FROM THE ELISSON ARCHIVES

Estes Park, Colorado, 1974.

This picture was taken a little over 30 years ago, during the Great Post-Graduation Road Trip that my friend Steve and I embarked upon shortly after collecting our college diplomas.

Think of it: a one-month, 10,000 mile trek across the great American continent, spanning almost the entire east-west and north-south dimensions of the Lower 48. The West Coast, all the way from Tijuana to the Puget Sound. San Francisco. Los Angeles. Denver. Yellowstone. The Grand Canyon. Las Vegas. All impossibly remote and exotic to us young East Coast boys.

And all on a budget of about $600 apiece. Man, those were the days. Cheap motels when we wanted to splurge - otherwise, racking out in the car, a thoroughly utilitarian 1970 Ford station wagon. If we had thought to name it, we could have called it “The Babe Repellent.”

But it’s a few years down the road, now. Next time I go to California, my ass will get there on an airplane. And not some Dinky-Ass Jet, either. A Big Ol’ Widebody, thankyewverymuch.

Now, what’s the number for room service?