It has been a really hot summer this year with record highs and record humidity so we are grateful for fall to get here. Fall has always been my favorite season, dating back to when I was in marching band in high school and we went to football games to perform at half time. I love the smell of fall, it is distinctly all its own!

We have spent a large part of our summer in Bullhead City, Arizona at the home we are going to eventually retire to, so I wanted to take this opportunity to share with all of you some of the events we have out here. Since this tri-state area is “trucker friendly” everyone could plan to come spend some time here and enjoy some of these events.

We are right across the Colorado River from Laughlin, Nevada and there is more than enough room to park all the trucks that may want to visit. There are boat shuttles that take you from the Arizona side over to the Nevada side and all of the casinos there. We have some very large casinos and hotels with great accommodations and restaurants. There are shows all the time as well, just like in Vegas, but Laughlin is smaller so it is less crowded.

We have bike week in early spring every year which brings in tens of thousands of motorcycles from all over the place and has become a true “must go” ride for many people. My friend Shay Turner, an owner operator from San Antonio, Texas makes it a point to go as often as possible. She usually just comes through on a run and parks her truck in the lots available, then spends a few days amongst the masses.

In August we had the 6th annual ‘Bullhead City River Regatta’ where tens of thousands people attended. They book in at the hotels in Laughlin and Bullhead City, and then they participate in the float itself. They enter the river at Davis Camp (just below Davis Dam), or at the Community Park and float down river to Rotary Park where people hired for the event help them out of the water. They let all the air out of their tubes or floats, whichever they chose, then get on busses and head back up to the different starting areas where they re-inflate and go again. This event is vying to be the largest river tube-floating event in the world.

The River moves at approximately 5 mph, so it takes about 2 hours to get from the beginning to the end making it entirely possible to float 2 or 3 times that day. People pack coolers with food and drinks and tie all manner of floating devices together and entire families make the trek together. The river is cleared of all motorized vehicles for this event, other than the volunteers who ride personal watercraft to monitor and help out participants. Registration is required for the actual float and includes a hot dog and soft drink at Rotary Park upon arrival there.

This year the event was called ‘True to the Red White and Blue’ and we had about 25,000 actual participants. Next year it’s going to be called the ‘Mardi-Gratta’ and will be going with the purple and green of Mardi Gras. There are competitions for floats with awards at the end of the event over in Laughlin. This event is well organized and is a lot of fun. The water temperature offsets the air temperature and makes it quite comfortable. Next year’s event is scheduled for August 8-10 and you can go online to WWW.BULLHEADREGATTA.COM for more information and to register.

This regatta is so much fun people make plans to attend it all year. There are horseshoe and mud volleyball tournaments as well as kayak and canoe races. The hotels and casinos host concerts and parties for the attendees. And did I mention there is PLENTY of room to park your trucks? There are many other events that weekend to participate in so you really should check it out!

We have beautiful fireworks at the AVI casino in Laughlin every Memorial, Labor, and 4th of July holiday and also the cities of Bullhead and Laughlin host a fireworks show as well on Independence day. There is so much to do out here that you really should make it a point to visit in the near future! We are only 20 miles north of I-40 at Needles, CA. and 85 miles south of Las Vegas so it’s very conveniently located for the trucking industry.

We hope to see some of you out here in the future; it’s a worthwhile stopover whether you have a couple hours or a couple days.

‘Til next month, y’all stay safe out there and God Bless!