A Few Words About Driving To Las Vegas From Denver

 

    It is not 1974, and I am not Hunter S. Thompson. So this will not be a very exciting post if that is your comparison, which it is if you are my age.

    It took us 10.5 hours from Denver to Vegas, leaving Denver at 4 am. We got out of Colorado in four hours. This is the trick: get through the mountains before everybody who moved here hits the road. Traffic on I 70 west has always been a bugaboo in the summer months and during ski season, but now that our population has exploded a thousand percent, every highway in every direction is jammed, all of the time. One of the great things about the lockdowns during Covid was being able to actually drive on the highways, not sit in stop and start traffic.

    In contrast, it took 12 hours to return, leaving LV at 11 am. Was it driving in 105 degree heat most of the way? Possibly. It was also stupid traffic on the I15, which honestly happened en route as well. Amazon truck drivers are playing some sort of Speedway game, jockeying for position by lining up in all three lanes when there is a "Climbing Lane". What's a "Climbing Lane?"  Utah, you're weird.

    This short post was largely to share with you the deliberate, military grade bug Kamikaze attack that occurred at 8:30 pm on I 70 eastbound between Silt and Glenwood Springs. I have never been in bug cyclone, but here it was. It was hailing bugs. I had to turn on the windshield wipers and blast the fluid to avoid an accident. It was so thick, I had to pull over in Glenwood to scrape off my windshield. Unprecedented, and  no thank you.