Elko, Nevada’s slogan is Elko; Where the Adventure Begins!

That’s true enough for us this week, I guess.

Come Monday as Jac was trying to sort out all the information we had and tracking down the info we lacked WHILE trying to work with some painfully slow internet, it was my charge to keep the kids busy and away or quiet in our room. And while I was at it, Monday needed some exercise because the hotel was not pet friendly.  Out we headed into the blizzard that  had just pummeled the Sierras – the same storm we had rushed to out run and had won.

I watched the snowflakes in bitter defeat.

Elko has a very cool Western Culture museum that just happens to be closed on Mondays. That was disappointing, let me tell you.  But they also have some nice parks and snow or no, we were going to have fun.  The kids tried the merry-go-round and Monday growled and nipped at their heels, not at all pleased with their shrieks and laughter. Tess tried the slide but it was so wet she couldn’t go and Ellie had a hard time breathing with the wind in her face.  When Philip announced he needed to go potty, we didn’t need another reason to leave and we raced back to the rental car.

Now what?

The only thing that remained loomed up on the hill.  We snaked our way up into the Walmart parking lot and, after using the facilities, I delivered a challenge:

Did they think they could play the alphabet game in Walmart? YES!!! was the answer and they began to call out letters.  No, no, no!  We weren’t going to find letters, they had to find ITEMS that started with each letter of the alphabet and then we’d take a picture to record it.  Ooooohhh!!

Off we went. Some were hard and some were easy.  I was impressed with their creativity and most especially with Philip’s recall.

“K. . . K. . . K. . . Oh! I know! Kleenex Starts with K!  You have to go back!”

My favorite find of the day was a unicorn.  When we got to ‘u’, they announced this was what we should find and wouldn’t you know, we found one.

Turns out Walmart does have everything!

Thanks for the adventure, Elko.

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