Heavy Horses: Hustling the XC90 to Atlantic City for a Jethro Tull Concert

Miles Driven: 2,017

Interstate highways tend to be the quickest way from Point A to Point B. They’re also deadly dull. So, when we took the XC90 for a weekend jaunt to Atlantic City recently, I was happy to follow a back-road route mapped out by Waze. (Nice to have that on Apple Carplay now.)

To get a jump start on the weekend, I left my office two hours earlier than usual on Friday afternoon and picked Patti up at her job. Soon we were motoring along mostly traffic-free back roads through southcentral Pennsylvania. Shortly before reaching Havre de Grace, Maryland, we turned onto I-95 and then I-295 for a short sprint north toward Wilmington, Delaware. We crossed the Delaware Memorial Bridge and worked our way over to the Atlantic City Expressway for a straight shot into AC. We completed the trip in about three and a half hours with one quick stop for a snack—a very respectable time considering we were contending with Friday’s evening rush hour. Had we taken our usual route through Philadelphia and over the Walt Whitman Bridge, I can’t imagine we’d have done it in less than four and a half hours.

Overall it was a relaxing ride, and we had some fun giving the Volvo’s Harman Kardon sound system a workout. I know car reviewers always rave about the XC90’s optional Bowers & Wilkens stereo, and I won’t argue its capabilities. But it seems the B&W is installed in nearly every XC90 made available to the automotive press, and I wonder how often the Harman Kardon system gets a chance to strut its stuff. It’s standard in the Inscription model but an upgrade over the base system in the Momentum trim. To my ears, it delivers crystal clear sound, great tone, and nice separation that lets every instrument shine through distinctly.

I found the Volvo’s front seats very comfortable for the 175-mile ride, too. You may remember I had worried that the bottom side bolsters were too stiff when I first took delivery of the vehicle. Now, I don’t find them a problem. I guess they just needed a little breaking in. Or maybe I did.

Upon arriving in Atlantic City we met up with one of our sons, Rob, who had driven in from his job in New Jersey, at the Borgata Hotel and Casino, where we would be staying for the weekend. The three of us had a nice meal at Angeline, an Italian restaurant in the casino operated by celebrity chef Michael Symon. It was Restaurant Week, and we each took advantage of a favorably priced prix-fixe meal. We all chose arancini for appetizers, and also shared a meat and cheese platter. Patti and Rob selected a short-rib bucatini for their entrees, while I chose fettucine alfredo with sausage. Desserts were taken back to our hotel room: cannoli for Rob and me, and tiramisu for Patti. Every part of the meal was delicious, including the amazing breads. (Why can’t some of the great Italian bakeries from New Jersey set up shop in our neck of Pennsylvania?) We left stuffed and happy.

After a late breakfast Saturday morning we ambled down the boardwalk to the new Hard Rock Hotel & Casino. I’m a modest gambler, but I had a lot of fun learning craps on a video game where the minimum bet was far lower than it is at the tables. Next, we Ubered to the other end of the boardwalk to take in the new Captain Marvel movie at the IMAX theater at the Tropicana Casino & Resort. (We’d left the Volvo valeted at the Borgata.) While reviews for the film were mixed, we all liked the movie. Go girl power.

After that it was another Uber ride for Patti and me to Ocean Resort and Casino to catch a Jethro Tull concert, part of the 50th anniversary tour for Ian Anderson and his bandmates. At 71, Anderson is still energetic and still a great flute player, prancing about the stage like a man half his age and regularly striking his signature one-legged playing pose. His high, nasally singing voice isn’t nearly as flexible as it once was, though, and he was clearly straining to hit some of his notes. Occasionally, other singers took over lead vocals. But it didn't detract from our enjoyment of the show. Anderson and the band earned a standing ovation from the large and enthusiastic audience after closing the concert with Aqualung, and then another after a driving Locomotive Breath encore.

Ian Anderson

Our ride home Sunday afternoon started as smoothly as the trip down, with me giving Pilot Assist its most extended use yet heading north on the Atlantic City Expressway. But proceeding down I-95 South with Pilot Assist still activated I decided to experiment with Waze by pushing an icon I didn’t recognize. The app froze. We thought we could live without navigation for a while, but later, heading north through Maryland on a back road, we ran into a detour that we presume was due to an accident or fire. We temporarily found ourselves wandering unfamiliar terrain, but I opened the XC90’s navigation app and soon enough we were back on track. We wound up getting home in four and a half hours, including a short lunch stop.

About that lunch stop. We had pulled into a strip shopping center to eat at a Five Guys burger restaurant and saw a black XC90 parked by itself. I parked our black XC90 two spots over, and figured the owners would get a smile out of it when they came back to their vehicle.

When we were nearly finished our meal, Patti observed a young couple leaving the restaurant. The guy was wearing the exact same pullover I was wearing, and the same color pants. “He’s probably the guy driving that other Volvo,” I quipped. We watched them continue into the parking lot, and sure enough, that’s where they headed. Patti and I laughed when we saw the woman try to get into the passenger side of our Volvo before realizing she had the wrong vehicle.

What a coincidence.

My only regret is that I didn’t dash out of the restaurant to ask the guy if his name was Randy.