Radical Sabbatical - Day 14

Monday, Jan 13 – Wednesday Jan 16, 2013

After the awesome, but cold, experience in Denver, we headed west on I70 towards Vegas.  Colorado and Utah are incredibly beautiful states, but I’d have to think long and hard before deciding to live there; it never got above 9 degrees the entire time we were in these two states!

I did learn a valuable travel tip:  When driving into an area that is below freezing, be sure and replace the windshield washer fluid with the non-freeze type BEFORE it gets below freezing.  Vehicles on snowy roads kick up milky-white grimy stuff, which sticks to your windshield.  If your washer fluid is frozen, then you’re stuck having to pull over every half hour and clean your windshield by hand.  Not fun.  It finally thawed out after a few hours and I picked up a gallon of the good stuff (I was wondering why every gas station had 20 cases of it sitting by the doors!) and regained windshield cleaning capability.

So west we headed on I70, driving through the Rocky Mountains; now I know how John Denver felt (OK that dated me a but, you young peeps will just have to Google him), because the Rocky’s are amazingly beautiful.  We stopped for lunch in Glenwood Springs, a small town nestled into a valley. It was pretty cool to sit in a Qdoba Mexican grill and have the Rocky’s as your backdrop!  On we trekked, going through Vail and Beckenridge.  Vail has a half-pipe situated right beside the interstate, so you can watch the snowboarders grab air as you drive by.  I almost wrecked.  Mental note:  don't watch the skiers when your on the interstate.

Onward to Utah… and it got COLDER.  Like -3 degrees colder.  In Utah the mountains change a bit from Colorado, but they are still beautiful.  One thing I learned about Utah, the state is mostly uninhabited!  We drove for hours and hours, with only a few exits, most of them have no services, so you better fill up with gas every time you see a station. No cell service either, so it would be wise to not run out of gas, or you could be sitting in a cold vehicle for a long time. If you want to live in isolation, Utah is the place for you.  We made it to a Richfield UT, got a room, grabbed some dinner at Steve’s Steakhouse, and got some much needed sleep.

Oh, another handy winter travel tip: Don’t leave your bottled water in the car overnight, because they will FREEZE SOLID.

Tuesday we launched out again to get through Utah, and made it to the Nevada state line by about 11.  The terrain changes significantly as you cross the state lines. Its almost as if the borders were set based on the topography of the land.  By 2 pm we were within site of Las Vegas, our next destination.

I know, “sin city,” what in the world is a pastor doing in sin city!  Granted there is a lot of sin in Vegas, but there are also some really cool things to see as well.  Just stay out of the casino areas, and don't take any of the flyers that people try to hand you on the street.  Being off-season were able to get a great deal on a deluxe king room in the MGM Grand hotel, less than we paid for some roadside hotel rooms! And, MGM threw in a free buffet dinner with the reservation – SCORE!  Tuesday night just happened to be the seafood buffet, so Tammy was able to cross off one of her “trip bucket list” items:  Eat crab legs.  I am ashamed to say that I did sin, I believe gluttony is on the list, and ate waaayyyy too many crab legs and steamed shrimp.  But before we retired to the room, we stopped by the show counter and were able to get tickets to the Wednesday night KA show – Cirque du Soleil.

Wednesday was “walk around Vegas” day.  If you step away from the gambling tables, Vegas is truly a magnificent place.  We walked through the Monte Carlo, with its roman style columns and façade, and took the free tram over the Bellagio.  The ride itself was very cool, as it takes you by the Aria resort, a modern architectural wonder with its glass and chrome outer panels and angled design.  Enter the Bellagio.  When you walk into the Bellagio, you feel like you are walking into the palace of a king.  It is HUGE, and the opulence is simply over the top.  There are gardens, an art gallery, and every inch of the place is spotless clean.  Not one piece of trash, or smudge on any window.

Next we walked over to the Forums at Caesar’s Palace, a shopping mall on steroids.  The Forums at Caesar’s is unbelievable.  Not only is there every super-high-end store you could thing of (Hermes, Coach, Gucci, Louis Vuitton), but the décor is nothing short of stunning.  Half of the people in the mall are taking pictures, it’s just that beautiful.

Next we headed back to the hotel for dinner.  While there are some pricy places to eat at the MGM (Wolfgang Puck has a restaurant there), you can also find reasonably prices food as well.  We ate at the Grand Wok, where the prices were similar to going to one of the Asian places in Wilmington, but the food was incredible.  We had a bowl of Vietnamese Pho, and the Aloha Sushi roll.  It could have been the oxygen enriched air that casino’s supposedly pump into the building, but that was some of the best food that has ever entered my mouth.

After dinner we walked around a bit, then headed to the KA Theater for our show.  I’ve never considered myself to be much of a show person, but I was won over by Cirque du Soleil.  I’m not even sure how to describe it.  It was performance acting, a play, gymnastics, aerial acrobatics, music, and a circus, all rolled into one event.  Of all the events/shows I’ve seen, I’d have to put Cirque du Soleil at #1.

Today (Thursday) is going to be a chill day, as the weather is nice so I think we’ll sit by the pool, do some reading, and rest up for the next leg of our trip.

We’ve met some really nice people in Vegas; Servers, hotel reservation desk folks, people that we’ve had a chance to talk to and learn about.  For all the opulence and grandeur, Las Vegas is just another town full of people that are trying to do life.  Ronny, our reservations specialist, helped us get a really good deal on our room.  Ronny has a dream to start a foundation that will help Hispanic kids who can’t afford the expensive soccer leagues in Vegas.  He wants to help them develop their skills, so they can have a shot at playing college soccer, with the goal of lifting them out of poverty and to an education and hopefully a better life.  I’m going to be praying for Ronnie.

Yes, some people get caught up in the sin and allure of the world.  As you walk down the street there are people handing out “Hot girls, direct to you!” flyers.  Please know I’m not being racist when I say this, but most of them are Hispanic, and it seems they may have just crossed the border.  In my humble opinion, they’re just people doing whatever they can to earn a few dollars.  And what about all those girls?  Where did they come from? How did they end up as Vegas call girls?  If you thing about it, each one of them is someone’s daughter, or someone’s sister. God loves each and every one of these people, and I know our Father would love nothing more than to break them free from the chains they are in.

While driving we started listening to Frances Chan’s “Erasing Hell” audio book.  Frances not only deals with the reality that scripture clearly teaches that hell is a literal place, but that we as Christians have a calling:  To tell people about Jesus Christ, so that they don't end up in this place.  We need to realize that we are surrounded by people who, if they do not have a relationship with Jesus Christ, will end up in hell. It's a hard thing to consider, but it’s also important enough that we shouldn't ignore it.  It's the “inconvenient truth” of our time.

On Friday we’ll be heading to Templeton CA, where our good friends Dan & Ashleigh Rhode live.  Dan & Ash used to live in Wilmington, but moved back to CA to operate an olive farm.  They are such an awesome family; we can’t wait to see them!

We really miss our Wilmington friends and CCW family, and we’re praying for you all daily.  God is really ministering to Tammy and I during this trip in so many ways, and we are so grateful for His love!

Love you all!


Pastor Clay & Tammy