’re in the town of Bridgeport. If you read our Quartzite Arizona journal last month, you may recall we had lunch in this town at Rhino’s Bar & Grill. We know the food is good there, but we venture out for a different kind of meal this time. We decide to eat dinner at the Bridgeport Inn. The inn was built in 1877 and actually really quite quaint as you might imagine. Adorned by 1800’s style wooden chairs, the somewhat small tables are covered in cloth and the flowers on your right are real, with a candle burning for the evening’s setting. By the way, we’re the only ones in here during our meal.

Patty decides on shrimp scampi with rice pilaf and asparagus. I order a rack of lamb with baked potato and asparagus. We both have the ham hock and bean soup, and order a bottle of wine. We tried a house branded wine, and knowing this can be dangerous, we got a pleasant surprise in that it was a very good Merlot and reasonably priced.

During dinner, I inquired with the bartender in the next room, asking if he was knowledgeable about any RV parks in the area. He told me this is a fishing area and the season doesn’t start until April. All the RV parks are closed until then. He thought we might have to drive forty-five minutes to Topaz Nevada. However, after dinner as we were leaving the bartender mentioned if we didn’t care about hookups we could park at Buster’s Market & Liquor at the north end of town because “he has a big parking lot and doesn’t care”. After such a big meal and a day of driving it sounded real good. So we got settled in back off the main street and tucked up next to the Buster’s building. It was quiet and after a week of racecars and worse yet – race car fans, we were enjoying the quietness. We were in bed before nine.



Today it’s a run for the border, or so it may seem. This will be the final chapter to this trip and event. You may have noticed how route plans hasn’t worked out as scribed, and that they keep changing? Don’t leave me now. We get headed up 395 north and rather than go into Reno, and take I-80 in California down the mountain, we’ll try something new and different, because it’s been working out great so far.


We exit 395 in Minden Nevada – head west on Hwy 88 towards Jackson California. We turned off 88 for a few miles to have lunch at the Jackson Rancher-something or other – an American Indian tribal casino. It’s the last rode meal, and it must be a cheeseburger and fries right? So that’s what we order. We ate outside in the warmth of an 83-degree day. Took a walk through the casino for a look, and dropped a quick $24.00 on the house by way there generous slot machines and got the hell outta there.
We continued on up Hwy 49 through the old west towns known as “The Golden Chain”. We took 16 west and stopped for fresh veggies being sold in a town called Sloughouse. They’re grown right there, and are usually exceptional in taste and of course freshness. This place is close so we’ve bought here for years and do so whenever we pass this way.

Well, this concludes our trip story. We’re home at 7:30PM on a Tuesday night. It was a tremendous week with a ride of almost 1,200 miles (not including the bike rides). We were near the lowest part of the country, being Death Valley, which is below sea level to gazing at the tallest mountain in the “lower 48” of America of over 14,000 feet, Mt. Whitney. Amazingly, these two locations being from the highest to the lowest points in the country are only about 80 miles a part. And, did you know that Nevada has the greatest number of mountain ranges in the country? Surprised? Look it up.

The colors and shapes of the mountains experienced in more ways than just visual were again too difficult to describe accurately. Let me assure you Nevada is gorgeous if you give her a look beyond I-80. Aside from the many beautiful mountains, seeing the different species of cactus that thrives and survives in the various regions of Nevada is always fun to travel through and say hello to.

While at the track, the racing was excellent, the parties were up to par, winning some money in Vegas without going to a casino was fun, and the company of our fun-lov’n friends is the real special treat for us in having been able to share this little trip together.

Thanks for reading…