Doing the Hilton timeshare hustle

Poolside at the Hilton Las Palmeras Vacation Resort, Orlando, Fla.

It can happen to anyone on vacation.  No matter your level of travel experience, you’ve let your guard down, and now you’re cornered by someone I like to call the “pitch person.”

He or she may look like they’re acting in some official capacity for a tourism bureau or visitor’s center or maybe the place you’re staying, but they’re real job is to sell you something … and it’s very pricy.  It may start innocently with a question like: “Are you enjoying your stay here?”  “Have you seen this attraction or that site yet?”  “Would you like to come back?”

Then the pitch person hits you with the offer.  And it seems like it’s worth it at the time.  Maybe you’re offered free tickets to an attraction, or free dinner vouchers, or free points added to your hotel chain’s rewards program.  Perhaps it’s even a combination of freebies.  All you have to do is one thing – sit through a timeshare presentation. 

Driving the Road To Nowhere – Nebraska

After navigating a lengthy section of "deconstructed" highway, followed by a quick drive through the Rosebud Tribe reservation (including a rather impressive and seemingly out of place casino on the South Dakota-Nebraska state line), it was mid-afternoon on one of my longest days of driving down the “Road To Nowhere.”  And I still had one of the loneliest stretches of U.S. 83 ahead of me before day’s end – the sandhills of west-central Nebraska. 

Before that, however, I wisely made a rest stop at the first sign of civilization just nine miles past the South Dakota border.  And it turned to be a very worthwhile stop in lovely Valentine, Neb.

Driving the Road To Nowhere – South Dakota

The first leg of my road trip down U.S. Highway 83 (aka “The Road To Nowhere”) through the heart of the country yielded some unexpected fun in North Dakota, such as Fort Mandan and the Lawrence Welk Birthplace.  What would the second leg through South Dakota bring? 

The answer:  Outside of Pierre, not much, unless you count an unanticipated off-road adventure. 

Scenes from the Lawrence Welk Birthplace, Strasburg, N.D.

Picture yourself cruising through the rolling hills and farmland of southern North Dakota early on a late summer morning. 

The sun is still rising and the dew has yet to completely evaporate.  Passing cars are few and far between. 

Then, suddenly, without warning you pass this sign near a quiet intersection with an otherwise barely noticeable gravel road.  What would you do?  Would you speed up and try to get away as quickly as possible?  Would you simply be amused by the happenstance and continue on, accepting that it’s past “tourist season” to visit?  

Or would you do what this commoner did, find the nearest spot to turn around and check it out anyway?  Of course, you would!