Day Two - Carlsbad Caverns and Hotel Hell

OK - we are so confused with the time zones and changes. We left Texas on Friday, and crossed over into New Mexico where it was an hour earlier. Saturday, we left New Mexico, reverting briefly back to Texas time, but re-entering New Mexico, and flipping back. Arizona was next, and thanks to a hellacious hotel mix-up (details to follow) Lars and I were awake at 2AM, when we "spring ahead" and set our clocks one hour later. Only...Arizona doesn't participate in daylight savings time, so without really moving, Texas fell two hours behind us. We have one time on the dashboard, another one on our computers, yet another one on our phones. Cray cray.

Anyhow - the boys jumped up Saturday AM bright and early, and went down to partake of the lovely La Quinta breakfast. As we left the "city" of Carlsbad (which is basically a bunch of hotel/motels, gas stations, and a few places for food), we saw this genius restaurant - old neon, new identity. Bet this place has an interesting story behind it.

 

Took Nibbles to the Carlsbad City Dog Park - GREAT park, with neither a human nor canine soul to be found. Geese, though...lots of geese.

 

Then, off to Carlsbad Caverns National Park, and the first glitch of the trip. Huge caverns - traditionally you walk down a very steep 1.5 mile trail, then another mile around the "big room," then take the elevator back to the surface. Can you guess what the glitch was? Elevators - out of service.

So, the boys and I took off on a 3+ mile, 3+ hour adventure. Rune was decidedly unimpressed - saying "its just a big cave!" Hart thought it was pretty cool. You be the judge....

For every step in/down, you will take another out/up.

 

For me, well, I am glad I went, even if my legs and knees are holding a grudge. 

And then, back to the road. Another huge stretch to cover as we aimed for Tucson. The boys are such clowns - and total road trip KINGS!

All the times I have passed this place, this is the first time I stopped. Didn't go in, though Lars did, and said it looked like a haven of touristy fabulousness. Sigh. Next time!

OK - here is the hotel hell story.  Carlsbad Caverns took longer than expected (in a race between a mechanical elevator ascending 800 vertical feet with me in it vs. me and my legs and knees ascending 800 vertical feet over 1.25  miles - who do you think would win?), and so the 7-8 hour trip to Tucson had us arriving at 9:48. We thought THAT was late...little did we know.

Because we were starving and because we all were dying to try the vaunted Tucson food icon - the Sonoran Hot Dog - we decided to hit BK Carne Asada and Hot Dogs before heading to our hotel to collapse in merciful release. The first half was great - 

Bacon-wrapped hot dog, with pinto beans, pico de gallo, onions, mayo, mustard, salsa...ay ay ay.

 

Funny - Hart wasn't feeling it. He said he wasn't hungry, his stomach kind of hurt. Then, there was a strange rumbling...the booth was shaking...Hart started laughing and Rune said "DUDE - that was 7.9 on the Richter scale!" Rune says his mom, the formidable Phoebe, has recently started ranking his flatular outputs on the earthquake scale. Soon as the earthquake was over, Hart was all over that shizz.

Upshot - we all rather liked the Sonoran dogs, but probably wouldn't seek them out. Although, Lars did. Yeah, well, they were total overkill, but strangely intriguing. 

Rune said in this photo he is the definition of tired.

Ok - long story as short as I can get it while still dealing with PTSD. Sated with Sonoran hot dogs, we headed for our hotel and arrived at 10:30....only to be told that they had no record of our reservation. Now, I had booked through a very reputable, international booking company, and had a confirmation number. This hotel had no record of it.

After 35 minutes of haggling with said booking company and said hotel (fully booked), I was told we were being moved to a better hotel, close by. Ha. We drove the 15 minutes to the new place, only to be met with total ineptitude and a pretty gross property. Nutshell: 15 minutes in line to check in, given key, get to room, only one bed. Back to front desk, another 15 minutes to get a new room and new keys. Get to room, keys don't work. Back to front desk, another 15 minutes to get new keys that....wait for it.....don't work. 

Luckily, Lars had met someone with a master key...we gained access to the room, finally, around midnight. The boys were such troopers....and it was so disheartening when we discovered that our room had two beds, but they were tiny. TINY. Hart slept on the floor, Lars and I battled for acreage, and Nibbles - sensing our discomfort, I feel - barked enough to keep the adults up for most of the night.

BAD.

But, the boys jumped up in the morning...what time? Not sure. See first paragraph. 

They went to the restaurant for breakfast (highly rated by our little gourmands), came back to the room, changed, and went to the pool. They came back, and hunkered down with some screen time and dog time while Lars and I got ready to face the day.

Clearly, there could be no video recap from the night of Hotel Hell, so the boys were gracious enough to try it this morning, as we were heading out from the Hell Hotel to an absolutely great day which we will blog about tomorrow.