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I needed to leave town for a few days. Not because ‘they’ were after me, although they probably are for something, but my best friend was getting married in Utah. I wasn’t about to let that happen without me!

The bird sitter flaked on me just before the trip so I decided to just take him with me. Have you ever traveled a long distance with an African Grey parrot before? I wouldn’t recommend it. He spend the first hour of the trip freaking out and begging to go home. He settled in eventually once we hit the long stretch of road going out of Las Vegas. Then he would start complaining off and on until we arrived in Salt Lake City, Utah.

If you have never made that drive from Las Vegas to Salt Lake City, I’d highly recommend it if you like the country. It is desert all the way there. There is sort of low desert and there is high desert. I think it is so awesome and beautiful. My bird, Echo, really enjoyed the scenery. I put him in charge of spotting hawks. He’d get all excited when he saw one. So, if you have a few extra days to kill when you’re vacationing in Las Vegas, you might want to take a drive out into the desert to see it.

The drive to Salt Lake City without being alone with a bird on the trip is anywhere from 5-½ to 7-½ hours depending on how much you stop and how fast you go. Unfortunately, driving alone with a bird it is about nine. The bird was doing much better on the way back but the road was full of speeding freight trucks, RVs, people pulling trailers and boats, etc. My drive time was just as miserable coming home.

I avoid driving on our Vegas freeways whenever possible because freeways just sort of freak me out these days. My eyes aren’t what they were ten or twenty years ago and I don’t trust my glasses to show me the real world. I was surprised to find that I-15 going North was under construction. Sure, I’d heard something about that, but who knows where they were talking about? I never go on the thing. Well, I found it. It wasn’t all that bad, or that long of a problem, actually.

I made my way through the desert and I got to hit all my favorite spots. My trusty, complaining companion, Echo, was a huge hit inside McDonalds for breakfast. He sat there and embarrassed me by perfectly imitating every beep, click and pounding noise in the place. He loved the children gathering around him. You don’t notice those sounds so much until there is a bird eating your Egg McMuffin making them.

I have lived here in Las Vegas for about three years now. I hadn’t realized how much I had assimilated until I arrived in Salt Lake City. It is so green there! The air has some humidity to it, but not too much and the temperature was about twenty degrees cooler but still pleasant. I drove around and felt a bit out of place for the first time. There were no casinos, hardly any homeless population, not one person begging in the middle of an intersection and everyone looked so wholesome. I was experiencing a little bit of a culture shock. Where are the Mystere dancers? Aren’t there any Elvi? I mean, there is a wedding today! You can do that without even one Elvis? Apparently, they manage to pull it off without one.

I followed the bride around most of the morning, along with the gaggle of women who we dubbed the ‘entourage’. We ran off to get her hair done, fending off all men, then it was to the next place for make-up. Somewhere in that run I got my hair styled a bit. It was a fright with the change in air moisture. Women went in all directions to finish up details, I drove the bride to her hotel and let her rest for a couple of hours before she had to get into her dress and be the big star of the day.

I cried my way through the ceremony. I started as soon as I knew the bride was on the way and it didn’t really officially stop until it was over. Oh, I do love weddings.

I only fell in love one time during the reception with a young photographer. Hey, he was a photographer to die for, I’ll tell ya that. He never said a word to me, which is really just as well. Why ruin a good thing? He was probably a healthy twenty years too young for me anyway. Hey, I know what you‘re thinking! Shut up! I never touched that guy. Or him either. Ok, there was that ONE, but it was a very long time ago.

The drive back home went smoother with the bird but the traffic was a bitch. It probably would have been okay for any normal driver, but I am very nervous around RVs and trucks. So it took just as long to get home.

Hitting that one point after Mesquite, NV, I knew I was coming home. I was almost there. I felt a calm come over me. Even Echo looked like he was starting to recognize the scenery of Vegas. I was back in the dust and deadly, dry air. I was so happy to be home.

Vegas is a hard place to stay away from, even for a few days.

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