More desert.

Sorry for the delay in updating this blog - I know all three of you who look at this have been waiting anxiously! Anyhow, the last two days have been nothing but driving. I got back to Phoenix Tuesday evening and took off on I-10 towards New Mexico. Along the way I stopped at Saguaro NP, a park dedicated to large Saguaro cacti. I got to the park just before dusk, and I was fortunate enough to be there as thunderstorms approached. I mean, how often does one get to go through a thunderstorm in the desert? Shoot, for all I know, it may be common during the summer, but either way the storm clouds provided some great backdrops for pictures. I spent about an hour in the park then got back on the road.

Once back on the road I got to drive through a few huge storms. I was pleased about this, though, as it cooled the temperature about 30 degrees. I mentioned earlier the problems with my car's cooling system, so I was glad to not have to drive it through 105 degree heat for 4 more hours. By the way, that coolant leak is pretty minor (either that or my silicon sealant/hose clamp fix worked wonders) so I should be able to make it back to NC without getting stranded anywhere. Word up! Anyhow, after I went through the rainstorms I got some gas and decided to get a car wash when I filled up - and by doing so I proved the old "it rains as soon as you get your car washed" murphy's law works even in the desert. Yup, a few hours down the road I got rained on again. Whatever though, I'm over trying to make my car look nice at this point.

I spent last night in Lordsburg, NM and woke this morning to hit the road and head through Texas. I think that, unless you've driven through Texas, most people don't realize how big a freaking state it is. On I-10, it's nearly 900 miles to cross the state from El Paso to Louisiana. 900 miles will also get you from Atlanta to New York City. But since Texas is a reasonable state, and they know you don't want to take a week to drive through their state, they set the speed limit at 80 mph. Yes lawd. So I left Lordsburg this morning, got through El Paso, and jetted across west Texas to Kerrville, TX, where I am tonight. Kerrville is just outside of San Antonio. Tomorrow I've got another long drive to get to New Orleans, where I'll be meeting my parents for a few days in the Big Easy.

One thing I did to pass time today was call in to the Sirius radio rap station. And I got on the air, oh yeah. Yes lawd, the nationwide audience definitely heard from "Spooner, from North Carolina" this afternoon. Hahaha, I know that's some corny shit, but I got to chat with DJ Rude Jude. Hey, all y'all were at work being productive, who else was I gonna talk to?

miles so far: 9300

shot glasses: 13

Free Bird's: 29

Red rocks, Joshua trees, and canyonland.

I remember driving to the beach with my sister Lydia one time when I was highschool, and she had a Meat Loaf tape that we listened to. She reasoned that it was good driving music because the songs were so long - by the time one was finished you were at the next town. Well, Lydia and Blake got me satellite radio for graduation, and coincidentally they've been playing a lot of Meat Loaf this week. And honestly, I think "Bat Out of Hell" might be my favorite driving song. 'Cause I be drivin' across the desert like a bat of hell...oh yeah, Lydia, I'm listening to Meat Loaf. What the hell.

By the time I get to Phoenix...

Alright alright alright. The last few days have been full of driving, parks, car troubles and heat. The great American southwest. Oh yeah. Lots to see, lots of miles to see it. I left Ventura, CA Wedensday morning and headed to LA. I was just going to do a driveby in LA, as I was spending the night in Vegas. But I had to roll through Beverly Hills at least, so I did just that. It was hazy, there was lots of traffic, and that was about all I got to experience with LA. I think I'll come back at some point in the next year and spend a weekend or something, I actually think I'd really like it. Word up.

After my quick drive through LA I went to Joshua Tree NP. Joshua Trees are these cacti that look like little trees, and this park was full of them. I was hoping that Bono would be kicking it in the park, but unfortunately he wasn't there. Actually, no one was there; it was really the most desolate park I've ever been to. There were maybe a total of 8 cars in the entire park. But I enjoyed the desolation and the landscape, and yes I took lots of pictures. When I left the park I headed north to Vegas, where I was spending the night with a Wharton classmate, Matt Knipp. I was ready to get crunk.

On the way to Vegas I crossed over the Hoover Dam. Hahaha, I wanted to go on the dam tour and see the dam inside, but the damn dam was closed as it was late by this time. After I crossed over the Hoover Dam the road took me up a hill - and after I crested this hill all I saw was lights. It was actually almost unreal, complete darkness and then a sea of bright lights. Vegas baby! Once in town I went straight to Matt's aparmment. It's not really his apartment, as he's staying at a hotel all summer. Kinda nice, he gets his bed made and clean towels every day. Anyhow, we had a drink and then went out to the Tangerine Lounge, or something like that. Another Wharton '07, Bobby Amerine, met us out there as well. I dunno, I hadn't been to Vegas as an adult, and I figured since I was in Vegas I'd get tore back. So basically that was the night - Matt and I getting tore back. Bobby is a responsible adult, so he was taking it easy. I don't remember much, but I do remember playing video poker at 3:00AM and winning $25. I took my $25 ticket to the redemption booth and told the lady "Yes, I'm a big winner, 25 whole dollars!!!!" I then put the 20 and 5 dollar bills on my forehead. Matt got a good picture of this, but I accidentally erased it. As I said, I was drunk. Oh yeah, I almost forgot - Alan Thicke was at Tangerine Wednesday night. I wanted to go ask Mr. Seaver how he was doing, but I'm sure he gets Growing Pains lines all the time.

Thursday morning I woke up with the worst hangover I've had in years. Matt somehow made it to work, and I left his hotel room at 10:30 and headed towards Bryce Canyon/Zion national parks in Utah. I dunno, I was pretty beat and really just wanted to head to my hotel in Page, AZ, but I felt guilty and decided to go to the parks anyway. And actually, by the time I got to Zion I was feeling decently better. Zion was great, but you have to take a shuttle to certain parts of the park, and I wasn't feeling up to getting on a shuttle. Instead I just did the scenic drive part which was cool. Lots of red rocks, trees, and desert, and I took pictures. When I got out of Zion I headed north to Bryce Canyon. Yes lawd.

Well, once I got Bryce I checked my car and realized I was leaking engine coolant. Fuck. I mean, this whole trip is dependent on that good ol' cloudy audi carrying my ass around. A quick inspection showed me that the leak wasn't that serious, but I was pretty damn low. So I jetted out of the park and was fortunate enough to find a store that had some coolant at the park entrance. Whew, I was relieved. I added some coolant and oil and went back in the park to check out the canyon. Wow, it was amazing. I was glad I made the trip out of the way to the park, it was well worth it. After checking out a couple of vantage points I left the park and headed to Page, and it was about 7:30 at this time.

So here's where it gets fun. According to my atlas there's a road that cuts south just outside of Bryce Canyon that would get me to Page. I started down this road and ended up running into a state park. I asked the guide how to get to Hwy89, and he told me there were two ways - 1) a 42 mile dirt road, or 2) go back to the other side of the park on paved roads, 120 miles. I decided that hell, I'd take the dirt road. Big mistake, Spooner. I started down this road and it was rough as hell, but I rembered when I was 14 and my family was going to Chaco Canyon over a dirt road - when we drove slow, it was rough. When we sped up, it was fine. You just float over the holes. So I sped the fuck up to about 40 and was cruising...cruising until I came upon a hill with a 90 degree right turn just on the other side of it. Oh shit, I slammed on the brakes, cut as hard as I could, and was able to keep 10% of my car on the road and my face out of the windshield. Of course, 90% of my car ran the hell off the road and over some rocks and dirt. I slid through the curve, ran over some sagebrush, and stopped the car. Fortunately, no amazingly, my car was ok. I didn't break any hoses or tear up my wheels. I did have dirt all up my hood above my headlights, but that was minor. The first thing that went through my mind was that scene in National Lampoons Family Vacation when Chevy Chase gets the family lost and stranded in the desert. That could've been me. So I said to hell with the rest of the dirt road and turned around to drive the 120 miles of paved road. I ended up checking into my hotel just before midnight and passed out. What a long ass day.

San Francisco and Highway 1

Let me start by saying "hell yeah" for the Carolina Hurricans and Miami Heat. Yes lawd, my two teams won their titles in the last two days. And the two MVP's for the titles were named Ward and Wade. Hahaha, just like the two MVP's of Mrs. Hansen's second grade class, Ward and Wade. So yeah, I called my good friend Chad Wade and told him that we should have an MVP party. Word!

Anyhow, so I spent yesterday wandering around San Francisco. Let me start by saying that I really dig San Francisco - it seemed like there was something interesting on every block. I saw the Museum of Modern Art (or the MOMA as they call it), Coit Tower, Alcatraz, robot-dancin'-panhandlers, China Town, porn shops, Lombard and Fillmore streets, the beautiful bay, etc etc. So it was a day well spent. My only beef with the city, though, is that there were just sooooo many damn hills. Manoj warned me about them, but shit, walking around San Francisco for a day was probably the best workout I've ever had. Anyhow, I also really enjoyed catching up with Erin, who was gracious enough to let me crash at her great apartment for two nights. Thanks Erin! I was also able to reunite with Griff and James, who had made it into town from Wyoming on Friday. The three of us and our friend Brent Reid got some drinks at an Irish pub called KT's Monday night, and it was good to have some beers after my walk-about. Yes lawd.

This morning I had planned on going to Yosemite and then taking the direct, non-scenic route to Ventura for the night. Well, I decided that since I'd seen Yosemite before (albeit when I was 14), that I'd take the long, scenic route down to Ventura on the Pacific Coast Highway, route 1. This ended up being a good decision, as it was simply an amazing drive. I took tons of pictures along the way, and I was even fortunate enough to see some elephant seals who were doing some sun bathing. Nice. Oh yeah, and apparently Santa Claus Lane is off of route 1, somewhere near Los Alamos (see the picture above). I guess Santa rolls down to southern California during the offseason.

Tomorrow it's a quick drive through LA and a visit to Joshua Tree NP before heading to Vegas for the night. Time to get a little crunk in sin city.

Craters, redwoods, and EUREKA

I left Portland Saturday morning without really seeing too much of the city. But that didn't mean that I didn't see some cool sites in Oregon, 'cause I went to Crater Lake and it was amazing. It was easily the bluest water I've ever seen - looked like a bumper boats pool or a putt-putt waterfall. Once again, the road around the rim of the lake wasn't completely open (apparently they had a LOT of snow in the northwest this winter), but I was able to get close enough to the lake to appreciate it. Another nice thing about Crater Lake park was the drive to and from the park from I-5. Shit was scenic. There are two state forests near the park, so the 80 mile drive to the park was completely lined with tall trees.

But these weren't the only trees I'd see, nope. 'Cause after I left Crater Lake I headed southwest towards Redwood National Park. This was a haul, but the redwood parks are right along Us-101, which runs right down the coast through Eureka, CA. I had a reservation in Eureka, so I figured I might as well check out some tall trees along the way. It was near sunset by the time I got into the park, which I think was the perfect time to have my drive. This was probably the best drive of my trip so far - tall redwoods on either side of the road, little to no traffic, and a temperature of about 65. I was digging it. Paul Bunyan was hanging out in the park too (see the picture above). As soon as I got out of the park, I pulled over at the next beach access and took some pictures of the sunset. So it was a good "nature" day - saw crater lake, redwoods, and the sun set over the pacific.

Then I got to Eureka around 9:00. I checked into my hotel and was like "to hell with it, I'm gonna get a beer". So I went out to see what Eureka had to offer. There was a pool hall called "Raggz Billiards", and I heard some music coming out of it so I went on in. I think live music and PBR signs are like my siren calls, and this place had both. I had a few PBR's, watched people shoot pool, and talked briefly with a few locals. Unfortunately, though, I don't have any good stories. People really didn't want to talk to me in Eureka. So I went back to my hotel room around midnight and went to bed. What a pity. I should come up with some sort of story to tell people next time I'm in that situation, like I'm a freaking astronaut of something.

This morning I left lovely Eureka and headed south to San Francisco. It was another beautiful drive, through more redwoods and vineyards. At one point I stopped to get gas in Garberville (or something like that), and it was like I'd stepped onto another planet. There was only one main street in this town, and there were pot-smokin', dreadlock havin', acoustic guitar strummin' hippies everywhere. Shit was cool. And the most prominent store on the main street was the "Hemp Exchange". Then I remembered I was in Humboldt County, CA, the top pot-exporting county in the country. At least I think I heard that somewhere. So it all made sense. The lady that made my tuna sub was definitely high off of something, 'cause it took her freaking 15 minutes to throw some tuna and provolone on an italian roll.

I got to San Francisco late afternoon and went to my friend Erin's apartment. We had some pizza for dinner then went to the original Swensen's for ice cream. So it's been a good start to my visit. Tomorrow I'll wander around and see what I can see, and try to stay out of trouble. Word.

Seattle and Mt. Roadclosed, oops, I mean Mt. Rainier

Yo!

Yesterday Alex and I left Missoula and headed towards Seattle. Game 4 of the NBA finals was last night, so our goal was to get there and be settled at a sports bar by tip. It felt good to have a tangible goal, made me feel a bit less worthless. Anyhow, at lunch we stopped in beautiful Idaho, 'cause we wanted to be able to say that we've spent some time in Idaho. We even went to the mall, where Alex picked us up some Idaho Vandals t-shirts. Hehe, bet none of y'all have vandals t-shirts! While we were at the mall, I went to use the bathroom. Now, when I use public bathrooms, I generally never use the handicap stall. I just don't do it normally. But yesterday, I was like "hell, this mall is empty, and the other stall isn't that clean. And what are the chances that someone in a wheelchair is gonna roll into the bathroom while I'm in here?" So of course, as I'm about to finish my business, I see two wheels roll up in front of my stall. No shit. Hahaha, I felt like George in that Seinfeld where Kramer convinces him to park in the handicap space at the mall. Luckily I was not vandalized (get it, "vandalized" - I was bringing it full circle with the Vandals reference...hmmm...)

So we ended up making it to Seattle by 5:00 and went to the Fox Sports bar and restuarant in downtown. We had some great food and watched the Heat spank the Mavs. White hot baby, white hot. Go heat. After dinner/game, I drove Alex to the airport and headed to my hotel. I'm gonna miss Alex, I miss you man!!! I called it a night (and cried myself to sleep, I was so lonely!), so that I would be well rested for today.

This morning my first stop was the space needle. I dunno, I mentioned earlier my penchant for observation decks on tall structures in large cities, so this shouldn't be a surprise. There's a great view of Seattle from the needle, I just thought at $14 the price was a bit steep. But hey, when am I ever gonna get the chance to go up in that freaking space needle again? And it gave me the chance to get a space needle shot glass. You see, I'm buying shot glasses at every site I visit on this trip. I think I'm up to about 7 now (although I didn't get one at the arch or at Badlands). That's a lot of tequila distribution potential, yes lawd.

After leaving the needle I headed to the market on Pike St. This is where they have that fish market where the guys throw fish are they're ordered. I'd seen this on some TV shows, so I thought I'd check it out. While the throwing of the fish was kinda silly, I don't think I'd ever seen such a selection of large seafood items. There were some big fish up in there. I also walked around the market and checked out some of the other merchants. There was a barber shop in there as well, and as I needed a haircut I went ahead and took care of that. Since this market is pretty chock full of tourists, I felt like a spectacle as a I sat there getting my hair cut. This one little lady even took a picture of me. I thought about asking her if I could take a picture of her taking a picture of me, but that would've been weird. I left the market after my haircut and got some coffee at Seattle's Best Coffee. I mean, I had to get some coffee, right?

So that concluded my trip to downtown Seattle. I left and headed towards Mt. Rainier, 'cause tall ass mountains are cool. There's a road connecting the north (Seattle side) and south sections of the national park, and this was convenient as I'm spending tonight in Portland. So I made the hour drive to the park, just to find out once I got there that the connecting road is closed. This meant I could see some of the park, but couldn't go through it. Fuck. So basically my experience was simply a scenic drive with a few glimpses of Ranier's peak (it was cloudy, so the peak was hidden most of my drive). Oh well. I mean, I guess I should've learned my lesson at Glacier, that these mountain parks are iffy before July. But how the hell was I supposed to know the main road would be shut down, again? The guide book said that the park was "open all year". Either way it made my freaking drive to Portland long as shit, and it made me get stuck in rush hour traffic in Tacoma. Watch out for Tacoma at rush hour if you're ever in the Seattle area - don't be fooled by its "secondary member of the metropolitan area" status. I did see a Toyata Tacoma while driving through Tacoma, and it made me pause for a second and think "How cool would it be to own a 'Honda Hillsborough' or a 'Nissan Raleigh'?

I made it to Portland by 9:00 and am now contemplating going out to see the nightlife. It's Friday night, but I'm in a strange city and I'm tired. I guess I should stay in and get ready for my scenic drive along the Pacific coast highway tomorrow. Hmm...

Glacier and Yellowstone pictures

From Gaclier to Missoula. Grizz Country!

Oh yeah, we're in Missoula, home of the University of Montana Grizzlies. Everyone has Griz Fever! Hahaha, so yesterday was a relatively rough day for us, but it ended well thanks to some local hospitality and some good college bars.

We woke up early to try to see as much of Glacier as we could, as early as we could, so we weren't on the road until 10:00 PM. Unfortunately, though, the rain from Tuesday persisted through the morning, so we weren't able to do any real hikes in the park. Don't get me wrong, the scenery at Glacier is amazing - I just think we picked the wrong time of year to visit. July or August probably would've been better, as more snow would've been melted off of the landscape. But we were able to see some huge rapids due to the massive amounts of water drainage from the snow and rain. So that was good.

We left the park around 3:00 and headed south towards Missoula. This would've been a nice, scenic, fast drive - except that Montana is a state who's entire highway system is under construction. And in Montana, they don't just rip up one side of the road at a time, nope. They tear up the entire thing so you get to drive over gravel and mud for 10 miles at a time. Thanks. So the drive took a good bit longer than it should've, but we arrived at Missoula around 7:00 ready for some dinner. After touring the UM campus (which is really nice, set right in front of a mountain), we headed to the Iron Horse Pub in downtown Missoula.

At the Iron Horse they have a Bob and Barbara's-esque special: a bottle of PBR and a shot of jager for $4. Oh yeah. So I had a couple of those, then asked the waitress if they could substitute Jim Beam for Jager. And the nice bartender did just that for me. I felt like I was back in Philly! Alex and I ate some good food, had a few drinks, then asked our waitress what bar we should go to. She suggested the Top Hat for some live music. To the Top Hat we went.

First off, I loved the place. They had a cover band playing songs from the '60s and '70s, and when we arrived they were playing "Up on Cripple Creek" by The Band. That's one of my favorite songs, yes lawd. The people at this bar were fairly hippy, and as I mentioned to Alex, everyone looked like they were having a great time. So we stayed for about an hour and enjoyed ourselves as well. Yes lawd, I'm glad we got to experience some of Griz Country!

Today we're heading to Seattle where Alex departs and heads back east. I'll miss him! He's been a good navigator and conversationalist, so now I have to talk to myself and find my own hotel rooms. We'll see how that goes...

Up north towards Canadia

We left Belgrade, Montana this morning bright and early and headed north through Montana towards Glacier. At lunch we stopped in Helena and ate at a surprisingly good restaurant in one of those little “fabricated Main St.” developments. Apparently Helena is the “best little art town in the country”. We didn’t go into any galleries, though, so I can’t vouch for the accuracy of that statement. But we did have a nice lunch, and that was all we needed. Honestly, I think that was our first meal in nearly two days, as my last meal had been that over-cooked buffalo burger I complained about in a previous post. After lunch we got on a two lane highway that headed towards Glacier that went through absolutely nothing. I swear, this was the loneliest highway I’ve been on in this trip so far. Well, it was lonely except for the construction workers. At one point we were just driving along, doing about 80, and all of a sudden a flag man appeared. That was about as much excitement as we had on the drive.

When we got to the park at 6:30 the ranger informed us that the “Got-to-the-Sun” road through the park is closed at its peak – so while you can see most of the park, you can’t drive directly through it. As our trip is as logistically lean as possible, this is going to make for another speed-viewing day tomorrow. And my car is tired of me driving the shit out of it up and down these mountains. But whatever, we’ll get ‘er done tomorrow. Once we checked into our room, we decided to try to find someplace with a TV to watch the NBA finals game. Our first stop was the Many Glacier Hotel bar, but they did not get ABC. Strange. So we thought we might as well go ahead and see some of the park since we had another couple of hours of daylight, and not shit else to do to entertain ourselves. But unfortunately about 10 miles into our drive the skies opened up and a storm came through. Great. By the time we got to the other park entrance it was pouring, so we stopped into that hotel and checked their TV for ABC. I swear, they had direct TV, so they had about 8,000 channels. But not ABC. What the fuck. They then informed us that they were closing the restaurant and bar because of the storm and the high likelihood of a power outage. Oh, ok. That meant it was probably best for us to just drive back to our room and call it a night. First, though, we stopped at this big restaurant outside of the park to see if they somehow, someway had a TV that carried ABC. Nope, no TV. Oh well, I guess we were just shit out of luck today. The last 15 miles of the drive back to our motel I felt like Snoopy in that Peanuts movie where they’re all in France – Snoopy and Woodstock are driving a little jalopy on a tiny road through a storm, trying to find the “chateau” that they’re staying at for the night. I was Snoopy, Alex was Woodstock. We made it back safely, though, and I’ve now decided to drink some of the mini-bottles I brought along for the trip. I’m now on my second Jamaican Rum and coke, thanks to some rum Yves imported for us this year from Costa Rica. Thanks Yves!!!

I mean, really what the fuck. A county where no one has access to ABC? What the hell is that all about?

Today we did Yellowstone. In one day. BOOM!

Man, what a long ass day. Yellowstone is a big place, with lots of smelly sulfur, thermal springs, geysers, and waterfalls. All very exciting, yes. And they said that seeing Yellowstone in one day was foolish to even consider - ha!! Alex and Spooner don't mess around. When we set out to DO a national park in one day, we DO it. Don't front on us.

We slept in a bit this morning (I think the Jim Beam at the Irma Hotel had a bit to do with this) and didn't end up leaving the hotel until 11:00. There was a Wal-Mart on the way out of Cody, so we stopped and got some supplies. We got some necessary supplies that you need out west, like wrinkle-releaser and diet cokes. Good stuff. Anyhow, after an hour drive we got to Yellowstone and headed around Yellowstone Lake towards the "Grand Canyon of Yellowstone" to view some breathtaking waterfalls. These waterfalls were not just breathtaking because of their beauty, but also because the damn hikes up and down the mountain to view the waterfalls will take all the damn breath out of you. Alex assured me that it was the altitude that causing me to get so worn out, not because I'm out of shape. Ok, I'll believe that. After seeing all we could see at the canyon, we headed towards Old Faithful. It was now 3:30, and we were on a tight schedule if we were to complete our DOING of Yellowstone.

On our way to Old Faithful we stopped and saw the sulphur pits and some other areas of bubbling dirt. Very interesting stuff. Smelly, bubbly dirt. This took only a few minutes, because we quickly decided that one pit of bubbly dirt was the same as all other pits of bubbly dirt, so we didn't waste time seeing all 27 of them. We had some doing to do and continued our journey to Old Faithul. Well, once we got to the lodge we learned that the next eruption of Old Faithful was at 6:40, so we walked around and saw some other geysers. And really, one geyser is pretty much like all other geysers, but we had to stay and see Old Faithful. And I'm glad we did. That shit was dope. But by the time we got through waiting around for it's Faithful ass, it was after 7:00 and we still had about 80 miles of park driving and some more pits and shit to see before nightfall.

We jetted out of the Old Faithful area (and we beat the geyser traffic!) and up towards the Prismatic Springs. These springs were actually pretty cool, and I snapped some pictures, but by this point it was after 8:00. So we got back on the Yellowstone loop road and pressed north towards the Mammoth Terrace springs. It was our last stop, and dammit, we were gonna make it by nightfall. On the way to Mammoth I actually ran over a squirrel - I felt pretty bad, because a) I had killed a squirrel, and b) I had killed a squirrel in Yellowstone National Park - the supposedly safest natural habitat for animals in this country. But shit, he jumped out in front of me. At least it wasn't an elk, that would've done some damage to my car.

At 9:00, just as the sun was setting, we finally made it to the Mammoth Terrace springs. Alex was happy about this. So I snapped some pictures, walked some trails, and got back in the damn car to head out to our hotel in Montana. As I told Alex, I was "Yellowstoned". What a day, we DID Yellowstone.

Now, some of y'all may be wondering why I'm talking about "doing" Yellowstone. One of my pet peeves with my Wharton classmates is that they never talk about traveling somewhere, or visiting some place - they always talk about "doing" it. As in, "I think we're gonna do South America this summer", or "have you done Dubai yet?" I dunno, shit is corny to me. Kinda demeaning really. I'm sure the locals at these places love getting "done" by a bunch of privileged American twenty-somethings. But hey, I did yellowstone today. Sounds good to say. In one day, 'cause that's how I do things.

Wyoming - big sky yes lawd.

Today we drove from Spearfish, SD to Cody, Wyoming. Spearfish, SD - a town that none of y'all will probably ever have the pleasure of experiencing, but they have fast food and a holiday inn. That's enough to please me I guess. Anyhow, we left Spearfish and headed into Wyoming, where we stopped off to see the Devil's Tower. The Devil's Tower is a rock formation that stands over 800' above the ground, and it's pretty damn impressive. The picture above doesn't really do it justice. Anyhow, we hiked around it, and believe it or not we actually saw people climbing to its peak. I mean, I thought they were crazy. Alex saw them and was like, "oh, I want to do that someday!!!" I dunno, scaling 800 feet of slick horizontal rock isn't really on my to-do list, but I have to admire his willingness to give it a shot.

After we left Devil's Tower we headed back to I-90 (my good friend I-90, I think I've driven over 1000 miles on this road so far) and towards Cody. Let me first say that Wyoming is wide open space. I was really digging seeing all the open land and sky. It really is beautiful. After a couple more hours of driving we stopped in Gillete, WY to eat lunch at Porky's Pig, or something like that. It was a barbecue joint. Alex got some pulled pig that he said was good, but my buffalo burger didn't live up to expectations. But at least I was able to eat some buffalo, which I thought was necessary since we were in Wyoming. After lunch we hit the road and headed down a two lane highway to Cody. On this route we climbed through some mountains and took a couple of the pictures I've posted here. After we made it through the mountains it was nice, easy driving into Cody. I think I got the silver bullet audi up to 100 at one point, but it didn't seem like it as the scale of distances is so completely different here.

Once we got checked into our hotel Alex and I watched the Heat get dominated in game 2 of the NBA finals. Good gracious, the boys better pick it up in game 3 or it's over. But whatever. After the game I made Alex go to the Irma Hotel and Saloon for a few drinks with me. Apparently this was Buffalo Bill's hotel and bar, so I felt like a real western cowboy pounding back a few drinks here. And the bartender was extremely friendly and chatted us up a bit. What was especially nice about her, though, was that she made the beam and cokes exactly how I make them - nearly transparent. Yes lawd. Unfortunately, though, it was a rather dead night in Cody and there was really no one out drinking other than me, Alex, a few bikers, and some cowboys. Really, that was about it. Think we looked out of place at all?

Speaking of dead, one of the funnier things I saw leaving South Dakota was in Deadwood. South Dakota and Wyoming are real hardcore places. Everything here has names like "Deadwood Black Mountain Cowboy Biker Hills Pass Buffalo Sacred Ground Cattle Ranch Saloon". It's a tough place. But not as tough as it may seem, because in the town of Deadwood, on Cemetery Ave., there's a fast-food mexican place called "Taco Jim's". How the hell did they let a place with a name like "Taco Jim's" (complete with a caricature of a big smiling Mexican man on its neon sign) into this town? That shit ain't hardcore at all. I bet ol' Wild Bill rolled over in his grave when they built that one.

Badlands to the bone

Yesterday we saw the South Dakota Badlands, Mt. Rushmore, Crazy Horse, and Custer State Park. We got up rather early to get a jump start on the day, but really it was just so that James could watch England's opening World Cup match. The beautiful game, ahhh, yes. Fortunately, that match was the least beautiful thing we saw all day.

Our first stop was Badlands, and my first thought when I saw the walls was "I bet those settlers were shocked as hell when they crossed 500 miles of praire and then stumbled upon this..." Pretty impressive. After spending a few hours driving and walking around the north wall, Alex and I went to Rapid City to get lunch. We ended up at the Sanford's Grub and Pub. Alex was a big fan of this place, as it had tons of country panache. Next stop was Rushmore, then we went to Custer State Park for a few scenic drives. Right before we began the Needles drive, we passed a damn Bison just grazing on the side of the road. Hahaha, I would have kept driving because I didn't see it right away, but Alex was like "holy shit, it's damn Buffalo!" Word up. The highlight of the evening for me, though, was the sunset through the clouds as we were leaving the state park. And there was a rainbow too. I know, rainbows are kind of pansey, but look at the picture, the shit was pretty.

We called it a day around 9:00 and checked into a Holiday Inn in Spearfish. I was tempted to go get a few drinks and meet some more locals, but the boredom of the morning's soccer match caught up with me and I was ready for bed. Today we drive towards Yellowstone in Wyoming, should be a good drive indeed.

Just for the record -
total miles on my car so far on this trip: 3200
total number of beam and cokes: 14
total times listened to "Free Bird": 3

Badlands and Rushmore pics

To South Dakota!

Alex, James, Griff and I left the Holiday Inn Express outside of Madison at 10:00 and headed due west. I was excited about this drive because we’d finally get to some open spaces. But before we could get to these open spaces, we had to drive through 300 miles of “America’s Dairyland”.

Around lunchtime Alex and I stopped in Lacrosse, Wisconsin to eat and pick up some supplies at the local Wal-Mart. Ahh, Wal-Mart - the only place where you can buy boxer shorts, bullets, and beer at the same time. Just west of Lacrosse lies the Mississippi River and Minnesota, and it was a beautiful view of the river as we crossed. Unfortunately, Alex is no Ansel Adams either, so we didn’t get any good pictures of it. And really, now that I’ve crossed the Mississippi three times in the past week, I should be used to it, right?

For the next 260 miles we were in Minnesota. I wish I had something interesting to say about our drive through Minnesota, but it was just dairy farm after dairy farm. Sine I-90 runs just north of the Iowa border, we did take a detour down to Iowa, just so we can now say we’ve been to Iowa. But I was glad we did this, ‘cause we got to see what is meant by “amber waves of grain.” Straight up amber waves of grain everywhere there.

By 5:00 we finally made it into South Dakota. One thing I didn’t realize was that it would be so freaking windy. The car door slammed back on my knee when I tried to get out at the welcome center. One nice thing about South Dakota is that the speed limit on the interstates is 75 - that made the last 150 miles of the trip go by very quickly. When we got to Mitchell, SD we went and saw the world-famous “Corn Palace”, which is a civic center decorated completely with corn. Wow. Apparently current NBA star Mike Miller played his high school games there at the Corn Palace. I bet his teammates in the league give him shit about that. But it was actually a pretty neat place to see. We got back on the road, and right before we got to Chamberlain/Oacoma (where we were staying the night), we went to a scenic rest area for an amazing view of the Missouri River. This was really the first truly beautiful natural sight I’d seen on this trip.

Now it was time for dinner. The attendant at the Holiday Inn said that we should go to the Derby Coffee Shop for steaks because they grill out on Fridays and Saturdays. So we wandered into Chamberlain and to the Derby. We got there right as it was closing, but since we got in “before they lock the door”, they said they’d feed us. It was just as the attendant had said – a coffee shop with a grill out front. The owner’s father, though, cooked some damn good steaks. He also chatted us up about what to see in the Badlands area, and even gave James a packet of his special steak seasonings. Having an Englishman with you will get you perks, for sure!

After we left dinner we headed to the Silver Dollar Bar. Hahaha, man, we were so freaking out of place at this joint. It was just as you might imagine, a lot of dudes drinking beer. Everyone was fairly friendly to us though, and Alex even played some games of foosball with one of the guys. There was this band playing that was a site to behold though. Have you seen the movie “Sling Blade”? Well, this band was like the abusive boyfriend’s band in “Sling Blade”. Good times. I also need to mention that the price for a beam and coke at this joint was $2. Oh yeah, my kind of bar. We eventually left the Silver Dollar and headed to another bar in the area called Al’s Oasis. At Al’s I might a guy named Mike, who was in town from Madison, South Dakota to do some fishing. We talked about South Dakota and Jim Beam for a while, and then we gave him a ride back to the Holiday Inn where he was staying as well. It was a long day, but it’s good to be out west finally.

Milwaukee, brewers, and Madison

Yesterday Alex and I got up and then headed to Milwaukee for an afternoon game between the Brewers and the Padres. Well, before we left I went to Starbucks for some coffee, and there was this dude there that is worth mentioning. This dude was crazy. He looked like George Carlin, and kept talking to everyone who came inside the Starbucks (he himself was outside). Then he started dancing and singing some Frank Sinatra at the top of his lungs. I dunno, not really that important to mention, but it was an interesting way to start my day, watching how everyone reacted to this dude.

On the way up to Milwaukee we passed an exit for a "Bong Recreation Area". Not sure exactly what that was, but it gave me a good first impression of the state of Wisconsin. We drove straight the ballpark and met three more of my Wharton classmates, Griff, James and Jen. They had been driving from Philly and seeing baseball games for the previous two days, and Griff and James will be heading west along with me and Alex for the next week or so. Anyhow, the five of us headed into the new Miller Park and settled in for some good baseball.

By the way, Miller Park was a great place to watch a game. Beautiful new stadium. We of course started drinking beer as soon as we got into the park because hey, what's baseball without beer? Griff mentioned that we should ask for some budweiser, but we figured that you wouldn't find any bud at miller park. And we were right - the only two kinds of beer you can get there are "Lite" and "Genuine Draft". Both of the Miller variety. During the game we played a betting game called "pass the cup", and Alex took advantage of this game to relieve the rest of us of probably close to $80. But that was ok because we all got to witness a Brewers walk-off homerun in the bottom of the 10th by Billy Hall. Billy-Hall-Billy-Hall-Billyhall-Billyhall. Great game indeed. There was also this 85-year-old man who was heckling the Padres the entire game, and I wasn't sure what was more entertaining - the basbeball game or the old man yelling out insults through a megaphone he constructed using his popcorn container. Funny stuff. And of course, I got mad picturez.

After the game we tailgated in the parking lot for about an hour. Griff cooked some great burgers and it was cool being the last fans remaining at the park. Griff and James then dropped of Jen at the airport while Alex and I drove on to Madison for the night. We settled in Madison and took a walk around the University of Wisconsin campus. It's a great campus, situated on a lake. And the weather was great, so we walked around for a while. Griff and James caught up with us, and we all went to Buffalo Wild Wings to watch game 1 of the NBA finals. Unfortunately, the Miami Heat played like poop in this game and made Jason Terry look like the best player in the league who can't hit a wide open lay-up. Wait a minute, he might be the best player in the league who can't hit a wide open lay-up. Oh well, either way the Mavs won. After the game we stopped by a couple of bars around campus, then headed out of town to our Holiday Inn Express for the night. And now I'm finishing up my coffee and about to make the 750 mile journey to Badlands, SD. Good lawd, this is gonna be a haul...

Chicago pics