Kingman Kraziness

Whew.

I need another vacation.

This past weekend we traveled to Kingman, AZ for both AZ State Regionals and a no-time standard swim meet.

It was a LOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG weekend to say the least. Lots of highs and lows. There were many moments when I questioned if all this kid competitive crap is even worth it. Are we doing this for us (parents) or for him (Evan)? In the end, I think it's for Evan. We ended the weekend on a really good note but more on that later. Let's get to it.

So where in the world is Kingman, AZ? It's 4 hours north of Yuma in the middle of nowhere.

4 hours of this...

And this...

Ooooh! Lake Havasu! Finally, something other than BROWN and DRY.

A road trip isn't complete unless someone dumps a Subway sandwich all over the floor. Thanks, Colin!

(*Note the errant Lego and flip flop. You could totally play "I Spy" in our van.)

4 hours later, we've arrived at this very random ass town!! Choo choo!

Fun Fact about Kingman (courtesy of Wikipedia): Pamela Anderson did one of her 1992 Playboy photo shoots at the corner of 4th Street and Andy Devine Avenue (U.S. Route 66), and was brought in to the Kingman Police Department for indecent exposure. She was not charged but asked to write a letter of apology. 

Bahahahaha!

Ok, back to our weekend...

We check into our hotel and then head off to the pool for warm-ups. Friday afternoon competition was Regionals. I think we knew it was going to be a long weekend when Evan got out of the pool in tears because the water was too cold. Evan tends to be a little "Hollywood Diva" about his water temps. They have to be just right. I guess when you have 0.5% body fat, you tend to be a little colder than the average Joe. Still though, it was a bit dramatastic. The water may have been "cold-er" than what he was used to (Kingman is a little cooler than Yuma), but I would hardly call it COLD. 

Strike 2 was the fact that he hates backstroke and we were opening the weekend with 100m backstroke.

Anyway, we got through it. The event went ok, and we made a trip to Walmart for a sweatshirt for Evan for the remainder of the weekend.

Next up was dinner. This was kind of fun. We decided to head to Mr. D'z Route 66 Diner. It looked like a fun, quirky kind of place. I happened to notice it on the way into town. 

It's kind of hard to miss.

I guess it must be a famous eatery or something. While we were dining, we noticed quite a few foreigners. I think the guys in the booth behind us were German. We also saw some Frenchies taking an extraordinary amount of pictures of Elvis and Marilyn and there was a Canadian family that came in as well. Quite odd. It was a fun little place, but I can't imagine actually coming there unless you were stuck in Kingman for whatever reason.

We sat at the mint green booth in the back.

 

The rest of the swim team came and joined us, so that was kind of fun. Team bonding and all that junk.

One of the high points of the trip. Enjoying a brownie fudge sundae (with no fudge apparently) and a banana split. Sometimes it's the little things. And let me tell you, I really had to embrace the little things on this trip.

And that's a wrap for Day 1. I have so many things to do that my head is spinning! Tomorrow is someone's 8th birthday, so peace out for now!