We drove all day Thursday. I loaded the car in the wee hours with our bags and our bikes. The boys woke up as we put them in the car, and we drove along the vacant highway in the dark. I think we played Raffi, which we just rediscovered, 'cause I remember the "Numbers Rumba," which Jackson loved to hear in the car when he was little and Rylee is just now listening to. The boys eventually fell asleep again, and Cyndi tried to sleep, with little success. We were in Flagstaff so early that the place where we wanted to have breakfast wasn't open yet, so we gassed up and drove on to Williams. We had slam breakfasts at a roadside Denny's, which Rylee loved, and drove the short main road through Williams to see what we had missed. The center of town isn't that far from the highway. It sits on the south side of the highway, and there's a depot and a "resort" for the Grand Canyon train and a couple of local spots where we could have had breakfast. We started playing travel bingo somewhere between Kingman and Needles and that helped several hours go by. There aren't many cows, tollgates, or birds-on-a-wire as you travel across the Mojave, so it takes a while to get a bingo or fill in your entire card. (We worked on our travel bingo the rest of our trip, shouting "bingo" every time we saw another smokestack, flag, or bird-on-a-wire; we didn't see a "tollgate" until the parking lot at the wharves in Monterey.) At the Essex rest stop in the desert, about 40 miles outside Needles, we pulled the bikes off so the boys could ride around, and we stopped again at Ludlow, just for a little gas and the Dairy Queen.
It was there that we had our first trouble with a general block put on gas stations and a few other businesses in Arizona and California by "My Financial Institution" in New Mexico, or so the rep said on the phone on Thursday, but he said I should be able to use my bank card with my pin number for debit transactions. I never heard of such a thing. About two hours later I get a call on the road on my cell phone from the card service provider, checking on my use of my bank card. Great, I thought, thanks for checking. No problems using the bank card again until our return trip. I wanted to put some gas in as I passed through Needles, and the card was denied for both debit and credit use. It was 109 degrees, and I was with my wife and two small boys in a packed car on the road in the desert. It was a Sunday, and, of course, My Financial Institution was closed. I had passed on getting gas in Barstow, and I didn't have enough to make it to Kingman. The card service told me there was nothing that could be done about it, and I would have to talk to My Financial Institution on Monday. I was being left stranded in the desert in Needles without access to any of my money. My Financial Institution is going to hear about this in much more detail. A clerk at a gas station knew the trick: key in the amount of the purchase before running the card through as a debit. Of course, when we got to Kingman, there was no problem at all. I ran the card through the machine. It automatically went to credit and I keyed in my zipcode. I got all the gas I could ever want. At another stop, I didn't even have to key in the zipcode. So, My Financial Institution decided I could not get gas in the Mojave Desert. This is something I just would never have expected.
In Barstow, we stretched our legs at a new section of the outlet mall there and grabbed an In and Out Burger. In Tehachapi, the only mountain pass to Bakersfield, the highway was closed because of a tanker accident ahead. We pulled into town. There were hundreds of semis parked all over, waiting for the highway to re-open. Someone told me it would be at least two more hours before the highway would open again. I got some gas (the debit worked, but not the credit), and we were on our way to a park to bicycle and wait it out when I saw the city police station. I went in and asked if there was another route. Oh, yes, but it sounded like it would be a slow and tortuous drive behind a line of vehicles, or I could drive toward LA. A woman was there and offered to draw me a map of the route. Cyndi thought we should go for it, so we got the map and took the back road. There weren't any cars to speak of, no semis, and the winding and narrow road along the edge of the hills turned out to be a beautiful drive. We rejoined the highway quickly in Keene and headed to Bakersfield (or Bleichersville, as Rylee says), where we stopped at a park. There was a spray park there, too, and the water was running, but by now we had lost time and needed to keep going. The road out of Bakersfield in our direction is a nightmare of traffic signals. We hit every one, but we eventually connected to the highway to Paso Robles, where we had a really good burrito and a quesadilla underneath a sidewalk umbrella and I got Cyndi a cold beer. She had a good headache going, something unusual for her, that she thought was from the trouble she was having from her contacts. The boys were great on the drive, all things considered. They kept themselves amused and played a few movies on their player. Jack likes the "Home Alone" movies, and I heard his loud laugh whenever the boy hero outsmarted the adults. The laugh infected Ry, who would repeat the lines and laugh.
The place where we stayed in Seaside, at the city limits of Monterey, was very nice. The room was cramped but it was surrounded by a lovely lagoon. There was fog that night and the next morning. After we got all the stuff into the room, Jackson and I took a walk at night, exploring, and then went to bed.
The next two days were pretty packed with wedding events. I hadn't taken into account a bridal shower that took up the morning and early afternoon before the rehearsal, so there wasn't much time that first morning. We first walked to the Starbucks. Jackson was thrilled with the breakfast bar at the hotel and spent several minutes making a plate of scrambled eggs, a cinnamon roll, a banana, and toast and jam, along with a bowl of cereal and a cup of hot chocolate, all the while chatting with the other guests. The boys got to ride their bikes for a few minutes on a part of a path that goes around the lagoon. Beth picked up Cyndi and several other ladies staying at the hotel for the long drive into the Salinas Valley for the bridal shower at a winery. Lisa knew the owners, so I imagine it was very nice. Meanwhile, Jack, Ry and I stopped off at a Costco to get another warm layer for Cyndi. We knew it would be cool along the coast, but it was cooler than we imagined. The boys had their parkas from our last visit to Monterey, so they'd be fine. We got a nice red quilted vest for Cyndi to be comfortable in later that night and picked up some snacks and chocolate-milk-in-a-box. Costco has Christmas toys out already, and the boys checked those out and really wanted them NOW!
When we got to my folk's place, where the wedding was going to take place, a crew was setting up the tent in the parking area. My father was the only one there, and when the tent crew had finished and left, the boys, Dad, and I drove to get a sandwich together. That was just about perfect, I thought, but I made the mistake of letting the boys each have a bottle of Gatorade. They did eat a little. At the house, Rylee played with the dogs, while Jackson went exploring about the house and the spaces and outside areas underneath and in the back of the house.
Everyone arrived for the rehearsal. The ceremony itself was going to take place in Papa's Park, the area under the oak trees at the top of a little hill. Rylee was the ringbearer, and he took his role seriously. He had some knowledge about his role from a book Terra found for him, and Cyndi had been reading it to him several times before the trip. He made up a little song about it that ended, "and that's the way the wedding goes."
Ariel, meanwhile, was en route from NYC. Gary and Eric would be picking her up in Oakland that day (Friday), and when the rehearsal ended Beth told me they were on their way and may even arrive to the rehearsal dinner before we did.
The rehearsal dinner was going to take place at the Monterey State Beach, and it was our plan to ride our bikes to it from the hotel. The beach park stretches along the bay, and we have picnicked before at the same spot, just across from the Dennis the Menace Park, whenever I was doing the Big Sur Marathon. Back then, the cousins would wade into the ocean until they were soaked and we learned to bring towels and extra clothes along to change into. So after the rehearsal, we headed back to our room, taking Karl's mother (the groom's mother) back, too, dressed warmly, and took off on our bikes toward the spot at the park. It was foggy at the start. Our hotel is on a little spur of a bike trail that goes underneath the Pacific Coast Highway and then joins the main coastal recreation trail. The trail follows Del Monte, along some old railroad tracks, alongside sand dunes, and through groves of eucalyptus trees. I'd say we went about a mile-and-a-half, maybe a little more. Just as we arrived, Ariel arrived, and there were many hugs. There were tables at the spot, and a good crowd of wedding guests, drinking wine and beer. The caterer had hors d'oeuvres and an excellent spread of food there on the beach, and a bonfire was set inside the grates of a raised grill for people to gather around in the cool coastal air. We met many of Sandra's family, some of whom we hadn't seen since Dave and Sandra's wedding some 30 years ago. The fog had arrived with the night, but as it settled in it did seem to get a little warmer. We talked with Ariel, who was happy but also very tired from her journey and a bit overwhelmed as her program at NYU had just begun and it was intense, as well as exciting. She was already conducting telephonic interviews while on the road during this trip, and had another one scheduled Saturday morning, or maybe it was Sunday morning, before heading back to NYC on an overnight flight. Jackson climbed the trees and then joined a volleyball game with some twenty-year-olds nearby who were not part of our party. Cyndi was snug in her vest, and the boys rode around the bike path in the fog under the lights. We rode back to the hotel in the dark and the fog. There were street lamps on the path along the way, and the boys had their headlamps. I thought they'd be too tired, but the ride was great. Cyndi loved it. Jackson would cruise ahead with Cyndi. Ry would snake along the trail, while I'd tell him, "Stay on your right," and then he'd stand on his pedals and take off. Ry really needs a real bike, as he has to do a lot of work to keep that little bike, with its little wheels, going. It's fun to watch other people's reactions as this little tot zooms by on his bike, bouncing over the bumps. He later learned to spell "right."
Saturday morning we had breakfast again. Ry had banana, cereal, yogurt, and eggs, and Jack made his plates of toast and everything else while chatting with the other hotel guests again. We planned another bike ride, but Cyndi and I weren't sure how the boys would do again. So the plan was Cyndi would take the bike trail and head up the big sand dune where our spur joined the main trail and ride north for a few miles along the ocean on her own, while the boys and I would start a bit later and head towards Monterey again, and we would meet up somewhere after Cyndi turned around. This time, the boys and I went beyond the spot in the park where the beach luau had been held and continued to the Fisherman's Wharf, which wasn't that much further, and we arrived just before Cyndi arrived from her trip.
It was early. The shop owners were outside, razzing each other about their fish, and delivery trucks were parked along the wharf. We walked our bikes along the wharf to the statue of the fisherman to see the marina and the pelicans, and then thought we better head back to get ready for the wedding...but not before stopping at a small restaurant on the wharf and getting a cup of clam chowder. The boys were upset with me for making them walk their bikes on the wharf, but got over it once we were riding again on the trail. Cyndi loved the whole morning.The wedding was beautiful under the shade of the oak trees. Cyndi wore a beautiful midnight blue dress. Jackson had new clothes, with a button-down Oxford shirt and tie. Rylee wore the tux we got mail order through Amazon: a vest and matching slacks Cyndi had hemmed, a shirt that matched the bride pretty closely, a tie, and new shoes he can wear to school now. We met Ariel there. She was so beautiful. Stunning. Jackson and Ariel sat together for the ceremony, and Rylee lined up in front of Jenni and Terra carrying his ring pillow for his part of the procession. He did a short run at the back of the "aisle" between the chairs set up outside, regained a walking pace, and took his place next to the best man at the front. He didn't fidget during the entire ceremony, and he didn't snap his fingers. (We talked to him about that; it's something he just taught himself and practices all the time.) The bride was beautiful, everyone was beaming, and the ceremony was perfect. Mom sang a "pretty song" during the ceremony.
The reception took place below the hill in the tent and around the lower parking level near the house. It was hot. A heat wave had hit California in the past couple of weeks, bringing fires to many areas, but when finally the sun set below the trees and cast the reception in shade, a light breeze stirred and the temperature began to fall. Rylee, who had insisted we bring our baseball gloves, played some catch with Eric on the hill above, and Jackson joined them. Rylee did tricks with the little fans that were on the seats at the ceremony. Jackson showed Cyndi around the back of the house. He later laid down, not feeling well. It might have been a combination of the heat, the trip, the bike rides, the peanut butter M&M he ate, everyone thinking it was chocolate, or the Benadryl he took as a precaution afterwards. (Fortunately, he didn't have any manifest reaction, and I and others thought maybe it was because there wasn't actually any peanut product in the M&M.) It was a shame Jackson was not feeling well, because he was missed on the dance floor. Ry wouldn't do it. Ariel danced, Cyndi danced, even I danced ("We Are Family"), and we watched Dad, Sandra, and all the older crowd (over thirty) dancing the night away. Cyndi was radiant and in her element.
Cyndi had met some of the women at the bridal shower and had a chance to talk with Mom a bit then. A good group of family and friends of Sandra's (and Dave's) had come from several states, and I met several of them the night before. They were a fun and friendly group. I chatted a bit with Sandra's friend, whom I also knew in Panama, and we caught up a little on the passing of time and a few mutual friends. Ariel and I talked a bit about NYU. As I said, she was feeling a bit overwhelmed but so happy to be there at the wedding. I talked with Karl's father and stepmother to thank them for the luau. Gary and I shared a couple of glasses of good wine. And I snuck a few good moments with Beth and Lisa here and there. David was fairly preoccupied, but I remember a couple of nice moments with Sandra, who was busy introducing everybody to everyone. All in all, we didn't get a lot of time with family. There were no other children, but the boys seemed to have fun wandering about the crowd and ordering drinks at the open soda bar.
We began to say our goodbyes long before the shuttle arrived to pick up guests and take them back to the hotel. (We had driven.) I had a few minutes at the very end with Mom, who seemed very happy and well. David shook my hand, and we lamented not having much time to talk. Dad got us a box of picked apples, and I gathered up all of our stuff. Terra and Jenni had gifts for the boys. The gifts were a big hit that night in our hotel room and on the road. We said goodbye to Ariel, which was the saddest moment.
So we packed a little and went to bed and before dawn we were on the road again. It was a long, long day. The Starbucks in Paso Robles was open...just barely...and I wish I had picked up a NY Times there. Cyndi drove a couple of times, and I got two moments of actual sleep along the way. Ry was busy drawing and making a creative mini scrap book with the stuff he got from Terra and Jenni. Jackson did his school work. Ry wanted to go to a Denny's again for eggs and pancakes. When we passed Tehachapi, we drove in again and stopped at a bakery on the main street. A nice town. We later found a Denny's in Barstow, in that oasis of restaurants, gas stations, and outlet malls on the highway between LA and Las Vegas. Jack was in the mood for a grilled cheese. Cyndi and I swore that would be about the last time we made that stop. The temperature rose in the Mojave, and then we had that dreadful moment in Needles that began as we were buying fruit at the grocery store there. From there, we tried to make good time, stopping outside Flagstaff for just a few minutes in the cool mountain air, grabbing popcorn chicken from a KFC in Holbrook, pulling over at the closed gate to the Petrified Forest National Park, but still it took a lot of hours before we saw the lights of Albuquerque from Nine Mile Hill.
What was I thinking? I pushed this method of travel on Cyndi and the boys. There were some natural moans and groans as they tried to stay comfortable in the car, but no one really complained.
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