Flagstaff, AZ - February 22-23, 2013

So you're probably thinking  to yourself "oh man, another college basketball post?!" Well, yep, that's exactly what this is, with a little bit of the Hoover Dam tucked in there at the end! One of Robbie's coworkers Alex (we call him Lemons) came along on this trip as Northern Arizona University was playing the University of North Dakota in college basketball, and Lemons went to school at UND. He was pretty excited for this trip.

Those of you who don't know, Robbie and I don't have a car anymore, and we haven't had one since June 2013, so every time we go on a road trip, we rent a car. Luckily most casinos on the strip have car rental locations, and luckily we live right down the street from MGM Grand, so car rentals are really at our disposal. Plus, my company offers really good discounts on rentals, too! Most rentals that we get include a free upgrade, so we always opt for a Ford Edge or Escape, and the rental agent hasn't let us down yet! That being said, we picked up our car on Saturday morning, and were on our way by 10am. The game started at 6:30 MST, so we had plenty of time to get there on Saturday. We had been to Flagstaff once before for an NAU game, so we knew the driving routine pretty well. Usually the general thought is that in Nevada and Arizona, it's all desert wherever you go (that's what we thought before we moved here, anyway), but the drive to Flagstaff at least is very lush with pines, hills, and even the Colorado River and some cattle.

We finally got to Flagstaff and checked into our hotel, and we had a little bit of time to relax before heading to the arena. Flagstaff is a nice little city, and it always reminds me of my college city, UW-River Falls. Quaint is a word that comes to mind when thinking about both of the city's.

The arena where the NAU Lumberjacks play is called the Walk-up Skydome, an old football stadium that they converted into the basketball arena. It's really cool inside! And, like the name states, it's really a dome shape!

Being Robbie and Lemons were both cheering for UND (I was really indifferent), we got General Admission tickets and sat behind UND's bench. I just have to say, going into a small college like NAU and cheering for the away team is quite something. There usually aren't that many fans for the away team, and let's face it, who is going to travel from North Dakota to Northern Arizona???!!! We were three (ok, two, really) of only a handful of fans cheering for UND, and we did a great job of holding our own. There were also 2 fans who were cheering non-stop against the visiting team. They reminded me of me when I was in college! I also always enjoy listening to the pep band play at these small colleges. They did very well, and had a strong French Horn section with 5 horn players!!!

 

The game was actually pretty entertaining. NAU has a Junior on their team, Quinton Upshur, who is way too good to be playing for a small team like NAU, but it made for some fun plays, that's for sure! Also, UND has a Senior, Troy Huff, who was cleaning it upon the court, and we even got his attention during the game. Those 2 players put on a clinic during most of the game, and even dunked a few times!! I love dunks!! At one point, Huff was disappointed that he couldn't attempt an alli-oop! If he did that, I would've gone crazy. Alli-oops are my all-time favorite thing about basketball at any level. UND plays this coming Thursday at Southern Utah University in Cedar City, and Robbie and Lemons are talking about going because Huff, and the rest of his teammates were that fun to watch! UND  ended up winning 75-63, but we all left satisfied with the performance we had just witnessed.

We also noticed that Flagstaff got a new establishment, Chick-Fil-A, so we all went there after the game! It was alright!

On our way home the next day, we stopped at Hoover Dam, as Lemons has never been there before. We walked on the (fairly) new bridge, the best vantage point to see the Dam, and we allowed him time to walk on the Dam and take the sights in. While he was doing that, Robbie and I went to a look-outpoint high above the Dam, and zoomed in with my camera to see if we could spot him, but we couldnt. :(

After Hoover Dam, we made one final pit stop at a look-out over Lake Mead. That area is really beautiful, and it is also really alarming how much Lake Mead and the Colorado River depths have been receding. It's been quite the topic of discussion in this area.

                                      

 

Flagstaff is always a nice city to visit. On our way down to Flagstaff, I thought to myself, "man, it's crazy that we have lived in Vegas for not even three years yet, and we already have fun traditions like this." Look for a "Flagstaff 2.0" blog post around this time next year!!

"Life is either a great adventure or nothing." -Helen Keller

Los Angeles, CA - February 8-9, 2014

I can say with 100% confidence that this, our first trip to Los Angeles, will not be our last in 2014. I predict 3 more, at least. This trip was college basketball-centric, as USC was hosting UCLA. After going to the PAC-12 Tournament last year, it became a goal of ours to make it to each of the PAC-12 basketball arenas. 1 down, 11 more to go!! One of Robbie's coworkers, Hilary, went to college at USC, so we asked her to come along for the weekend, and she was in. It was a quick trip to LA (leave Vegas on Saturday morning, and get back on Sunday afternoon), but as always, it was really fun. After picking up our car rental and Hilary on Saturday morning, we were on our way. As we got closer to L.A., the fog was lifting in the valley, which made for a very picturesque drive!!!

It's inevitable that we run into some type of traffic in LA, and this time was no different. We had just hit the eastern suburbs of LA with our destination being Long Beach, and traffic was at a stand-still, at 2:30pm mind you! But with map skills like a wizard, Robbie came through yet again, and got us to Long Beach without taking one freeway after we left the 605.

We stayed in Long Beach because Hilary had some college friends who lived there. So we decided to stay aboard the Queen Mary, and old ship that was restored into a hotel. We had seen the Queen Mary on our honeymoon, and we always thought it would be fun to stay in. Before the basketball game, we quickly checked in, and were off. Although I wasn't able to get any pictures at that time, I did get a few that night when we returned, and the next morning, so I'll just talk about our experience now. We knew the Queen Mary was restored into a hotel, so we stayed there for the experience. Neither of us had ever been on a ship of that size; the only other large vessel of that sort was a ferry boat, and the only thing we could think of to compare it to in our heads was the Titanic ship, from the movie. When we got there, it was very much like the Titanic, but on a smaller scale. We checked in, and were given directions to our room. We had a center "stateside" room, so there were no windows, which was weird, but it proved to be a blessing come sun-up!! That night, we noticed the air-conditioning was outdated, and when inquiring about it, we were told that it needed to be turned on from a "control room." Ha! We had never heard of such a thing! We eventually had to have 2 maintenance guys come in at 11pm and fidget with the air ducts in the room. Oh man. In the morning, we noticed that the bathtub water knobs were also outdated. It would either spray scalding hot water, or freezing cold. We were finally able to to get it to a luke warm setting. All in all, it wasn't a terrible stay, just some things to get used to. The bed, on the other hand, was extremely comfy!! Sunday morning, we were able to walk around the ship for some photo opportunities before we left. For anyone looking for an historic stay, the Queen Mary would be the place for you!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now, the reason we went to LA in the first place, the USC/UCLA basketball game!! After we checked in, me, Robbie, Hilary, and 2 of her college friends were off to the USC campus! Time allowed us to walk around the USC campus for a little bit. Robbie really wanted to see Heritage Hall, which paid homage to all the USC greats who went on to bigger and better things, sports-wise. We spent a bunch of time in there, and on our way to the basketball arena, we crossed the quad and stopped for pizza.

 

 

 

The Galen Center is the venue for home USC games, so that's where we were for the evening. After getting to our seats, we had a few minutes to watch warm-ups and listen to some tunes!

 

 

The game itself was very action-filled, in the first half anyway for USC! UCLA was the favorite, but USC took an early lead, and then pretty much dropped the ball (ha-ha) in the second half. All in all, it was an entertaining game!!

Before we went back to the Queen Mary, one of Hilary's friends who was riding with us took us over a few bridges that overlooked the Long Beach Harbor. All the pictures I took of the harbor turned out blurry, but I did get a pretty good one of the bridge itself, and a cool shot of a bunch of overpasses, and I think they turned out pretty great!

 

 

The next day before we left LA, we went to the best breakfast spot, the Original House of Pancakes!!! The best thing about it was that it was located right along the Pacific Coast Highway!!

 

 

The weekend went by really quick, but it was really fun!! As we were driving out of the valley and making a steady incline, we drove through the fog, which was pretty neat! Now onto planning our next trip to LA!!!

 

"It is very hard to generalize. Everyone's adventure is original." -Bernard Pivot