It was the summer of (I can’t remember when) and I was headed out on a road trip. Along the way I was going to Phoenix to see my mom and try and get some fishing in somewhere. I was planning on being gone about a week. My daughter Lynn and her husband Fernando gave me permission to take their sons Chuck and Mike with me. Chuck was 11 and Mike was 9 (I think).
I drove to their house in Riverside County and the boys loaded their belongings in the car and we took off almost immediately. Boys being boys, they immediately began asking when we were going to eat! I put it off as long as I could and finally stopped at a big truck stop in Indio. The highway for many miles stretching back towards the west was still empty back then. Today there are casinos, housing developments, fast food restaurants, gas stations, and auto dealerships packed along highway 10 all the way to Indio.
The boys filled up on omelets, pancakes, toast, ice tea and whatever else they could lay their hands on. Little did I know that was just the beginning of their week long food binge. Hey, I was grandpa and I never said no to them! The drive to Phoenix was interspersed with several potty stops and to reload on snacks for the ride. I called mom when we got about an hour from her apartment and she said she was anxious to see the boys. As soon as we got to her place she fed us, because of course we had not eaten anything for a long time. Watching the boys devour her cooking one would have thought that I had starved them.
That night we all went to a local Mexican restaurant. They served the biggest tortillas I had ever seen, 18 inches or more across. That provided the impetus for the boys to again devour everything in sight and then ask for seconds. I do have to admit that the food in that restaurant was excellent and very flavorful. Good home cooking in a nice clean family operated restaurant. We spent the night with mom and most of the next day.
The boys and I discussed what was going to be the next stop on our trip. I made a few phone calls to the local fishing marinas and found out that fishing was terrible and had been for weeks. The boys asked where else we could go and I mentioned Lake Mead and they quickly decided on that. So off we went on a long drive to Nevada. We went on roads I had never been on before and they were virtually empty of traffic. But the roads from Phoenix were so rough and poorly maintained that it took us a very long time to get there. The boys didn’t mind because mom had packed them a lunch and extra sandwiches too.
Casino buffet’s, casino buffet’s, casino buffet’s – it seems as if we were in one every time I turned around. That trip to Vegas was so much fun and memorable for me because of them and their enthusiasm for life. I don’t recall much of the details because of the one great adventure that has since dominated my memory of that trip.
We went to Lake Mead to go fishing and stopped at a big marina there. There was a crowd of 20 or 30 people out on the docks, so we immediately went out to see what was going on. There were huge schools of giant 20-30 pound carp all around the docks and the people were feeding them popcorn, bread and whatever else they had available. Chuck and I wandered out on one of the arms of the dock pointing at the fish and admiring their size and coloration as well as the odd sucking noises they made at the top of the water when feeding. Behind us and on a separate arm we heard a commotion and looked over.
There was Michael up to his neck in the water. He had tried to catch a fish or pet one or something and had fallen in. A big hunk of a man, he must have been an athlete to have that strength, reached down and grabbed Mike by the scruff of his shirt and lifted him out of the water onto the dock, drenched!
Of course Chuck and I ribbed him and teased him and had so much fun at his expense. But he not only took it with his usual good nature, but entertained us with his version and how he almost had a big fish to take home and Chuck and I didn’t even bother to try and get one.
Great story, dad… I remember those boys the same way. Curious, enthusiastic, and hungry!
I was looking for winter fishing trips and I came across this. I decided to read the whole thing and low and behold: I have a lot in common with this scenario. My daughter has 2 children who are now 18 and 21, but back in 1997, they were a lot smaller, but I took them w/ me up to Rocky Mountain National Park to go camping for a few days while my daughter and husband can have the weekend together. I packed a lot of snacks and food, but the trip soon turned into a bottomless-pit smorgasbord in every restaurant I took them to. I thought this would never end because they are so fit, but they can eat like there is no tomorrow. the part that I can attest to understand more than anything was that when we weren’t near any place to eat, we had a bunch of sandwiches and sodas in the cooler that their grandma packed for them. Sounds familiar, right? When we went fishing, I told them that if we catch enough fish, we can bring them over to Aspen (my son-in-law’s best friend is part owner and one of the 2 head chefs of West Cobb Restaurant) and have Ansley cool them for us. We fished for 6 hours with a lunch break inbetween, then drove the 45 minutes to Aspen and spent our last night there (the previous 2 nights were in a camper I had attached to the back of the Ford Explorer I rented for the 2 weeks). Needless to say, fantastic trip: Kids sure can eat a lot!