A "best of" collection of road trip pictures can be found here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/aspersions/XUSA07BestOf
Slideshow here:
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Maps! Maps! Maps!
A couple more maps:
This is a map color-coded by day of the trip:
This is a map color-coded by which minivan ("Cannonball") we were driving:
This is a map color-coded by day of the trip:
This is a map color-coded by which minivan ("Cannonball") we were driving:
Thursday, June 21, 2007
Saturday, June 16, 2007
The first of many visualizations
Presenting our route, courtesy of Ilteris:
(Click on map for more detail)
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
DATELINE: willits, ca
Author: Andy
I totally just got drunk-dialed by jenny chowdhury! She's in san francisco, a mere 150 miles away.
We just ate dinner at this random diner in town. Although we arrived 15 minutes after closing, the waitress let us order anyway. That's the 2nd time we've lucked out like that in 2 days. We were on the cusp of having to eat at Denny's again.
I drove about 200 miles today, taking over somewhere near Eureka. The drive along the california coast was beautiful. The views were right out of a postcard. We've been taking US 101 the whole way. We drove past a lot of ridiculously large redwood trees. At some points while I was driving, the road would weave underneath a thick canopy of giant trees. The sand dunes are still my scenic highlight of the day, but the subsequent drive today has been a very pleasant surprise.
Karl drove for 5 hours today and now ilteris has taken over for the last leg. It's funny how driving 300 miles seems like such a reasonable task at this point. We're going to arrive in SF in style, right over the Golden Gate Bridge.
DATELINE: fort dick, ca
Author: Ilteris
Finally! We are in california. We entered 25th state of our trip couple of minutes ago. I can see pacific ocean on my right and we are passing through small towns on the coast. Beautiful. 360 miles more and our trip is finally going to end in san francisco. I am pretty sure we are all looking forward to it!
DATELINE: reedsport, or
Author: Andy
Sand for breakfast! First stop today was the Oregon Sand Dunes. I'd been looking forward to it from the beginning of the trip. We paid $25 each for a half-hour dune buggy ride and it was great. Our driver buckled us into the dune buggy and drove down this lush forest path. Within a couple minutes the path opened up into rolling sand dunes. The driver then accelerated and we started bounding across the Dunes at high speed. It felt a lot like a roller coaster. We would shoot up the backside of a dune and then rocket down the other side at a steep angle and twisted 50 degrees to one side. After a while he drove us down another path, which opened up onto the beach. Fitting that when we finally reach the Pacific, it is on a dune buggy. Our driver sped down the beach, fishtailing the buggy and spinning it out (on purpose). Then we went back into the main dune area for more awesome roller coaster fun. It was a beautiful and exhilirating ride. I'm still a bit dizzy.
Anyway, we made it to the pacific ocean! And it only took us three minivans to do it.
Seattle yesterday was fun. The EMP and sci-fi museum worth both very engaging and consumed 2 hours more of our day than we had planned. My only qualms with the EMP and sci-fi museums is that they were conspicuously light on electronic music and Babylon 5 respectively. I think both of them are heavily weighted towards the tastes of their founder, Paul Allen. Hey it's his museum, he can do whatever he wants.
It was a little surreal seeing seattle grunge in a museum. In one display case they had a shitty-looking t-shirt that kurt cobain once wore. I mean Nirvana was good and all, but treating his torn thrift store shirt like the shroud of turin is a bit much.
I did the drive from Seattle to Portland. We hit some traffic, but once again the car pool lane made it less painful. After dinner we turned west at Eugene towards Florence, where we stayed the night. The drive was surreal. The only light was from our headlights and we were surrounded by very very tall trees. When we finally got to a hotel near the coast, we drove out to the beach to dispense with the fireworks we bought in wyoming.
On a closing note, Ran Tao was a great hostess in Seattle and we already miss her a lot. Hooray for Ran Tao!
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
DATELINE: albany, or
Author: Karl
When have you ever seen a Hungarian restaurant mentioned on one of those blue highway info signs? Neither had we so that's why we had to stop and check out Novaks Hungarian restaurant. By far the best highway stop food ever, one of the very few non-chain, real restaurants off of an interstate. Chicken paprika, challah bread, chicken dumpling soup, and stuffed cabbage. Wow it felt great to not feel disgusted after a meal for once, the best food of the trip in my opinion. They even stayed open an extra hour for us and gave us free extra portions. If you ever drive through central Oregon this place is worth stopping for.
DATELINE: donald, or
Author: Karl
We rolled in to Seattle last night to meet up with our good friend Ran Tao. After a couple days driving through the stix of Montana & Idaho it really felt comforting to be back in a real city again. Ran's place was really nice, we sipped a couple beers and ate at a pub just down the street from her.
We started of today eating the sinlge most obscene portion of food I have ever recieved in my life at the 5 point cafe. I went with the country fried steak breakfast with gravy, hashbrwons and eggs. Let me tell you, it was a portion fit for an NFL linebacker and not a normal human. Normally I'm good about finishing my plate, but there was no way in hell I could have finished this mountain of carbs. This unfortunately jacked up my blood sugar to hi levels for the rest of the day which made me more groggy than usual, but oh well nothing new. Next we checked out the space needle, experience music project and the science fiction museum. The experience music project & sci fi museum building was your typical Frank Gehry contruction, huge wrapping plates of metal in fluid like/organic shapes in blue and purple colors... Very impressive but not particularly different than his Chicago and Bilbao constructions. The museum featured insightful first hand audio accounts from a number of muscians and people in the music biz. It had a lot of really great interactive exhibts, all kinds of ways of recording your own stories and music; these were in-line with many of my thesis advisor's projects at his company Local Projects. The Jimi Hendrix and general history of Seattle music displays were also fascinating (good grunge music history). The connected science fiction museum was also really sweet. It seemed to be heavily bank rolled by Paul Allen, go figure, who else could justify buying raygun collection from classic sci fi cinema. Images, props and stories from Star Trek, Jetsons, Star Wars, Alien, Dune, War of the Worlds, and Lost in Space were just a few of the sights. It also glossed over various sci fi themes such as, teleportation, time travel, altered futures, changes in scale, etc... I felt they could have had more info on japanese anime and other manga style anime. But overall, it was cool and made me want to read a sci fi novel.
Time kinda ran out so we weren't able to take the microsoft tour, be then again I didn't really care too much about doing that anyway. I hope Ran likes the good bye card we left her ;-) ... You rock Ran thanks for letting us crash!
Monday, June 11, 2007
DATELINE: fishtrap, wa
Author: Karl
Road trips are fun Karl, that's what I just keep telling myself. We're on the 3rd minivan with probably $1,000 worth of damage to the last 2, and I have to go through the fun process of now filling out yet another insurance claim form. The newest cannonball is substantially smaller, only a dodge caravan, and not designed for cargo. We somehow stuff all my bags into the van, many of which are now splitting apart with my clothing spilling out all over the place. Melted chocolate, diet coke spills and mystery lotion slick coats the last vans interior. Budget would be stupid to ever want to rent a car to me again... Chances are cannonball III will also be returned in the same ravaged state as the first 2.
My perspective on the deer decapitation: I was fast asleep at 3am. We were driving in the remote state of Montana in the absolute darkest and most desolate pitch black night I can ever recollect, no lights on the horizon, no other cars, just black. When the tank hits half you start worrying when u will ever see another gas station. I feel the car slow down and swerve right, I wake up from my delirious sleep seconds from impact. I see the deer standing still in the left lane. Andy cuts into the right shoulder and slows down to about 60 mph. In the last possible moment this deer makes a suicidal dart for the KIA. Andy makes the smart move not to jerk the wheel hard, which could have ended in tumbling inferno, but tries to keep it as right as he can without flying off the road. Then I hear a load thud against the front left of the car and see what looks like a football sized object launch into the night sky. It took me close to 1 minute to realize that this was in fact not a dream and really happening. According to the casino guy in Ananconda at least we didn't hit a cow ... why? Because if you hit a cow in Montana you have to pay the farmer for it.
Will we ever make it to san fran??
As Andy mentioned, all good stories end in a trilogy. Neither a rock in the road, a charging deer nor Grillz Mcgee could stop this journey, we roll on to the north western corner of the USA... Forward we press on without looking back.
DATELINE: alberton, mt
Author: Andy
Two fun facts about deers, highways, and Montana. We learned these from a local an hour after they would have come in handy.
If you see a deer in the road, you are supposed to come to a complete halt rather than try to avoid it. This runs counter to the instinct most of us would have on a 75mph interstate; the last thing you would ever want to do is stop, particularly in the passing lane. But here in Montana, especially at night, the chances of getting violently rear-ended are much less because you are typically the only car on the road for many many miles.
The other lesson concerns what to do if you do hit a deer. Apparently it is customary to stop your car, get out, and drag the carcass onto the shoulder. As it worked out, the idea of doing this didn't even cross our minds. I would go so far as to say that dragging a decapitated deer around was the last thing any of us was inclined to do.
We soldiered on and found lodging in the lovely town of Anaconda. The problem was that both motels in Anaconda were closed for the night. We went into a casino (there's lots of little ones in montana) to use the bathroom. We met a very nice guy running the place who explained the aforementioned deer rules to us. He also explained that we were out of luck finding a hotel within 20 miles with an open check-in counter at that hour of the night. Exhausted, we parked in a nearby parking lot and slept in the minivan.
We stopped off in Missoula to use the free wi-fi at a random super 8. Karl had to make some calls to deal with the car situation. Our left front headlight is smashed to pieces, and there is even deer hair embedded in it. We're gonna need another new minivan. Karl arranged for us to pick one up in Spokane.
We had pizza for lunch. We've been laughing a lot.
DATELINE: butte, mt
Author: Ilteris
Karl: 'omg! I saw something flying off!` after these couple of days, finally we just chopped off a head of a deer at 3am in the morning in montana interstate north something. Last two days were insane. First we went to vegas. Of course on the way grand canyon and hover dam. To be honest, I couldn`t make it if I was sober. Vegas. It`s a city where you come for a day and live the danger of not be able to leave again. Seductive for addiction. We could threw ourselves into road saturday afternoon and made it to salt lake city around 11pm. I must say I have never seen such a strange nightlife. Men from different ages and pretty girls are dancing through the worst cover band ever and having their best moment. It was weird. The next day, today, I have experienced the more impressive part of it. This was the part about latter-days saints. So the story goes on like this. Jesus shows up in the north america for a couple of days long before colombus. Then a guy named joseph smith finds a book about this. Starts translating and sharing it people. The people that goes in this way become mormons. Of course, the other christians don`t like this idea. They are forced to move west and end up in utah. Beside all of these stories, the folks at salt lake city built nice buildings out of these. I really enjoyed walking through temple area. I cannot tell the same about nightlife. It was interesting to see two such different cities such close in such a little time. Oh, and the text message that I got from my brother was explaining how we are doing this trip. `what happened to san fran? What are you guys doing in utah, are you going back?`
Sunday, June 10, 2007
DATELINE: chubbuck, id
Author: Andy
Do a google image search for "virgin river gorge." It is really really fun to drive through.
Driving north through utah basically goes like this: you drive up to the crest of a hill, and suddenly you see a 15 mile long valley ahead of you. There are at most two buildings in the whole valley. At the northern edge of the valley is another set of mountains. You follow the road up the front of the mountain. You reach the crest of the road, and you see the next 15 mile valley laid before you. This repeats for about 300 miles. Each valley is a little greener than the one before. Finally you reach the crest of a hill and a whole lot of lights are in the last valley. This is Provo. It's the southern edge of 68 miles of salt lake city sprawl.
We got into SLC a little late, checked into the hotel and walked up to the area of town where the desk clerk said the bars were. There were two bars, only one of which was serving food. The bars close at 1am, so we ate fast. While we ate, a band on stage played instrumental Tool cover songs while half a dozen disenchanted youths moshed in front of the stage.
Our next stop was the 4-floor party juggernaut Port O' Call. You don't pay a cover charge in Utah, you "buy a temporary membership" to a "social club." Karl is now the proud owner of a 3-week membership to Port O' Call (ilteris and I were his guests). The entertainment for the evening was a cover band fronted by a guy in an afro wig. They were basically a wedding band. They closed with "Ladies Night." The scene was kinda lame. When they say they close at 1, they mean it. They literally padlock the liquor at midnight and shut off the taps at 1am sharp. Utah has very strict rules about these things.
We spent the afternoon touring Temple Square and learning about Mormonism. We had a guided tour of their new conference center, which features a slick 21,000 person auditorium. We spent some time in the visitors center and the museum of mormon history. The whole experience connected a lot of dots for me, as I now realize that I only had a partial idea of what their deal is. Basically, there are two narratives at work.
First, there is the story contained within the book of mormon. 600 years before christ, this guy Lehi in jerusalem has a prophecy about the coming of the messiah. He gathers his family in a boat and sails for the americas. Shortly after being crucified, jesus turns up in latin america and hangs out with the native americans, who are decendents of Lehi. Then the tribes are at peace for a while, but then become wicked. The message of christ is lost in the process, which is why there is why when the spanish showed up with catholicism, no one knew what they were talking about.
Anyway, we know about all this because in 18something joseph smith found gold tablets in his backyard in upstate new york(!) and translated them with the help of an angel. Then his growing band of followers is persecuted evrywhere they go until, under the leadership of brigham young, they get to utah. This is the second narrative, the one that took place more recently. It also proves that god has a special place in his heart for the USA.
Yeah.
We've got a lot of driving ahead of us. The woman working behind the counter at an Idaho Chevron tried to pick up Karl.
DATELINE: downey, id
Author: Karl
What a nice surprise, Grillz McGee the dirty south hustla from memphis gave us a ring. He wanted to say wazzup and asked us to pick up some important ups deliveries in Seattle.
Grillz: Hey man where u at? Lets link up.
Me: ok, cool I'm chillin out in west Butte. U going to be around there tonight?
Grillz: Uh, ok, where's that from beale st.?
Me: Oh, yea it's on the westside ... westside Montana dawg!
Grilly-Z was just being his good caring self and helping out the community from coast to coast...
Saturday, June 9, 2007
DATELINE: mona, ut
Author: Karl
The cannonball sailed over the hoover damn with just enough time to dart out for a quick picture. The road swooped around lake mead and down a long desert stretch and there it was, a giant f*ing pyramid in the desert... Vegas stood before us.
We parked the cannonball at stop number one, got out and each picked our favorite machine gun. Andy went with the sniper rifle, Ilteris - laser scope assault rifle, and I preffered the guerrilla classic - AK-47. Checked in at Excaliber. We proceeded to stuff our faces with buffalo wings and oysters while girls in scantily orange booty shorts sang to me for my birthday. We slugged sips from bottles of wine and whisky in the streets. Mexicans passed us stacks of what looked like prostitute playing cards as we watched a massive fountain dance to 'All that Jazz'. Glitzy skyscrapers, an elevated monorail, interconnected labyrinths of miles of casinos. Nothing was too big and everything created flashy spectacle. Fake breasts, swirls of fire from pirate ship cannons, elevators going sidways up a pyramid, indoors converted to outdoor daytime venetian streets, bridges connected more parties, clubs, stores and casinos. Flashing, blinking, buzzing gambling all around you and everywhere. Bachlorette parties, strangers soliciting sex, bathroom stall clouds, and 5 am blackjack. Winning money and loosing money, then winning and loosing some more while the drinking and gorging conitnued. The party never ends and it feels like all sense of time and place are swirled up around u in some kind of buzzed vortex. We moved from one fantasy land to the next in debaucherous exhillaration. It ended with a thin wallet, a cracked watch, and tossing down the final free cocktail waitress cocktail at sunrise. We hit an all you can eat buffet at circus circus on the way out, 3 waters, 2 coffees and 3 servings later we're on the road through a desolate Utah mountain range.
Friday, June 8, 2007
DATELINE: Buenos Aires, Argentina
Author: Eliot
Holy fucking shit! I'm in heaven!
This place is totally insane. The insanity started when I bumped into Lian Sifuentes on my American Airlines flight from Dallas to Buenos Aires. That was really an unbelievable coincidence. But I can't believe how awesome the last couple of days have been. The food here is amazing, and so so cheap when you're thinking in American dollars. For example, a group of 19 of us went out for dinner the other night. Apetisers, mains, desserts, wine (and the food was incredible)... ordering as much aas we possibly could, and the check (including tip) came out to about US $14. Needless to say I've been eating and drinking like crazy here. Everything is amazing here. The food, the culture, the architecture, the people... wow. Sai and I have been talking all day (while stuffing our faces) about how we could move to this amazing city. Its really that good. I can't believe I still have almost a month left to hang out. Totally phyched. And I'm totally psyched for the main event, David an Fernanda's wedding which is tomorrow night. The reception, according to Argentinan tradition goes til 7am the next morning (so like 12 bloody hours!!!). But I'm still thinking of going out tonight. The clube only open at 2am. It's exactly 1:59am right now... The others have warned me not to do it because of the huge party tomorrow, but Fernanda's brother is spinning from 3 til 4 at a club not to far from the apartment I'm renting, so I think I've got to check this out.
ps: The steak here is sensational. There's really nothing like it. (Sorry Texas... not even close)
DATELINE: kingman, az
Author: Andy
I'd been to tucson once before, on my last project with IBM. I did a fair amount of siteseeing then, and decided it was imperative that I bring karl and ilteris to my favorite attraction, the Titan Missile Museum. It messes with your head, touring a nuclear missile silo with a missile still in it. The tour guide even lets you turn the key that would have launched the missile. Our guide was a veteran who had been staffed at the facility in its heyday. We could tell that working there leaves some lasting effects on your outlook towards the world.
Karl's friend Bruce took us to a nice Italian restaurant in a hip part of town. Even after exploring Tucson thoroughly for a week when I was there the first time, I completely missed that area. It's a college town afterall, and therefore I should have figured there would be a bohemian neighborhood of some kind. Anyway I realized that I'd had a fairly one-dimensional view of the town, and that there is more to it than I'd thought. Bruce's wife made some cupcakes for karl's birthday, which were delicious. They were great hosts.
This morning ilteris and I woke up at 4:30 and loaded Cannonball 2 with our luggage and Karl. I volunteered for the first leg, and made it all the way up to the grand canyon in 6 hours. We just beat the notorious phoenix rush hour (I made extensive use of the carpool lane). I am so glad I got the FM transmitter working again. Listening to my own music was key to my success. The best part of the drive was when the sun came up and all the mountains glowed red and orange. I was driving at 85mph listening to good music. It was a fairly inspiring moment.
I'd been to the grand canyon twice before, but it was fun seeing it through karl and ileris' eyes. For some reason there was a lot of corvettes cruising around the south rim. They're apparently having some sort of convention. I wonder, though, about parading around in those right by something that is clearly more awe-inspiring than your car will ever be. I'm glad we stopped by, although on the way out of the park we stopped at the most unnerving Wendy's I've ever been to. The lady behind the counter was super-hyper and laughed at everything anyone said and had a gigantic creepy smile. Also, the place was crowded with an even mix of midwestern families and surly bearded bikers. Now we're on the road to vegas. It's exciting to know that within a couple hours these guys will see both Hoover Dam and Las Vegas Blvd for the first time.
DATELINE: flagstaff, az
Author: Karl
Tuscon yesterday was a blast, I finally got to hang out with my friend bruce that I haven't seen for a while in Tucson. Ilteris & Andy crashed early and Bruce and I checked out some local tucson bars. He explained to me how easy it was to buy a gun in Arizona, it has some of the most lax gun laws. He explained how a few bar brawls with his buddies have ended up in 9mm's getting drawn. Bruce had some fun, rowdy drinking buddys that we linked up with at some place called O'Malleys. After downing a few drinks and catching up on his recent marriage and other good stories I went back for a restful 2 hour sleep and we hit the road again early.
Today we took a look at the grand canyon. It's definitely another one of those cites that's difficult to capture in words or images. Its just the most massive expansive of open rocky mass u can ever imagine. It's hard for your eyes to even comprehend the sheer volume of space in front of them. Stunning and beautiful, it made me feel complete awe. A site that everyone should experience at least once in their life. Next stop - Vegas .... Time to party it up on my birthday today!
DATELINE: phoenix, az
Author: Ilteris
7 am. On our way to grand canyon and las vegas. Got up at 4.30am in order to fool phoenix morning rush hour and be able to arrive early to vegas. Yesterday was fun. We arrived tucson around afternoon and decided to visit titan missile museum. I am talking about a underground facility which had a nuclear missile ready to be used in the defense of an attack from former ussr. It wasn`t easy for me to appreciate any kind of weapon even it's in the name of defense but thinking US built this facility in 1962 was mind blowing. This place was abandoned in 1982 but one cannot help but imagine what they might have now with all these advanced technologies.
I really like tucson in general. Karl`s friend Bruce and his wife Danielle were kind enough to welcome us in their place overnight. Great people! Bruce also took us to a cute italian place on 4th avenue. Garlic toast was delicious. The population of tucson is around a million. I was imagining it smaller but it`s pretty large. It had a charleston feeling to it in some ways. Sunny weather, cute girls, smiling people. It has definitely different properties too. Spread out structure, large roads and gunshops. I wish I could come here when utku was studying at the university of arizona.
Now we are heading to grand canyon and hopefully we are going to make it to vegas around evening. I am excited!
Thursday, June 7, 2007
DATELINE: benson, az
Author: Andy
"Welcome to Arizona" Ilteris said from the driver's seat as I woke up from a nap. It was a moment that made me glad we didn't get him deported last night.
After our coasting-on-fumes experience last night we began what could best be described as a descent into El Paso. Mexican border towns in my experience are sketchy, and el paso didn't disappoint. On the outskirts of town are a series of grungy-looking strip clubs and truck stops. As you approach downtown you can see the white glow of the border and the twinkling lights of juarez in the distance. The mexican border cities have always fascinated me because they are the real world environment that best approximates a Hunter S. Thompson hallucination.
We parked by the border and walked over to the US customs office. On the way, we saw a whole lot of mexicans sleeping in trucks or on the street. Right by the border was a bank of two dozen pay phones. There's a special tension in the air at places like this. I went up to an immigration guy and explained what sort of documentation ilteris had. The explained that without his I-20 in hand, if he left the country he would create all sorts of problems for himself. As the guard put it "he would bebasically deporting himself."
But we at least got to see Juarez at a safe distance. Going there at night might not have been a fantastic idea to begin with. We got back on I-10 and headed up to Las Cruces, the next bastion of civilization along the route. Since it was nearing 11:00, our dinner options were becoming increasingly limited. In the end, we wound up at Denny's for the second time that day. When we woke up at the Super 8 this morning and looked out our window, we were surprised to learn that Las Cruces is bounded bya big set of mountains that we couldn't see at night.
We decided to get a quick jump on our driving today. We got on the road and made it only 2 exits before ilteris, who was driving, saw a Cracker Barrel. "You guys, I am exiting now." Food was good, I have to admit Cracker Barrel is a good time.
We just stopped at a tourist trap called "The Thing" for gas. In lieu of a cheesy souvenir, I bought a blizzard from Dairy Queen. Haven't had one of those in years.
DATELINE: las cruces, nm
Author: Karl
The carlsbad caves were immaculate, actually difficult to describe in words. 14 football fields of wide open cave space with all varieties of stalagtites, stalagmites, bizzare rippling rock formations, etc... 750 feet into the center of a guadalupe mountain. Deafening silence and cold air surround you inside. Some of the sights included a bottomless pit, massive 60 foot stone spires created from thousands of years of calcium fortefied water droplets, glistening white cave crystals and bat shit. After an hour and a half of wandering this wierd alien world we took off.
On the way out I thought it might be a good idea to pump in some extra gallons of gas since we only had a little over a quarter left. However, the gas price was pretty high at $3.37 so we thought, hey there has to be another gas station between Carlsbad and El Paso, that's about 140 miles. The joke was on us! By far the most scenic leg of the trip, stunning jutting mountains, white sandy deserts and a gorgeous texas sundown. I saw the most hazard signs too, which made driving really fun: high wind hazard, falling rocks, dust storms and deer crossings. But what really made things exciting was the fact that we were completey running out of gas! There were absolutely no hints of civilization in sight for the whole stretch. One of those desolate postcard roads of Texan wilderness. Luckily we hit a bunch of downhill closing in on El Paso and we were able coast with the extreme weight of the cannonball for several miles and hit a gas station within 10 miles of El Paso with the needle firmly on E. I even hit a red light and coasted right through since I didn't want to loose our precious momentum. To our surprise we got a free icecream cone upon filling up more than 10 gallons ... Thanks for opting to save those $3 on gas Andy, it was worth it buddy!
Wednesday, June 6, 2007
DATELINE: el paso, nm
Author: Ilteris
Nope, we couldn`t make it to mexico. Andy talked to the guy at the customs and told him that he had a student friend not america citizen but since I didn`t take my I-20 with me the guy told him clearly that if i cross the border I will be deporting myself. Well, since I want to make it to yahoo interview on 18th I decided not to deport myself this time. Andy seemed dissappointed we couldn`t make it. Sorry andy.
DATELINE: carlsbad, nm
Author: Andy
I drove the first leg today after we had lunch at Denny's. Ilteris had his first Grand Slam Breakfast ever. The scenery today has been interesting. We drove through wide open fields covered in low-lying brush and dotted with operating oil wells. It's almost hypnotic and vaguely poignant how they rhythmically rotate unattended with nothing around them.
We passed through Andrews, TX which, as per a big sign at the edge of town, supports God, Country and Free Enterprise. Ilteris noted that there seemed to be a church on every block. Then, just as soon as it had snuck up on us, it faded away. Such are the towns of West Texas.
Last night I ventured under the dashboard of Cannonball 2 and took a stab at replacing the fuse for the cigarette lighter. My efforts were successful, and as such I was able to bring my FM transmitter back to life by powering it from the cigarette lighter adapter instead of AAA batteries. So I can listen to my mp3s when I drive now. This pleases me.
DATELINE: tarzan, tx
Author: Karl
We rolled in to the Quality Inn in Big Spring, Texas. Each light source was swarming with big fat mosquitos, moths and other twitching mystery bugs. We checked in to the room and then decided to take a look at the local adjacent watering hole, Pinkys, afterall its was ladys night.
To get in you had to sprint past a huge insect swarm by the door. The place was just what u would expect, flourescent lighting, cheap plastic tables and chairs, low ceilings, blacklights and an ugly dark colored carpet. There were about 3 rather plump ladies and about 10 tattooed up truck drivers. About every minute or so you would have to swat a bug off of your neck or shoo one away from landing in your beer. A 'vip' room towards the back had the great advantage of having a mosquito net curtain to prevent the bug onslaught. Peering in I saw one heafty lady casually sipping on a budweiser.
After that we got a much need 10 hours of sleep. Todays it's off to check out the caves of carlsbad and then El Paso. All along the route we can see numerous old oil well's slowly pumping for oil.
Tuesday, June 5, 2007
DATELINE: westbrook, tx
Author: Ilteris
Good times as eliot put it. About an hour later after I blogged yesterday some unfortunate things happened to our dodge. Probably you already know enough about it. The new car, a KIA, is much better though. If nothing else, we can open rear windows now. Plus it is way much more stable on the way. Those are interesting side effects of spending so much time on the same vehicle I guess. Being able to see differences so quick. The same thing is happening looking at the landscape as we are travelling. I could definitely say that texas seems huge as one can see miles away on the horizon. Weirdly, it seems the sky is higher. There are barely trees but still green fields. Also I cannot feel the humidity I felt when we were in new orleans anymore.
Tonight we had great mexican food in a very local town. Talking to waitress for a bit just made me realize how much things that I have in this life that I take for granted. She was surprised when she saw my ID and she said she hasn`t been there when we asked about a town 1 hour away. Yet the way she smiled and the way I imagined her was enough for me to appreciate her pureness. She was a great lady.
So now we are cruising through southwest. I can see the stars again in the sky after for a long time. I feel so lucky in general that I am in this journey. More later.
DATELINE: abilene, tx
Author: Andy
We dropped off the aussie at DFW and then headed down to resume our on-again off-again relationship with I-20. I think we've now crossed it about 5 times in our sine wave route west. On the way we hit Dallas rush hour, which set us back an hour or so. Things really thin out west of dallas. There are hardly any tall trees, and you can see for miles around you. The interstate exits are much further apart, and most of them have no services (gas, food, lodging etc.) We'd been looking for food for a while before we hit Abilene. We ventured off the interstate and drove down the main strip of town. A local referred us to a restaurant called Dos Amigos which seems like the only place in town with any cars in the parking lot. Food's here, time to eat.
DATELINE: dallas, tx
Author: Karl
Last night in Austin was chill, we got to check out a decent portland oregon hip-hop crew rip it up at emos. I noticed a few bboy/bgirls in the cut, although they weren't particularly impressive.
Today we had the chance to check out JFK's assassination point and the sixth floor museum in Dallas. Definitely a fascinating and chilling location. Some guy we met swore the sniper popped out of a nearby manhole.
Just dropped off the travelling aussie at the fort worth airport for his next world adventure in Argentina.
DATELINE: austin, tx
Author: Eliot
Ribs for breakfast. It had to be done. Andy took us to a well known BBQ restaurant this morning to compensate for missing out on the classic Texas BBQ last night.
We arrived in Austin at 12am after yesterdays automobile incident, and didn't have much choice as far as dinner was concerned. We found one place which was still serving dinner late at night and the burgers they cooked up were great. We briefly checked out a live hip hop show, and then took a little late night tour around the downtown area on foot. It seems like a really cool place. An oasis of liberalism amongst the strange conservative surrounding areas that we have encountered so far on this trip.
Now we're on the way to Dallas in our brand new Canonball 2. We're going to hit the JFK assaintion tour first, and then the guys will be dropping me off at the airport where I'll be flying to Buenos Aires, Argentina for David Shulman and Fernanda Cohens wedding. I'm excited to begin the next leg of my trip, but a bit sad to leave the guys and miss out on the rest of the road trip. It's been awesome. We've driven through15 states in 6 days. It's been exciting and intense, but by no means relaxing. Fun times. I may drop another couple of messages from Buenos Aires if I can be bothered. I'm really looking forward to being able to relax and explore the city without any time constraints.
Some photos from the last 3 days
We've been having trouble uploading pictures from our phones. Here are three of the ones we've tried to share:
An Aussie at Graceland
Bourbon Street brass band
The hole in the tire of Cannonball 1 (click image to see close-up). Note that not only is there a big hole in the tire, but a wedge has been chopped out of the rim.
Monday, June 4, 2007
DATELINE: burton, tx
Author: Andy
We're cruising through central texas. Eliot is driving Cannonball 2, our new white kia minivan. We're listening to our official road trip country song "I'd like to check you for ticks." It's a real country hit song right now, google it, download it. Katie bauer just sent me an sms to see how we're doing. I told her to go read the blog, which perhaps she is doing. Hi katie!
DATELINE: houston, tx
Author: Karl
Phew! Today was just one pain after the other. Andy's hi end fancy luggage lost a wheel which rolled out of the lobby of the hotel. I started off the day driving the first leg after the usual approx 4 hours of sleep after a night of drinkin. The next dose of crap today threw at us was when andy's memory stick suddenly became unrecognizable to his camera, which means we had to pick up another one at best buy and lost a lot of our pictures. Next few hours went smooth until I jerked my head up from a nap to a load bang and Andy swerving all over the road. The wheel had a huge gash and the tear looked like someone shot it with a shotgun. We marooned the car at the 'texas nuthouse' candy shop in a nothing town in texas. We found a repair shop, threw on the donut tire, then were forced to re-route through houston to exchange the minivan for a new one.... This time we got a kia of similar size and its much nicer. Because of this we missed out on the texas prison system museum and lost hours, oh well. Onward to Austin...
DATELINE: new waverly, tx
Author: Andy
"Oh shit" - mexican car mechanic when he first laid eyes on what had happened to our right rear tire.
Not only did we blow a tire, but apparently the wheel is messed up too.
I was driving, and eliot and I have been having a debate over how big the rock that we ran over was. As I can recall, it was a low, fairly rounded rock. Eliot describes it more like mount doom of mordor.
So yes, we are currently stuck in a small Texas town. Yet we blog on.
DATELINE: cleveland, tx
Author: Ilteris
Here we come, texas. It`s 857 miles to El Paso from where we entered. We are going to be spending our next three days in this state.
Last night we were in New Orleans. One sunday night was not enough to analyze what`s happening in the city. Nevertheless, I could still feel it was not one of your everyday cities. Walking around french quarter and bourbon street I could feel a unique flavor both with its architecture and people. I can boldly speculate this flavor includes paris and barcelona in some ways. I wish I could come here before katrina in order to compare differences but personally I find people tired and trying to hang in there rather than being sketchy. In any way, this place definitely deserves more time than we give. It has a whole deep language waiting to be discovered. Even in couple of hours we spend, it`s so clear that this city is artistically so inspirational. Now as we are passing by the first set of ranches near 105 in Texas, I am surprised, watching the transformation between two states.
DATELINE: metairie, la
Author: Andy
Last night I think I caused some problems by pulling the cable for my camera out of the usb port on karl's computer without unmounting it first. Now the card with all of my pictures on it is unreadable. I bought a new one at best buy for $27.18, and the guy at the geek squad desk said he's heard of data being recovered in these circumstances. All this because the "album cover" picture I took was so good I just had to upload it to the blog whilst sleep-deprived.
DATELINE: New Orleans, LA
Author: Eliot
Long bloody day. We finished up with Graceland later than expected and arrived in New Orleans at around 12:30am. Sunday night on Bourbon Street wasn't what I remembered from Mardi Gras 1999. Less people makes it a little more desperate and dodgy. This guy dragged us into a bar to watch the band just so they would be playing to an audience. It was more like watching band practice than an actual show. The musicians were yelling at eachother that the other guy wasn't playing it right.
You really feel like a piece of meat walking down Bourbon street on a night like tonight. I felt like everyone there had their eyes on us, trying to work out ways to squeeze as much cash out of us that they possibly could. To say business was relatively slow would be an understatement; although it was 2am on a Sunday night after all.
Andy led us down an alley to a cool and hidden halloween themed bar, right at the beginning of the night. Late night donut-like things at the famous Cafe du Monde were great... but the waitress serving us was a total weirdo bitch, and gave us shit for asking for a anything that would force her to actually work. It was bizarre.
The night was strange and entertaining. Not exactly what I expected, but fun nonetheless. An attractive dancer told Andy that her dad's car was stolen by the drummer from Pink Floyd. He told her his dad's stereo was stolen by the drummer from Devo.
Sunday, June 3, 2007
DATELINE: duck hill, ms
Author: Andy
My gadget that broadcasts from a headphone jack to the radio died. So now we can't play music off of our mp3 players anymore. We drove to Arkansas and then back to memphis, then had lunch with my cousin. We poked around sun records and then went to Graceland. I did the drive from memphis to here. We listened to a mix of country music and preaching on the radio. This one religous station played this inspirational fanfare to begin a sermon, and just as we did The Cannonball reached a crest in the highway and laid before us was a straight 2 mile stretch of mississippi highway darting towards the horizon.
DATELINE: memphis, tn
Author: Ilteris
Wow. This has been the craziest south experience for me so far. Last night at beale st. We walked from our hotel through empty streets until we found this street full of people emerged out of nowhere. This experience totally reminded me of what I lived in Santander, a northern spanish city, in my europe trip back in 2005. People were drinking on the streets, booing cops if they show up and having fun. This time was not different. It was like a carnaval. I have found a chance to speak to some people and learned some stories. It was great until the cops showed up on their horses around 3 and started to clean the streets. Later, I have learned it is a temporary thing to lessen the crowd. One kid told me to wait for 20 mins and the police is going to open the street again. He was right about that. In the end I can tell that memphis was an interesting spot to visit. The people were interested in tourists(this is the impression that I got anyway), probably because we added a small flavor to their routine lifes. But I also need to say that the people are not the happiest people on earth and there is still a tension going on in all these carnivalesque lifes. Finally, today, we just visited elvis' graceland and now I have a better understanding of what he means to these people as a figure. Now we are on our way to New Orleans.
DATELINE: memphis, tn
Author: Andy
It's about 4am and we're at denny's north of beale. Eliot and karl are chatting up some random people. Ilteris is outside talking to a homeless guy. I find myself standing by the entrance for some reason. There's a security guard at the door, and old white guy, and I notice him tell some black guys trying to enter that the restaurant is closed.
"I didn't know Denny's closes" I asked the guard.
"It's too busy right now, the cooks can't keep up." The guard answers.
I look around and notice half the tables are empty.
"There's so much space," I said, putting on my consultant hat, "Why not just hire more cooks for saturday night when Beale st. empties out."
"It ain't that simple. It gets too wild. We get a lot of people leaving without paying." he said, just after turning some more black people away.
"OK, well my turkish friend is outside. Please let him in when he finishes his conversation. We have the hotel key so he needs to meet back up with us."
"Oh, sure. No problem." The guard said.
As I caught up with karl and eliot I realized what was going on. With all the hip-hop clubs emptying out, they could do a brisk business. They just don't want that kind of business. Weird.
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