The Portland Not-Exactly-Express: Day 11/12 - I Killed A Night In Reno Just To Watch It Die...

Sacramento was nice, but I honestly wasn't upset that I was leaving. Although the house where the hostel is located was a great house their beds sucked. The room had a creaky metal bunk bed and flimsy mattress that looked like they bought them from the same place as the jail just down the road. I woke up early and only marginally rested, packed up, and checked out. I grabbed a decent breakfast of chorizo (the Mexican kind, not the high-end Portuguese stuff I had in Portland) and eggs at a taqueria a few blocks down the road and then made my way to the train station, not a Union Station this time, and was shortly on my way to Reno. This was one of the few legs of the trip where I would actually be passing through the scenic areas during the day, and it was only a short 5 hour trip. As an added bonus, two volunteers from the railroad museum traveled along the Sacramento to Reno leg and provided commentary about the history of the railroad quiches proved to be pretty interesting. It may be the holiday season, or maybe a coincidence, but people seemed far more talkative and pleasant on this train as opposed to the others. The scenery, commentary, and conversation made for a very short ride. Before I knew it I was standing outside the Reno train station, also not Union Station, trying to figure out where I was.

As it turned out the train station was only about a block from a nice transportation plaza where a variety of buses came and went. There were the standard route buses that went all over Reno, and then there were a couple that had special routes that pretty much just went in circles up and down the main drag. I was staying at a casino called Peppermill that was a little further down from the main cluster of casinos downtown so i hopped onto one of the rapid buss es to the casino. Peppermill is loosely Italian themed, as an awful lot in Reno seems to be, the casino floor is mostly dim lighting and all-over mirrors with subdued but obvious Italian nods, in the hotel towers its a heavier but still tasteful Italian villa decor, and then balls-to-the-wall gauche Italian tackiness in the newer tower. I was in one of the calmer rooms with lots of dark walnut and marble furniture and a large Jacuzzi featured prominently near the four-postered king size bed. I spent some time familiarizing myself with the restaurants and lounges at the casino, and started looking online to see if anything outside of my hotel stood out. What became quickly apparent is that outside of casinos and bars, there's not much to Reno. I knew they called it the "biggest little city in the world" but I didn't realize they meant that pretty literally. Outside of the casino section, of which mine seemed to be on the edge of, it turned into your typical small city and off the main thoroughfare it was mostly residential. It didn't really matter though, I was only in Reno because of the casinos and I was just fine not leaving my hotel.

I hadn't eaten since Sacramento and it was past 6pm. I had checked the restaurant menus already and although none of them sounded bad, neither did they really impress me. Upscale or casual there was no shortage of Italian and steakhouse fare, and a couple of buffet type places ubiquitous to casinos. One thing I had found online was that Reno seemed to be starting one particular trend in the form of all you can eat sushi bars. I checked the website for Peppermills' seafood restaurant, Oceanography, and sure enough for $20 i could get in on the sushi gluttony - and I did. The restaurant is decorated with giant 5 or 6 foot long jelly fish lights, life-sized sharks hanging from the high ceiling, and a hideous underwater blue-on-blue color scheme. In the center of the dining room are three long sushi counters, each staffed with 5 or 6 sushi chefs. I plopped down at a counter and commended to shove an obscene amount of sushi in my mouth. I tried old favorites new rolls I'd never seen before. I tried things I was fairly certain I wouldn't like and was pleasantly surprised by a few. I even tried a quail egg shooter which is a shot glass with raw quail egg, srirachi, ponzu sauce, and some kind of seasoning. It was actually pretty good.

After I gorged myself on rice and fish I quickly lost all the money I had allotted myself to gamble in a miserable string of slot machine and table blackjack losses and that's all there really is to say about that. A couple Jacksons poorer I went back up to my room where I spent the rest of the night chilling in the Jacuzzi while watching TV and sipping on a bottle of Rogue Dead Guy I had squirreled away back in Portland. Not exactly an action packed night of gambling, booze, and women...but not a bad one either. I ended the night by climbing, quite literally, into the enormous king-sized bed, burying myself under a mountain, not quite literally, of blankets and down pillows and slept peacefully. I woke just in time to pack up and check out and headed back to the train station to stow my bags before hunting for food only to find out that Reno's station doesn't have any lockers, cranky luggage sitters, or even a conveniently out of order bathroom stall to hide it.

With all my bags I'm tow I set out to find something I haven't had in about 13 years - an In-n-Out burger. For those of you not familiar with In-n-Out they are only the home of the greatest fast food burgers you can find. I know "great fast food" is typically considered an oxymoron, but this is the Holy Grail and its real. As far as I know they're only a west coast chain, and even then they aren't like McDonald's and don't have one on every street corner. There weren't any in Portland, and the 2 in Sacramento were way out in the suburbs so i was pleased when there was one only a short bus ride from the train station. Well, it should've been a short ride. I'm not entirely sure where the malfunction originated, but aside from the rapid bus to and from Peppermill, I either always got on he wrong bus or Google was a lying son of a bitch. Some buses seemed to go the route in reverse of what Google Maps showed, and one went on a crazy ass zig-zag through neighborhoods, past the Reno Livestock Events Center (seriously), and after 45 minutes of riding around only came within a mile of where I wanted be. Regardless I walked my mile, got there and enjoyed a yummy burger, walked the mile back to the bus stop, and then got on the "wrong" bus twice trying to get back. By the time I got back to the train station there was only an hour before the train arrived so i plopped down and waited it out. Salt Lake City is the next destination where I'll spend two days before beginning the brutal marathon home. The train doesn't get in to SLC until 3am and the first rail car doesn't operate until 5am, its about a mile to my room, and its supposed to be snowing there. Should be fun.