Brendan's Ramblings

Mississippi - Somewhere along the Redneck Rivierra

2009-02-17T20:07:00.000-08:00

I’m sitting in the middle of a wetland somewhere near costal Mississippi. It’s beautiful here and the people are really friendly. After a long day in the driver’s seat, it’s nice to kick back and watch the sun set while cooking dinner, enjoying a drink and get eaten alive. From my limited knowledge of insects in winter I all these bugs should be sleeping or dead.

Oh, did I say limited knowledge? I meant no knowledge. My bad. In every place I’ve ever visited in America, these bastards are dead in winter. I’ve never spent a winter evening in Mississippi, nor have I ever contemplated how much a case of West Nile virus would cost me given my shoddy health insurance. I can now scratch 2 more items off my Never Done It list. Whoopee.

Word to the wise: don’t use OFF! anywhere near a camp stove.

This trip is turning into a nice adventure. Last we spoke (or *I* spoke, it is a blog, after all) I was in South Carolina where it was cold, wet, swampy and pleasantly un-buggy. Pulling out of the Congaree area, I caught an interview with the race manager for the Daytona 500 on the radio. Lo and behold, it was race day! Having watched Talladega nights (A compelling NASCAR drama staring Will Farrell and John C. Riley) about 255 times I’ve picked up a bit of a passing fascination with NASCAR and for half the day I flirted with the idea of driving to Daytona, finding tickets and seeing an American spectacle. By 11:15, after 4 hours of daydreaming, I had worked myself into a mental frenzy with the idea.

Could it happen? How far to Daytona? What time does the race start?

Lacking any method for getting information (the newspapers in SC have the thickness of two ply toilet paper and the same contents), I decided to resolve these issues by driving around the nearest town with my laptop out, scanning for an open wireless connection.

To my amazement, Burger King has free wireless. Wha?

Answers:
280 miles to Daytona International Speedway.
The race starts at 3:30.
No idea if there are any tickets left.
I had 3 hours and 55 minutes to make the trip.

The GPS said I could make it. Daytona 500, here I come.

I could write pages about attending my first NASCAR race but I’ll spare you the details that you can imagine yourself (hint: husband and wife teams in matching DeWalt race gear). There are *three* main events I’d like to tell you about.

My welcome to NASCAR began immediately upon my arrival as I was wisked from my car to the bus lot by a tractor. On the bus that would take me to the stadium (almost everyone parks in an offsite lot and is taken by bus to the stadium) I got my first taste of the type of people I would be spending my day with.

Boarding the bus, we were enthusiastically greeted by the driver. I though this was awesome. An “All right, all right!” to one passenger would be followed by a “Hey, ready to go racing?” to the next boarding passenger. Once everyone had boarded the bus he exchanged a couple of words with one of his coworkers about the time of the race and a short joke that I didn’t quite understand because he did this in Spanish.

At this point the woman in the seat in front of me gets visibly perturbed. She starts muttering, loudly to her husband that, “You’re in America so speak English.” And, “You’ve got to speak English to drive this bus.” After a few more attempts at saying the same thing her husband nodded in agreement and said something to the accord of “I swear…”.

I’m five minutes into my NASCAR experience and wondering if I should point out to these two that being bilingual is a commendable trait. I was halfway through working up the courage when I was distracted by the thought of pointing out to these two that wearing a jacket covered with corporate logos and anthropromorphic M&M’s makes you a tool.

Being a wimp, I decided to say nothing.

Brendan’s action packed summary of a NASCAR race (video):

This is hilarious: At the end of the race there are approximately 168,000 fans leaving the speedway, most of whom will need to be ferried, by bus, back to Lot 7 to pick up their cars (I have no idea where lots 1-6 are, or who parks there, most everyone was in lot 7). While there countless busses running the few miles to the parking area, there was still a one to two hour wait to get on a bus.

Keep in mind that photo is only showing the crowd on the raceway side of the street, there are thousands of people in line on the other side of the street who are actually in queues for the busses. The wait was hours!

Fortunately there was a Barnes and Noble bookstore only 40 yards from where you waited in line for the busses. Heck, you didn’t even need to cross the street. I thought the store would be mobbed by people who, instead of waiting in line, were looking for a diversion while the crowd died down.

Here’s what the store looked like inside:

Thousands outside, not a soul browsing for books. NASCAR fans: Not big readers...

Other notes:
Unlike other sporting events, NASCAR doesn’t discourage you from bringing in drinks or snacks. In fact there are signs all over the speedway notifying attendees that you’re allowed to bring in one, soft sided mini-cooler per person. Load it up with ice, beer and some chips and get ready to Go Racin’!

EVERYONE is a Dale Jr. fan. Whenever he’d make a move, the crowd would go wild. Those who weren’t standing up (most stand for the entire race) stood up. Unfortunately he was knocked out of contention in collision midway through the race.

30% of Americans approved of George W. Bush in the final years of his presidency. I now know what those people look like.

Tune in next time. Til then, y’all hold my beer and check this out!

(If you’re not in the know, those are a redneck’s last words)

South Carolina

2009-02-13T20:05:00.000-08:00

I’m back on my little laptop and that can only mean one thing: back on the road. The plan is to head on out to California - home - and find work while simultaneously doing a bit of surfing and catching up on normal life. Thailand was, at one time, a possibility but, with the recession going on, I’m none too plussed about burning through my $afety net and then looking for a new job. In a way, I’m looking at a career change so this job search is a bit more daunting than most.

I’m finding myself much less enthusiastic about this leg of the Big American Journey. As my dad suggested, this could be due to the fact that I’m headed home and have a gloomy job search ahead of me. It’s possible my wanderlust might be temporarily cured. Or the prospect of exploring one’s own country is a bit dull after a whirlwind tour of far more exotic lands. I’m blaming it all on winter. The days are shorter, the air is cooler and the countryside is, for the most part, dead.

Fortunately, America is a large country and two of winters’ curses can be dealt with by heading south. In the south, the landscape isn’t as rugged and the adventure is tamed by a serious lack of wilderness. I thought I would be up for experiencing BBQ for dinner and the southern pace of life but I’m way to impatient for this stuff right now. I dream of rugged and it’s hard to feel like you’re roughing it when fresh BBQ and cheap beer is less than a mile from your campsite.

Regardless, I’ll push on through. I don’t have a route planned yet but it’ll come together. Tonight I’m in Congaree National Park and will be exploring the swampy trails tomorrow. After that, I have no idea where I’m headed.

Back

2009-01-12T14:24:00.000-08:00

Well, in case you didn't know I'm back in the USA (go ahead, chant: "USA USA USA!" You have my permission). In fact, I've been here for about a month now. Anyways I have about 8 blog posts I've written that I need to clean up and post and about 720-750 photos I need to edit. Not really looking forward to either of those...

Video update from Turkey

2008-12-07T10:50:00.000-08:00

Warning: I swear like a sailor in this one. Like a puppy peeing on the floor, I tend to pepper my speech with obscenities when I get really excited.

Finally

2008-12-02T04:16:00.000-08:00

I'm in Bratislava and finally got around to posting my travels through Bulgaria. I'm off to Turkey tomorrow so I'm hoping to have some time to start working on editing the photos of Romania tonight. We'll see if I get anything up in the next few days.

Go Go Go Go

2008-11-19T03:37:00.000-08:00

I've been on the move quite a bit in the past three weeks. I'm trying to put together posts on Sofia, Veliko Tarnovo, the Black Sea coast, trains and Romania. We'll see how much I can plow through in the next few hours on this couch. Currently I'm back at Backpack Hostel in Budapest. This is the first town I've returned to on this trip. It was a really cool experience to wake up, get off a train and have some strange feeling of familiarity as I exited the station.

Varna to Brasov: Part II

2008-11-13T13:09:00.000-08:00

Uh, my train didn't go to Brasov. I was on the right train but it didn't go where my ticket said it did. I want to make it back home with a few stories people haven't heard yet so I'm not gonna post this one. If you're curious, ask.

Varna to Brasov

2008-11-13T13:03:00.000-08:00

At least I’m on the right train. I almost missed it. I’d be stuck in Ruse if I hadn’t made friends with a taxi driver/hustler here in the station. I’m not sure what his deal is but he tries to catch people coming off the train and offers them trips over the boarder to Bucharest. He is “special taxi man, cause not in taxi.” I think that means he has a car.

Anyways I’m not sure how the train schedules and signs work here. There was something about Budapest on the departures section of the train board about an hour ago but it quickly disappeared after a strange announcement. I was told “you wait, late.” So I waited… After two weeks I can barely read Cyrillic but, using a cheat sheet, I could tell that my train wasn’t listed on the board in the station. No Bucharest, no Brasov and no Budapest. Then my friend shouted at me, “What you do? Go now! Train!”

So here I am on the train. I’m not sure what the sign said but, the conductor assures me it’s going to Brasov.

My quick check with the direction of the sun says that we’re headed in the right direction, however I smashed my thumb in the cabin door on the way back in. It’s a day of ups and downs but I’m really enjoying it. It’s a total adventure.

I’m going to try and finish up my novel before arriving in Brasov but before I go, I’d love to share a few things:

Last night rocked for the simple reason that I found one of the coolest little lodging bargains in Varna. Art Hotel runs about $28/night for a single room in the center of town. For this price, I got my own cozy little room and bathroom, stylishly decked out in square modern furnishing, cable TV and free internet. I was planning on staying at Flag Varna Hostel but despite what Lonely Planet and Let’s Go say, they’re not open in the winter. I found this out after trying to knock on the door at 3PM, 5PM and 6PM. You think they’d have a sign…

Lost in translation moments are abound here. Hand gestures, wild sounds, head nodding and lots of laughter.

In another type of cultural experience, a 7 year old kid asked me for a cigarette as I waited in Varna’s central square. I gave him a piece of gum. He spit it out and shouted, “Cigarro! Cigarette! You give me! Gum for baby.” I don’t even smoke…

For my goodbye Bulgaria dinner I went to a Turkish restaurant where I feasted for about $10. This got me a tasty salad, full chicken plate (a full pound of freakin’ chicken and a grilled chicken heart on the side), a half liter of beer and custard desert. I’ll also add that Bulgarian cafeterias have won my heart. Just point, smile, act like a stupid tourist and they’ll pile on the food.

This morning I found an amazing bakery. Honestly, if you’re ever in Varna, you have to go to *** for breakfast. Tell ‘em Brendan sent you (if only for the strange, “I don’t understand but you’re funny” looks you’ll get). Get the chocolate croissant. In addition to its magnus gigantius size, you’ll enjoy the fact that it’s dipped in chocolate and completely filled with a dark espresso chocolate goo that is so rich, tasty and explosive that you’ll be licking it off your fingers for lunch. I’m glad I ate it in private.

We just crossed the Danube and I’m back in the world of an alphabet I’m fluent in. Everything is still made out of concrete but at least the billboards are phonetically familiar.

Which also brings us to passport control time and, from what I’ve heard, this takes a while. I’m known as Mr. Cox in these places. I have the urge to tell them Mr. Cox is my dad, I’m Brendan, BCox or even B-Dog but I can’t do that. Border controls fill my heart with an uncomfortable guilty dread. I doubt I’m alone in this sentiment. I feel like they’re going to go through my bags, inquire about my taste in travel literature and ask about why I bought the cherry Danish instead of the apple fritter:

“You are American yes? American like Apple Pie… WHY YOU GET CHERRY?”

I can’t help but feel as if I’m looked upon as a threat in these places. Like I’m punching a hole into their territory or intruding on their sovereignty. Once through, I always realize that they’re not the SS or the American border patrol. I’m not a suspect and they’re not the Gestapo. They’re just guys with a job to do: Go down the rows of trains, fill out forms, address passengers by their last names and put stamps in their passports..

Hey, another stamp. Cool!

Bulgaria: Sozopol

2008-11-12T04:03:00.000-08:00

I’m spending the night in Sozopol where it’s cold, windy, cloudy and dark outside. A week ago I had no idea I would begin an entry about the black sea with a sentence like that. I was assured by many people that it would be warm and wonderful here.

I can say with certainty that none of those people have ever been on the Black Sea coast in November. It’s freezing cold here. This is the type of cold that can only be found on a chilly beach in the middle of the off season. It’s a pretty town but everything has been shut down and boarded up for the winter so I feel like I’m staying in the residential portion of an old, abandoned amusement park. The umbrellas have been stripped of their cloth, leaving only heavy rusted iron skeletons. The only thing of value left in most outdoor bars and cabanas is the concrete seating areas and shell of the bar, all covered in bright paint the color of summertime.

I think that the tourist season must have recently ended because the highlight of my day was watching someone clear out their bar for the winter. The bar was located on the top of a rocky cliff so their moving technique was awesome: they simply threw all their cheap furniture and junk out of the window and onto the rocks below. Chairs, broken tables, bamboo thingies, lampshades and other items were simply cast off like an Anasazi spring cleaning[1]. For about 5 minutes I sat on the beach and watched all these items smash on the rocks below.

In hindsight, I might have witnessed the Bulgarian Mafia ransacking a bar….

Anyways, I’ve spent my time here walking around, taking pictures and walking around a bit more. There isn’t much more to do here. There are a few overpriced restaurants and cafes but that’s about it. Any public place I spend a bit of time in, I can’t help but feel like I’m intruding on these people’s lives. The economy of the black sea coast is heavily dependent on tourism (e.g. Sunny Beach has three times more hotel space than the beach can accommodate) but it’s obviously a summer time thing. From my interactions I can’t help but feel like I’m strangely out of place and out of time. I get concerned and confused looks like I’ve shown up right at the final buzzer of a sporting event or just in time for the curtain call of a play.

Tonight I’m staying in a simple guesthouse. The place is in Lonely Planet and it consists of 3 cold rooms on the second floor of an older couple’s house. It’s outfitted with creaky doors, strange plumbing and skeleton keys for the rooms. Nice. After ringing the doorbell a few times and waiting a bit, I engaged in a scene that I’ve reenacted in almost every city I’ve stayed in across Bulgaria: A strange man or woman approaches you on the street and motions at the place where you’re staying. He then tries to tell you (usually in Bulgarian punctuated with wild hand gestures) that it’s (a) expensive, (b) cold, (c) noisy or (d) filled with gypsies. What strikes me is that they’re not trying to sell me on alternative accommodations but they’re just trying to scare me away. For Sozopol, the man in question went for a combination of options A and B. This was a bit of a bummer because the ones who skip A B and C and go straight for the gypsies are by far the most entertaining of the bunch. Old ranting and raving bigots tend put a lot more heart into their practiced attempts to dissuade you.

Other Sozopol highlights include the taxi drivers waiting for a fare at the Burgas bus terminal. One the drivers I talked to actually lives in Sozopol. We communicated enough that I know he’s a bit shady and he knows I’m from California. An hour after I arrived, I found him back here hustling for fares in the central square. Every time I pass through the square he sings out “CALI-FORN-YA!” and points me out to his friends. I can’t help but feel like it’s a bit patronizing but I can’t help but smile and bust out a jiggy dance move for him.

I’m a good ambassador.

Most of the buildings here are made of wood. I like this because I’m sick of concrete by now. I might find the time to rant more about building materials in a later entry. For now, all you need to know is that I have a sinking suspicion that you can learn a lot about a people by how they build their homes and infrastructure. I’m going to have to fight the urge to throw a brick through every CVS or Walgreen’s window I see when I get back.

Finally, I’ll leave you a with an idea that is totally removed from travel and anything else I’ve talked about here. While hiding from the cold in a nice café I finally had the opportunity to read the transcript of Malcolm Gladwell’s talk: Age Before Beauty. It’s absolutely beautiful and completely inspiring. I think he’s about to publish a book on Genius and his talk ties in with the subject. If you’ve ever been interested in the difference between greatness achieved at a young age vs. greatness achieved later on in life go and read it. Absolutely fascinating.

And with that, I slip back into the dimly lit cold streets to find a store that sells Chocolate and Rakia: a nasty and cheap liquor made from grapes, plums and whatever other fruits a distiller might have lying around. One US dollar gets you approximately a half pint of 80 proof liquor. I’m not an alcoholic but it’ll help warm up my cold and dim single bedroom.

[1] The area below Mesa Verde yielded a gold mine of broken Native American artifacts because the Anasazi simply threw their trash and broken wares down the hills behind their settlements.

Bulgaria: Veliko Tarnovo

2008-11-10T03:45:00.000-08:00

I back date a lot of my posts so that the date of entry corresponds with the date I visited the city. Usually I write when the memories are still fresh and then procrastinate on getting everything online. This time it’s been two weeks since I was in Veliko Tarnovo but I’ll try to remember what my experiences there were like.

Veliko Tarnovo (or just Tarnovo for short) is a beautiful city. When you visit, you’ll understand why the New Bulgarians (British) are buying up property left and right here. The houses and buildings of the city are packed onto the land in such a way that they seem to form the hills themselves. Most of the suburban sections of the city are composed of old concrete apartment blocks but the main old town is historic and authentic without any disneylandesque sheen. Wonderful!

I’ve spent a good deal of my time here walking around the old town. After seeing the fortress the main sights in the area are monasteries and churches that seem to be everywhere in Bulgaria. I’m not a big House of God person. I enjoy large churches for their sheer size and Baroque decorations and I visit Mosques for their wonderful atmosphere but in Tarnovo I reached my limit early in my stay. Thus, I spent a significant amount of time walking around the city, taking photos and taking it easy (cooking, reading, hanging out) at the hostel.

I’ve met some really interesting people here at the hostel. I’ll don’t really write a lot about the interesting people I meet while traveling since it seems that everyone is interesting when you’re on the road. Even so, I’ll introduce you to two people here: Ichiro and Wayne. I like both of these guys a lot and they’re representative of some of the more colorful characters you’ll meet while hostel hopping.

When I met Ichiro, he was dressed in a traditional Japanese robe and had some type of white powder covering his body. I thought he had a skin condition. I became a bit intrigued when I saw that he has a friar’s halo shaved into his hair. It turns out, he’s a traditional Japanese dancer. At 43 (I think), his travel experience is incredible. He’s walked from Ireland to Istanbul (with the help of 2 ferries) and for the last 10 years of his life, he’s lived on the road, supporting himself by traveling from town to town performing the traditional Japanese Dragon dance. He’s toured every inhabited continent. As for the friar’s doo, his hair is shaved to resemble the Kappa, a mythical creature that lives in lakes and emerges from the water to get people to party. Seriously, the Kappa’s job is to convince people to get drunk. Put that culture in your pipe and smoke it.

Wayne is an American traveler living in Columbia. He’s a nut for word associations, etymology and 2012. I can’t really sum him up in a paragraph but he travels the world and tells his story to willing travelers and gives them a message: Just Be. Simply be. Without ego, without shame, you want to exist in the moment. His website is a work in progress and while I don’t agree with much of what he’s saying, I love his message and the amount of work he’s willing to put into learning more.

http://www.circusoflife.com

I left my book on the bus from Sofia but just happened to stumble upon a secondhand bookstore a few blocks away from the hostel. I’m now wrapped up in Malcolm Bradbury 1981 story of Dr. Petworth’s cultural visit to Slaka, the fictional Soviet Satellite state that seems to be vaguely modeled after Bulgaria. It’s a delightful read, full or ruminations on travel and movement through strange places and customs.

Unlike Dr. Petworth I still can’t understand a lick of the Cyrillic alphabet.

On Saturday, I leeched onto a student’s birthday party and made the trip out to a Bulgarian superclub. This was a first rate cultural experience. While we had a lot of fun dancing and hanging out I don’t think a lot of our Bulgarian counterparts had a good time. The club was huge so I took some time away from our group to explore the club and people watch. What I saw literally made me laugh out loud. I'd say that 80-90 percent of the people there were trying to look so cool that they were forgetting to have a good time. Frowns, stiff posture, and dismissive glances were everywhere. We still had a blast and managed to pull a few locals into our fun. Note: if you’re positive and trying to have fun, even if you’re a bit shy and nervous on the inside, you’re no only going to pull yourself into a positive and fun headspace but you’ll also pull those around you into it as well. If you just want to act standoffish and too cool for everyone, well, you’re gonna end up boring yourself and all those around you.

Other notes:
There’s a lot of hiking around Veliko Tarnovo but it isn’t spectacular, mostly trails through the hills to other towns and monasteries.

One of my favorite moments happened only a few minutes after I arrived. Since Veliko Tarnovo is a tourist town, if you’re walking down the street with a backpack, you’ll be accosted by old ladies who own guesthouses. They’ll use every trick they can to get you to stay with them. They’ll tell you that your hostel is closed or that it’s noisy. My favorite woman kept up with me for five minutes of walking and got more and more worked up with every step. By the time I left her, she was shouting that Hostel Mostel is “UNNATURAL PLACE TO STAY! 10 PEOPLE IN ROOM! GOD DIDN’T WANT IT THAT WAY! WHY YOU STAY THERE! YOU STAY IN GYPSY TOWN! YOU STAY WITH THE GYPSEYS!” When I saw her the next day, she wouldn’t even talk to me. She simply shook her head and gave me the stink eye.

I stayed in Veliko Tarnovo a day too long. I should have listened to my internal travel barometer. By now I think I’m a bit more attuned to when it’s time to leave a place and when I should stay longer. By Sunday morning I was itching to go but I didn’t make the jump. I ended up wasting another day kicking around the town instead of getting somewhere fresh and new.

I got a few suggestions to go to Sozopol. It’s a bit out of the way but we’ll see if I get there.

Bulgaria: Sofia and Rila

2008-11-05T03:29:00.000-08:00

So wha'd you guys do today? Oh really? That’s nice. Me? Oh, not much: went for a hike, saw some old churches, purified my soul…

Yea, really! Sorry to pull this type of stunt and say your day really can’t compare with mine but that’s why I’m on the road. You deal with tons of strange and upsetting situations, and spend countless hours in uncomfortable seats and once in a while you stumble upon something that’s totally amazing. It might be a spectacular view or a beautiful girl who just happens to have a thing for American Engineers or an opportunity to purify your soul by crawling through a dark cave. Yep, supposedly, passing through St. Ivan's cave purifies your soul and symbolize rebirth.

Anyways, I just got through spending a night in the Rila Monastery. It’s a beautiful monastery located in the Rila Mountains. There are tons of hiking trails that wind their way through the mountains and loads of small churches and shrines hidden away in this area. I’d love to spend a week backpacking through Rila National Park during the summer. Now isn't the time because it's freezing up here.

I timed my visit so that I’d be up here on November 4th: Election Day. My superstitious side thought it might be a good idea to make my way up here and spend the night in quiet isolation convincing the infinite that we need a democratically controlled executive branch. Whatever. It beats watching CNN for 18 hours. I’m not sure if they still allow him to cover the elections in the states but truly regret missing the spectacle of Dan Rather slowly going insane over the course of his 24 hour stints covering an election.

"You would sooner find a tall talking broccoli stick to offer to mow your lawn for free."

In complete media isolation, last night I felt like I was five year old kid waiting for Christmas. I had a ton of trouble falling asleep and when I finally managed to, I was plagued by three very vivid and very strange dreams that were loosely tied to Obama, McCain or the US government.

Strange dreams and cold rooms aside, spending the night in Rila is a great experience and I’d recommend it to anyone who comes to this part of Bulgaria. It gives you a chance to see the monastery and explore the surrounding mountains. Because of the limited bus service, you only have about an hour and a half of sight seeing when you do Rila as a day trip so make sure to spend the night.

When you do make the trip, you need to know three things: First of all, there’s no bar or nightclub in the monastery. It’s really quiet up here at night, you’ll need a book. Second, the restaurant outside the monastery says it’s open until 10PM. It is not. In fact, they close really early. I think they do this in order to give you the real deal ascetic starving monk experience. My dinner consisted of tap water two week old cookie crumbs I found in my luggage. Finally, when you check into a room here, you have to state why you’re visiting. Just so you know, "The beautiful ladies of Rila" is no an appropriate reason to visit the monastery. You’re on a "spiritual journey".

Anyways, on my return to Sofia today, I was greeted with a smile and a hug from Vasil, a member of the staff at Hostel Mostel (you should stay there!). Everyone here seems excited by Obama's victory. In fact, I didn’t know he had won until I struck up a conversation with a German couple on the ride back from Rila. I had seen his face on a newspaper earlier on in the day but his expression was not one of triumph. Perhaps he realized the job he’s about to undertake. Or he had to sneeze.

I’ve spent quite a bit of time in Sofia. It’s not an amazingly beautiful city but it’s a great place to spend some time. It’s cheap and there’s plenty to do. Supposedly the club scene is spectacular but there aren’t any amazing acts coming through town while I’m here (Marco Carola is scheduled for next weekend… shoot).

One of Sofia’s nearby attractions is Vitosha mountain. At 2000 meters, it towers over the background of the city. I made my way out there and climbed to the top a few days ago. While it’s a big attraction, I was blown away by the staggering number of people out on the hiking trails. It was literally like being in an amusement park. While I could have done with a bit more solitude, I was really impressed to see so many people out and enjoying a bit of nature.

The views weren’t bad either.

OK, I’ve gotta’ go purify my stomach with a plate of veggies and a Bulgarian Pilsner.

Greek Driving

2008-10-25T14:49:00.000-07:00

Greeks seem to drive in a massive coordinated dance. My defensive need for order on the road would get me nowhere in this country. Somehow Tassos, the man I would never trust with my car in Chicago is actually a safe and very responsible driver here. I’m starting to realize that safe driving doesn’t depend on your own driving but how you mesh with the other drivers on the road.

You would never see driving like this in a country where the liability laws are as strict (dare I say draconian?) as those in the US. After being over here for less than a month I’ve come to accept the fact that the American legal system keeps Americans doing things in a very American way. A certain amount of organic togetherness that is seen on the road here, where everything moves with a bit of harmony, has been replaced by systems of rules that outline how one should behave if they don’t want to get sued.

American driving is a very isolated experience. In fact, I’ll speculate that it is this isolation that leads to our issues of road rage and driving anxiety. When a driver is forced to drive by following rules (designed to protect them from prosecution) instead of the people around them, any event that forces them to acknowledge another person (intrusion) on the road can lead to mental struggles related to power. Any level of anxiety, embarrassment or rage will follow.

OK, I’ve obviously been drinking too much frappe (a cold instant coffee drink) this morning. This is understandable since we managed to wake up at 6:40 AM. Compare this to yesterday where we all rolled out of bed between noon and 2PM. Out of our group, I think that I got the most sleep last night. Chloe came up the big looser in that department, clocking in at less than 1 hour. No wonder she’s nagging Tassos about the speed he’s driving at. When you’re riding shotgun and sleepy you really feel the true speed of the car instead of the relative speed to other motorists that the driver feels.

In her defense, Chloe would like to add that we are driving down the most dangerous highway in Greece. Legend has it that entire armies have been wiped out along this road.

We’ve been sleeping in and taking it easy here. Athens doesn’t have a ton of super interesting tourist sights after you exhaust the Parthenon and a few of the museums. Those are great sights. However, once I started saying, “Hey, more old rocks!” I decided to get around to doing what I really wanted at this point in the trip: to be as lazy as possible for days on end. The only reason I left the house yesterday was to buy cheap vodka for our current trip. My travel barometer says that when Tassos is doing more work than you, you’ve officially reached the vacation leg of the trip.

The freeway has ended and we’re on a 2 lane road now. When not passing, it’s courteous to drive with half your car on the shoulder of the road, this allows other cars to straddle the center lane marker and pass in the presence of oncoming traffic (at 160 km/hour). My American sensibilities are left to wonder which direction of traffic has the right of way over the center of the road. From what I can see, there’s really no formal rule other than Don’t Hit Nobody.

Like I was saying, this leg of the trip has been dominated by hanging out and relaxing. I’m completely freeloading off of Tassos and Chloe. They live in an apartment on the bottom floor of their parents house. Mrs. Benetatos brings down delicious Greek food every day and there’s a wonderful bakery with fresh spanikopeta (sp?) up the street. I’ve passed my time with Tassos by playing music, reading a bunch (sweet!), kicking around town, and helping his friend move. Honestly, that last activity was one of the most interesting experiences I’ve had here. Not because Athens is so incredibly boring but navigating the insane streets and trying to get around back alleyways by car is so incredibly awesome. Trying to find your way down single lane streets with no sidewalks (crowded with people) while hauling stuff on your roof and trading Greek obscenities is good fun. You should try it sometime.

Anyways, we’re headed to Kehpalonia (pronounced kif-ah-len-ya) for a few days. Joining our happy, get-along-gang family is Tom, Natalie and Vasili (who’s name kinda’ means basil or king in Greek). The Greek coastline is beautiful. It actually has a lot in common with the California coastline (500 meter jagged mountains falling into the sea). I feel like I’m in Greece’s Big Sur (or, with a less ethnocentric spin, I live on America’s Greek coast). I’m sure it’s going to be a good and relaxing time.

Warsaw Poland

2008-10-17T14:25:00.000-07:00

I traveled to Warsaw (Warszawa) to get to Greece. Norwegian air shuttle makes a cheap hop from Warsaw to Athens twice a week and I needed a way to get to Athens from Northeastern Europe on the cheap. That was pretty much my only reason for taking the train to Warsaw. I’ve never heard a glowing review of Warsaw and you’re not going to find one here. Overall, it’s a big post communist city that’s westernizing quickly. There are tall hotels and commercial buildings, some big city nightlife, large shopping centers and in the center of it all, the Palace of Culture and Science.

The Palace of Culture and Science. was a gift from Stalin to the people of Poland. While it’s an interesting building, I have to say that if I got something like that as a present, I’d hope there was a gift receipt inside. It’s too much of a monstrosity to regift and too damn expansive and prominent to have in the center of town. Many people joke that the best views of Warsaw are from within the building for the simple reason that it’s the only place in the city where the building can’t be seen.

Through my travels through Eastern Europe I’m starting to realize that communists had downright awful taste. Yea, some of their buildings and artwork are cool in their own soviet way but the utilitarianism with which they approached architecture boggles the mind. Didn’t they realize these things were frightening utilitarian symbols? Were they attempts to remove the humanity from the city and thus the people, in a totalitarian bid to turn the people into machines of the state? Perhaps that was the point but then one must wonder, why would someone want to live (or create) a state where the people are subjected to such things? What type of people would actually believe in this shit?

As a westerner, I’m not qualified to answer these questions. However, I find the following excerpt from Milan Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being relevant:

Anyone who thinks that the Communist regimes of Central Europe are exclusively the work of criminals is overlooking a basic truth: the criminal regimes were made not by criminals but by enthusiasts convinced they had discovered the only road to paradise. They defended that road so valiantly that they were forced to execute many people. Later it became clear that there was no paradise, that the enthusiasts were therefore murderers.

Then everyone took to shouting at the Communists: You’re the ones responsible for our country’s misfortunes (it had grown poor and desolate), for its loss of independence (it had fallen into the hands of the Russians), for its judicial murders!

And the accused responded: We didn’t know! We were deceived! We were true believers! Deep in our hearts we are innocent!

In the end, the dispute narrowed down to a single question: Did they really not know or were they merely making believe?

OK! OK! I’ll get back to the travel stuff.

The hostel in Warsaw was packed. In fact, every hostel in Warsaw was full for the weekend. I could only book Friday night and was left to fend for myself on Saturday. What was really surprising was the number of Warsaw residents staying in the hostel. This might be due to the fact that Warsaw lacks any midrange hotel options. There are budget hostels and upscale business hotels but nothing in between. If you need a place to sleep and you don’t want to spend a lot of money, you’re staying in a hostel. While it wasn’t a super friendly or personable place to spend a night, I did manage to meet Polish students, a Polish teachers and a Polish businessman. I also played Monopoly with a gang of English soccer hooligans. Good times.

For my second day in Warsaw, I stashed my pack in the hostel locker and set out on foot to explore the city. Since I lacked a home base, this left me with a lot of walking and time to sit in cafes drinking overpriced espresso (drip coffee isn’t very popular here in Eastern Europe). Despite the rain, wind, a broken umbrella and 40 degree temperatures, I got around to a lot of the museums and sights. Old town is incredibly interesting if for no other reason than it’s a complete recreation of the original old town. The site was leveled by the German army in WWII and meticulously rebuilt in the 1950s to match its prewar state. It’s got a bit of a Disneyland sheen to it but, in the end, it works!

The other highlight was the Warsaw Museum of Contemporary Art. They had a few good exhibitions, including “Fly” by Yoko Ono. Her work includes a number of projects that bring the Museum patrons into the creation process. You’re invited to decorate plates with magic markers and construct works of art from their broken pieces, write on the walls and adorn leafless tree branches with small pieces of paper you’ve written on. She’s included personal notes to Warsaw, framed on the walls. Very fun.

At the end of the day, after an unsuccessful search for other accommodations, I resigned myself to spending the night in the Warsaw airport. Norwegian Air Shuttle flies out of Warsaw Airport’s Etiuda terminal, a terminal that has a reputation for being for being one of the worst in Europe. It’s a fitting reputation. After a few hours of shuteye on a metal bench in the international terminal, I made my way over to Etiuda at 4:10AM to check in for my 6:10 flight. I was a bit shocked to find that, even at 4:10 AM, the line to check in was already out the door. In hindsight, I would have never made my plane had found a place to stay in the city.

After waiting in line for a while, I passed through security, conked out on the plane and woke up in Athens. Upon exiting the plane I was greeted by warm Greek air and could feel the sunshine radiate through the terminal windows. It’s funny but, in my first 5 minutes in Greece, I could tell that I was in a country with a completely different mentality than Poland. Free, laid back (if not lazy) and cool (with a certain 80s flair in their style). It’s not a European city as I know them, it’s Mediterranean and it’s a nice change.

Auschwitz-Birkenau

2008-10-16T14:18:00.000-07:00

This was one of those day trips that’ll stay with me for the rest of my life. In high school I read Elie Wiesel’s book Night. It’s a horrific book but did no good in preparing me for my day at Auschwitz. The immense amount of work that went into exterminating the Jews is so apparent and in your face when walking around Auschwitz and the massive Birkenau sites that there’s no escaping it.

I won’t go into too many details about my visit but here are a few memories.

1. There’s a 30 meter long glass display in the museum that contains a few tons of human hair. The Nazi’s would shave their victims and sell the hair for use in industrial and textile manufacturing. Visitors and relatives of victims have left roses in front of this glass display case. For me, it was by far the most powerful, shocking and immensely saddening display in the museum.

2. We call them concentration camps but they were actually extermination camps. After visiting I see why holocaust scholars make the distinction. The few who made it through the selection process faced an average life expectancy of 2-3 months before succumbing to exhaustion, disease or starvation. I have no idea how a few individuals managed to survive a single a polish winter of hard work with rations of 1300 calories and clothing as thin as pajamas.

3. The inhumanity displayed by the Nazis is shocking.

4. The visit is immensely worthwhile.

Krakow Poland

2008-10-15T14:00:00.000-07:00

It’s been almost three weeks since I was in Poland but I’ll try to re-hash my experience there by picking away at my sleep deprived memory and checking with my (more reliable) pictures.

I purchased my train ticket to Poland at the main station in Budapest. From my dealings with ticket agents, I’m starting to get the feeling that being a ticket agent in Europe must be the most fun job in the world. As far as I can tell, you can be a complete dick to any and everyone who comes to your window and acting as if you give a shit about anything is completely optional. After negotiating a nonrefundable path to Krakow with the agent, I took my ticket and noted that they spell Krakow as Katowice. This didn’t strike me as odd because in Hungary and Poland, Warsaw is known as Warszawa, Krakow could very well be called Katowice.

For future reference, Krakow is Krakow or something that looks like that in almost every language on this planet. Katowice is English, Hungarian and Polish for a medium size industrial town about 80 km from Krakow… Travel tip #187: don’t be too shy to double check any suspicions with the ticket agents once you get your ticket, no matter how unfriendly they are. This is a good skill to learn and practice. Failure to do so can leave one with an unsettling disoriented feeling as you step onto the train platform in the wrong city at 4AM. In hindsight, I was really lucky that Katowice is so near to Krakow. After touring the train station and watching a few polish cops rough up a drunk (who, by his singing, didn’t seem to mind the attention), I was able to purchase a 6AM commuter train ticket to Krakow. Instead of getting to the hostel at 4AM, I arrived at the reasonable time of 8AM having seen a good bit of the Southern Poland countryside.

Krakow is billed as the next Prague. I’d say it’s more along the lines of Prague Lite. There’s gorgeous architecture and impressive religious buildings but most of the beauty is confined to the old town in the central portion of the city. Once you leave this area, Krakow is still an interesting eastern European city but not much more. The old town is small enough that, by the end of my first day, I felt as if I’d seen most of the sights and had a good feeling for the area.

Having seen the a lot of the city, I decided to plop down a bit of cash to do the Polish tourist thing: Wielicza Salt Mine. The mine and associated tour (required in order to visit) has been described as kitschy and a bit silly. After visiting, I can confirm these reports. It’s essentially a Disneylandesque salt mine tour tied together by the salt carvings and statues made by the miners. Probably the highlight of the trip was taking a minibus through the Polish countryside. Seeing traditional houses with long, skinny farming plots stretching out behind them and into the rolling hills was well worth the 60Pl price of the tour. Then again, when it comes to touring salt mines , it would be difficult to beat my previous experience.

When I was 5 or 7, my family toured the salt mines of Salzburg Austria. I still remember a lot of that tour. Not only did we get outfitted in awesome white miner jumpsuits but the method for getting from one level of the mine to the next was The Slide. Yep! If my memory serves me right, a wide banister shaped slide connected each level of the mine. These banisters were over 50 yards long and, to get to the next level you would straddle it and zip down to the next level. If I ever own a house with a cave I’m definitely getting one of those installed.

Here are a few notes from my stay:
Polish Food: Heavy, heavy heavy! One evening, I had an entire meal of fried perogi. I’ve never eaten such a greesy meal. It’s like the long lost relative of The Best Breakfast Ever.

I’m pretty sure my sweat consisted of 5% vegetable oil for the next week.

The hostel staff at Tom and Greg’s hostel are fantastic. They even took us out drinking with them when their shift ended. I had a good time talking about American movies ("I love Big Lebowski!") and cheering on the Montenegro football (soccer) team with them. As the newest country in the world, Montenegro is an easy team to root for when your favorite team isn’t playing. They’re young, spirited and complete underdogs. When they tied the game at 1-1 the bar went nuts. Unfortunately they lost 3-1. Maybe next year guys...

When the conversation turned to politics I was treated to a real surprise. Many of the Polish people are actually strong McCain supporters. Here’s why: The Polish people really don't like Russia. They're pissed off about the Russian aggression in Georgia and they’re very nervous about Russia exerting it’s power in the region again. They want a very strong US leader who will stand up to Russia. They view Obama as a thinker, not a fighter but they view McCain as a soldier who would have no problem telling Russia to “cut that shit out”. Interesting. When asked about American domestic issues I was told that they really don’t care.

Romania got a lot of plugs from other travelers. Cheap food, nice people and not a ton of tourists. I’ll try to get there.

Every year...

2008-10-13T11:20:00.000-07:00

I’m 30. It's incredibly strange to say that but it feels good. I feel like I can say it with a certain air of authority and wisdom. It just so happened that my birthday here in Budapest coincided with Blake’s goodbye party so we combined the two and had a blast. I think I got the better end of the deal since he didn’t get a tiramisu cake with a rocket ordinance jammed in the top.

To really celebrate the occasion, we made the trip out to Mongolian Barbeque, an all you can eat extravaganza that’s a hell of a deal. For about $15 you get:

1. All you can eat (a) buffet, (b) meat bar where you pile your plate sky high with deliciously marinated raw meat, veggies and quail eggs, hand it to the friendly cook who sears it all on the grill and (c) desserts.
2. All you can drink wine, beer, soda, sangria, etc.
3. Five hours to do it all in (12-5).

Everyone had a blast. I can’t think of a better way to spend a birthday.

Budapest

2008-10-12T11:13:00.000-07:00

I take the night train to Krakow tomorrow evening and I’m not looking forward to the trip. It isn’t the fact that I’ll be arriving in town at 4AM and I still don’t know where I’ll be staying. No, I’m just having a wonderful time here in Budapest. For the past few nights I’ve been staying at the ridiculously friendly Backpack Budapest hostel. It’s located a bit off the beaten path in the Buda half of the city (Budapest is actually separated into 2 halves, Buda to the East of the Danube contains the historic and mostly residential portion of the city and Pest to the west contains the downtown, (not so) central park and Parliament).

I suppose my visit here started in Prague when I met up with my college friend Alisa. We had a spectacular time tromping around the city Tuesday night, eating and drinking at the local/expat hangouts in the less touristy part of downtown Prague. I didn’t get a lot of sleep before we made our way out to the Museum of Contemporary art the next day. It’s a very well done museum and even cooler since it was free for the day as they were installing some type of Ikea looking art installation on the first floor. Pardon our dust but the Museum is free today. No Problemo.

I planned on catching up on sleep on the night train to Budapest but ended up drinking $1.50 beers with a guy from here for the first few hours of the trip. So much for sleep. By the end of my first evening here I’d come down with a savage cold from my lack of Z-s. The cold stayed with me for about 36 hours (and ended with what was probably the worst headache of my life) and eased up by Saturday morning, allowing me the chance to enjoy the Budapest Baths and see the (not-so) central park with Namon (??) my new friend from the Netherlands.

The Budapest baths are absolutely awesome! If you come to Budapest and don’t have a bath, you’ve missed out on the experience of a lifetime. Imagine lazily swimming laps in a heated pool complex that looks like this:

The locals play chess while relaxing in the 37C water, lazily soaking up the sun. Some stand under stone fountains and get massaged by the falling water. It was an amazing experience. Life is good here.

The rest of the day passed by lazily and then made way for Saturday night. I won’t go into details but the hostel made a pilgrimage to the city, bars were hit, strange Hungarian pop hippie bands were amusedly stared at and house music was danced to (The DJ played tracks I haven’t heard in about 8 years). Much of Eastern European art and culture carries a funny side of the 80’s close to its heart. It’s not strange to hear a guitar solo or see a guy rocking out to an electric flute. For this American it’s absolutely charming and silly all at once.

We found our way home around 5AM and many of us didn’t make it to bed until 9AM (Formula 1 was on). That’s just the way it seems to work at Backpack. Since they’re a 24 hour hostel, one of the 3 workers is always awake. This keeps everyone else up and going to the wee hours of the morning. It reminds me of college but without the whole study thing. I have no idea how they keep on going. The pace and intensity with which Jai talks makes me think he’s a speed freak but his behavior just doesn’t match up. I think after 5 years of working strange hours at the hostel he just doesn’t need a decent nights sleep anymore. He’s also a bit looney.

I can’t remember a single minute where music was not playing here.

To sum up Budapest, the reports are true: It’s an Eastern European city but with a Turkish twist. Many people are friendly (but not overly so) and have even gone out of their way to help me get on the correct bus or lend a hand in pointing me in the right direction.

As for the sights, they’re cool but not what you travel to Budapest for. Go and soak up the culture, the people and have a bath.

Zizkov - The most awesome of TV towers

2008-10-06T08:32:00.000-07:00

I first saw pictures of the Zizkov tower on the internet a few months ago. The pictures said nothing about where it was located or the story behind the tower so I was absolutely PSYCHED to look out my hotel room and see the creepy and yet somehow beautifully awesome tower perched over the Prague skyline.

Have some pictures.

Prague (so far)

2008-10-05T08:22:00.000-07:00

Prague is beautiful. Please notice the period at the end of that sentence. I can’t remember ever visiting a city with this much pure beauty. Everywhere you turn and everywhere you go, you’re absolutely overwhelmed by the architecture and layout of the city. Narrow stone alleyways randomly run into large courtyard squares surrounded by art nuveau? buildings. It’s truly an amazing place. I’ve never been to Paris but I can’t imagine a city’s beauty besting that or Prague. I’ll visit sometime to make the call but in the meantime I’m making a mental note to never move to Prague for the simple reason that every other city I live after moving away in will be downright ugly in comparison.

The past few days have been spent walking around the city in no particular direction and marveling at every turn. It’s an adventure here. City structures and pathways date back to medieval times (I stumbled upon a large orchard/garden that’s existed in the same place since the1200s to today) and back then, city planning consisted of someone saying “gosh it’s nice I’m not dying today” and then throwing their shit in the street. I can see why the Czech cubist movement flourished here. There are no right angles in the streets and it adds to the flavor of the city. Why not extend that idea to your buildings, furnishings and paintings?

BTW, the black Madonna house is quite nice:

As is the café inside. I enjoyed my time there a lot:

I really don’t have much more to say, amazing sums it up well I suppose I’m getting my feet wet, learning how I like to travel by the seat of my pants in a foreign country and exist on the go. Learning a few Czech phrases has been fun and there’s a bit of adventure at every turn from buying beer in shops to figuring out how to use and get cheated by the local pay phones.

iPod: The Resurection

2008-09-21T20:00:00.000-07:00

It's a miracle: The iPod is back!

All praise be to Steve and his mighty reality distortion field.

Now begins the super sprint to Ithaca NY for a stay with my friend Celeste and her other half Jacob and then I'm off to Maine. My stay with Chris, Asia (Joanna) and Gus in Chicago has been wonderful.

Colorado to Chicago

2008-09-19T16:54:00.000-07:00

I’m sitting at The Common Cup, a wonderfully laid back coffee shop in the Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago. The coffee is good and breakfast treats are delicious. I’m really happy to be back here. Chicago is a city of industrious beauty, history and really great people. After being away for a few years, I can easily say it is truly the second city, only bested by New York in its cityness. No other American cities come close to those two.

Despite the 5 years I spent here, Chicago has never felt like home to me. There’s something about it that’s completely oppressive. I suppose that it’s the fact that, if you’re in Chicago and want to do something, you’re going to do it in Chicago. There’s no easy escape here. You’re boxed in by city, traffic, miles of suburbs and then hundreds of miles of flat flat fields. If you want to go camping or backpacking, you drive to a different state. To go skiing, you get on a plane. To go surfing, you go to the video store and rent a DVD on the subject.

Not really a place I would like to spend my life but it’s still a great place to be today. Fall lasts about 10 days here and I caught one of those days. Good timing.

The drive here was long. About 1,300 miles from Grand Junction. After experiencing Southern Utah, Colorado and the Rockies had no appeal for me. I longed to stay in the same bed for few days, spend time with some good friends, enjoy good company and make use of the internet, shops and everything I’m used to back home. I’m also enjoying not having any real itinerary to speak of.

Yes, I’ve been on a schedule. Once you set goals to see certain sights, it’s hard to back away from racing from pin to pin in the map. I don’t believe I’m alone in this traveling fault but awareness is one stop on the path to recovery.

The Rockies were pretty, but far from spectacular when blowing by at 75 miles per hour from scarred interstate. Upon dropping down into Denver, I got a feel for what was ahead for the next 1000 miles: Flat. Flat. Flat. That’s something I hadn’t seen since the start of the trip in the central valley of California. If you remember, I didn’t like it then either.

Stereotypical Nebraska starts long before you cross into the state and continues until you’re within sight of the Missouri river. For the most part, the entire state was a labor to cross with the exception of one moment. As I wearily walked out of a rest stop bathroom and begrudgingly faced my sentence of 250 more miles, I looked up into an electric neon sunset. Hot pink fading to aqua blue. With no trees or hills around I had 180 degrees of brilliant sky above me. The land smelled warm and dusty, rich in soil. As I merged back onto the freeway and barreled eastward, I locked the wheel with my knee and whooped it up while clapping.

Notes:
I spent the night on the outskirts of Omaha at a Motel 6. The people were fun and made my stay memorable. I slept too late to make use of the indoor pool (my main reason for stopping there).

Iowa has beautiful rolling farmland and would have been a joy to travel through if it wasn’t keeping me from getting to Chicago. They have wireless internet at their rest stops and the most awesome picnic tables ever. I think the only way that table could be more awesome is if the eagle was playing electric guitar.

The Mississippi is a gigantic river and brought back memories of traveling along the Columbia in Oregon. It’s surrounded by beautiful rolling farmland. If I had another few weeks, I’d love to travel the length of it. Perhaps a barge tour? There’s always a Next Time.

My apologies for plagiarizing HST but Chicago comes on like good psychedelics. One moment you’re driving along, wondering what you’re doing, bored and thinking the boring farmland will never end. Then, without warning, you’re not sure how or when it happened but you suddenly notice the huge office buildings, the road has opened up to 3 or 4 lanes in each direction, there’s construction, confusing signs, bumpy unmaintained narrow lanes and traffic that jams into all available spaces. About 20% of the cars dart around you at ridiculous speeds while the other 80% get in your way. Driving here feels like being in the middle of a gradeschool playground at recess.

It’s unbelievably fun once you get into it.

Then you get into the real jams. I spent 2 hours getting to Chris’s house. Over 1,300 high speed miles in two days and I’m standing still on the freeway within 10 miles of my destination. At 8PM! And I thought the bay area was bad.

After bringing my stuff inside, we reacquainted after 6 or 7 years over drinks and burgers. I was too zonked from the drive to understand any stories that involved pronouns. I said this a lot: “Hold on, who again?”

Then 10 hours of glorious sleep. Chris' dog Gus finally woke me up midmorning. He sings along with the fire trucks.

Escalante to Arches and then into Colorado

2008-09-16T16:52:00.000-07:00

Today was complete and utter scenic overload. I can’t even begin to describe what a strange and beautiful place southern Utah is. I think the following exchange between myself and someone at the campfire last night sums it up well

ME: So what are some of y’alls favorite spots in Southern Utah?
GUY: Yes.

Nuf said. Everywhere you go is amazing. Today’s trip from Escalante to Arches had my jaw dropping at every turn. I couldn’t believe it. I even took a direct route that bypassed one of the most scenic roads in Utah and I was still amazed.

The day started in the wonderful town of Escelante. When packing up my tent and getting ready to hit the road I met a really cool couple from Blowing Rock NC. They’re running a production company in Vegas now but their license plate still says “First in Flight”. I love meeting other folks from NC and Faron and Sarah were no exception to my sentiments. Great people. They’ve got the travel spirit and are in Utah filming the Escape Adventures crew doing all types of adventure sports throughout the area.

After chatting for a bit, I repaired my stove (how is it that Escalante Outfitters even had all the parts I needed for my 15 year old stove!?) threw a scone in my face and jumped in the car with the hope of making Denver by 10 PM. About 5 minutes into the drive I slowly began to get the feeling that I had no hope of getting even close to Denver by midnight.

My drive ended up taking me through the State parks near Escalante, across Capital Reef and to Arches.

The drive wound through amazing scenery and strange landscapes cut by erosion.

By the time I go to Capital Reef (didn’t even expect to go there, it was just in the way of getting to arches) I was screaming at God, “How the hell do you expect me to get anywhere if you keep on throwing beautiful scenery in my way?”

There were barren landscape, desert, and finally Arches.

Arches was an incredible finale for Southern Utah. It doesn’t get any stranger than that. Next Time, I’ll see more of it.

I made it as far as Highline Lake State Park in Colorado where I am right now. They have hot showers, grassy camping spots and, from what I can hear, about a million crickets.

Bryce Canyon and Escalante

2008-09-15T13:34:00.000-07:00

I’m sitting in the bar section of Escalante Outfitters sipping a cold Heferwizen and eagerly awaiting my veggie calzone. My tent space 100 yards away cost me 16 bucks. They have free wireless internet, hot showers and their own liquor store where you can buy a fifth of gin (in a glass bottle) for $8.99. That last detail won’t be necessary tonight but it is fueling my sneaking suspicion that I am no longer in Utah but have somehow taken a wrong turn and will be spending the night in the Elysian Fields.

Not that I could easily ask anyone around me where exactly I am. Everyone in this section of Utah speaks German. They’re the new Japanese tourists of the 80’s. Seriously! Everywhere I went in Bryce Canyon I heard German. Not that that’s a bad thing, it’s just really really funny to be in the middle of rural America and hear, “Guten Tag, bin das fine weinersnitzel meizen zeist Volkswagon”

I actually really like Germans a lot. Those I met today were really friendly and their countrymen make good beer and fine automobiles.

OK, enough rambling, I’m still waiting on my calzone so that means I can tell you about Bryce Canyon. Scratch that, as soon as I typed that last sentence the waitress brought it out. It comes with a salad. I like salad. I’ve missed salad.

brb.

OK, today’s notes:

The Cedar Creek Motel’s advertised continental breakfast isn’t even in the same league or nation as the Cedar Creek Restaruarnt’s. For them, 1/4 inch of Sunny Delight and a few vending machine mini doughnuts constitutes a nutritious start to the day. Screw it, they have laundry.

Laundry caused me to get a slow start to the day but I was still able to climb my car up to 10,500 feet and see Cedar Breaks National Monument. Very pretty and cool. It’s like a strange painted top of a mountain that’s eroding away.

Red Canyon is like a fairytale landscape of fire red formations. Supposedly Butch Cassidy hid from the law here numerous times. Mr. Wishkins thought it was spectacular. He’s getting out of the car to look around more and more. While he was born in the forest (and likes camping), I think his ancient race came from a planet that looks a lot like Southern Utah.

I was actually contemplating skipping Bryce but a friendly retired couple in Zion worked to convince me otherwise. It worked. They were right. It’s freaking nuts. I can’t even begin to describe the size and multitude of spires and spikes. I took a ton of pictures.

Es ist alles gut!

Zion

2008-09-14T13:30:00.000-07:00

Oh wow! What a day. Zion is like the Grand Canyon but with all that unused extra space taken out and replaced with color and otherworldly landscape. While chatting with other hikers I pointed out that, if we should ever colonize another planet, I hope the entire place looks like Zion. It’s dramatic and absolutely amazing. Seriously, it can’t be beat.

After eating breakfast I rocketed into the park. It’s a cool place but it has the feeling of some type of nature version of Disneyworld. You park your car and take propane powered shuttle-trams around the park. They let you off at various spots and trailheads. I was a bit apprehensive of leaving my car but after getting chauffeured around, I can say that their system works great.

Zion is a compact park centered around a canyon with steep red sandstone walls. There’s something new and interesting to see in every nook and cranny of the canyon. Since I was only planning on spending one day there, I opted to see a few of the sighs along the main road and then hike the Observation point trail.

I was a bit nervous about the hike since it’s eight miles round trip and my feet are still very sore and blistered from the Cirque trek. Also, my shoes and insoles have holes in them. However after a few minutes of strolling around Weeping Rock they were feeling like they’d make it.

The Observation trail is a steep climb that takes you up over 2000 vertical feet in under 3.5 miles. In that time, you get one hell of a view of the main canyon as well as some time passing through different terrain in narrow side canyons.

Hey John, I'll give you a dollar if you jump in:

Finally, at the end of the trail you’re treated to a view from the top of the park, looking back through the main drag of Zion. It’s one hell of a view.

From observation point you can see the park’s other famous hike, Angel’s Landing. It’s an awesome trek up and along the top of a knife edge ridge that juts out into the canyon. In the above picture, Angel's Landing is the ridge on the lower right hand side. While lumbering back to the valley floor I played with the idea of doing that hike as well, then eating a bucket of railroad spikes for dinner. However, half way down from the top of the canyon, my feet informed me that they had a problem with the idea of hiking a lot more. They’re high maintenance and I’m whipped. I’ll save Angels Landing for next time.

Overall, it was another day of amazing scenery and great hiking.

Tonight I’m hanging out in a cheap but excellent hotel in Cedar City, they got internet, cable and most importantly, heat. Comedy Central is playing a Chapelle’s show marathon and I’ve got a few tall boys of High Life (“The Champage of Beers”). That means this little blurb is ending now.

Zion's Breakfast

2008-09-14T13:04:00.000-07:00

I’m sitting in the Cedar Creek Restaurant eagerly awaiting the follow up to yesterday’s Epic Breakfast. I’ve come to accept the simple fact that, in order to find the best breakfast spots, follow the crowds. Counting cars in the parking lot is an easy metric and on this Sunday morning, the Cedar Creek Restaurant wins handily over the Main Street Cafe 22-3. This is not a technique that should be used exclusively for any other meal other than breakfast lest you enjoy eating dinner at Sizzler every night of the week. For breakfast however, it works well.

I’ve found breakfast tastes to be highly universal. Early in the morning we enjoy calories: preferably in the form of grease, protein and starch. All a restaurant needs to do is make fluffy food that combines all three of those ingredients in wonderful quantities. I’ve also found that the Sunday breakfast crowd is fiercely loyal. If you have a favorite breakfast spot, you go there. If you have friends or family, you bring them. It’s true for La Note in Berkeley, I have no doubt it’s true for the Bear Town Restaurant in Evanston Wyoming and I can see it’s true at the Cedar Creek Restaurant as well.

The nights are still cold, especially at 8,200 feet. The coffee is cutting through my early groggyness after waking up with the sun. Once again I got the experience of waking up and getting acclimated to my picturesque surroundings pulling in to a campsite after midnight. Like a prairie dog emerging from his hole, I popped my head out of my tent and said, “Wow, that’s pretty!” (A mantra I find myself repeating frequently out here.) It was about that time that some hyperactive chipmunk started throwing pine cones at me. From the top of a tree 40 feet up, he dropped pine cone bombs down on me every few seconds until he had exhausted his armory. I've never seen anything like it. The entire barrage lasted about 8 minutes as I tried to disassemble my tent and guard my head. Bastard laughed at me the whole time.

Mr. Chipmunk, I hope they clearcut your mom’s house down.

The drive from Vernal to Cedar City was beautiful but uneventful. I was a bit let down by missing the dam tour (Heh! Putting dam in front of any noun never gets old) but was snapped out of that about 20 miles down the road when I rounded a corner and got this view.

Even Mr. Wishkins got out to enjoy it. He’s having a blast.

Pictures can’t accurately capture the massive amount of space out here. Like the redwoods, the landscape can only be truly appreciated in person.

Actually, that sounds incredibly selfish. Enjoy the photos.

My detour to Flaming Gorge meant that I would be on smaller highways and local routes for the daylight hours and hitting the interstate for high speed travel after the sun set. Perfect.

During the daylight, I was treated to huge vistas, cliffs and canyons cut by the erosion of petrified sand dunes, beautiful color contrasts, and long straight-aways where the road disappears into the horizon at a point. Everything out here has a western feel.

Sorry about the black and white. Sometimes that’s the best I can do. Oh and I liked this. Nestled into a beautiful canyon was, what Georgia Pacific called a “carbon power plant”. Uh… don’t you mean coal? Nonetheless, I thought it was cool in a very evil type of way. If I ever have a summer home on Cape Cod, I want it to look like this:

Breakfast is served. Spread across three plates are eggs, corned beef hash and buttermilk pancakes. I feel like it’s playtime in kindergarten and it’s my turn to select a toy before anyone else. Of course I go for the red hook and ladder fire truck. Y’all are suckers.

I’ll be back in a sec-. Wait! What the hell is that? An orange slice? Don’t you know this is Pancake Country! Get it out of here!

OK, now that that’s fixed. It’s breakfast time.

Best Breakfast Ever

2008-09-13T13:02:00.000-07:00

I just had The Best Breakfast Ever! It was epic. Magnificent. Perfect.

I was on my way out of Evanston Wyoming when I decided that I hadn't had a suitable meal after backpacking (and starving) back in the Cirque. About 5 miles down I-70, I turned the car around and barreled back to Evanston to find the perfect place for breakfast.

When I say that I wanted the perfect place to eat breakfast, I really don't mean that I set out to find perfection in breakfast form. It's just a figure of speech. However, this time, I actually found it. And less than 100 yards from the motel I stayed at the previous night.

It was perfect.

Pulling into the parking lot I first noticed that pickup trucks outnumbered regular cars 3 to 1. There were 4 smokers on the front porch and the ashtray was full of butts. A car full of army grunts were loitering around the parking lot and a lady was attempting to squeeze/waddle through the front door. She was literally having trouble fitting through the door.

These are all good signs for someone who wants to feel full. I had obviously arrived at a place where people really don't give a shit about eating a bit more than a healthy amount of grease.

I looked over the menu and was amazed. Everything was loaded with carbs, grease and protein. If I remember correctly, all meals off the kids menu were delivered a Remmington bolt action rifle and 5 live rounds on the side. After much deliberation I ordered a Denver Omlette. The waitress seemed a bit taken aback by this since it was the only thing on the menu that had any trace of green in it (green peppers). I believe they put that item on the menu to see who's not from round these parts.

I thought I was really pegging myself for an out-of-towner when, instead of a muffin, I chose a scone as my side order.

Scone's are defined by wikipedia as:

"a British snack of Scottish origin. A small quickbread made of wheat, barley or oatmeal, usually with baking powder as a leavening agent. British scones are often lightly sweetened, but may also be savoury. In the U.S., scones are drier, larger and typically sweet."

Heh. Not in these parts sissy boy.

When my meal finally made it to my table I was amazed. I had the largest, greasiest omlette I've ever seen. It sat in a puddle of fat with sausage and bacon on the side, and then, on it's own plate, the scone: A 6 inch disc of fried dough, with no less than 3 tablespoons of solid butter floating in a pond of melted butter on the top. By its shape, I could tell the butter had been scooped out of a tub with a spatula. It comes with 4 containers of honey on the side. I drenched it in sweetness.

In Wyoming, a scone is a funnel cake type doughnut drowning in butter and honey. It's ridiculously decadent and bad for you beyond a doubt. But is it any good?

Oh hell yes!

I worked through my meal, taking a break in the middle to go outside and catch a breather. One of the men outside pegged me.

"You're not from round here are you? Where you travlin' to?"

Humm, I knew it. The veggies in my Denver omelette had blown my cover. "I'm heading into Utah." I answered. Scenes from Easy Rider flashed through my head.

The man smiled big with a Marlboro hanging out of the side of his mouth. "Well let me tell you about my favorite drive to get there."

The guy was awesome. He proceeded to tell me in great detail all about his most favorite drives into Utah. Traveling into Utah via the Flaming Gorge dam was recommended. He urged me to get out my road atlas. We plotted the drive together. I heard, once again, what I've heard over and over again on this trip, "I'm really jealous. Wish I could come with you."

After 10 minutes of passing the atlas back and forth, swapping road trip stories and directions I made my way back inside the restaurant, my day and drive transformed. Round 2 of breakfast was just as amazing as the first half. I finished everything on the plate, paid the check and rolled out of town on my new route. He hadn't lied to me. It was a spectacular day of driving.

Cirque of the Towers

2008-09-12T16:13:00.000-07:00

I was in an unbelievably swanky coffee shop with free internet in Missoula Montana when I started poking around in my road atlas. You see, I bought the “Adventure Atlas” with blurbs on national parks and descriptions of about 100 popular destinations around America. I looked at what was described near my route when I came across the Cirque:

Cirque of the Towers, Wyoming
Begin the most classic hike in the Wind River Range at the Big Sandy Opening trailhead. Pack in eight miles and make camp in the cirque – a wonderland ringed by soaring tabletops, fins and spikes of gray granite. You’ll be smack in the middle of award-worthy calendar photo.

After a bit of Googling, and some reading I knew:
1) It’s only 525 miles away.
2) The last 40 miles are along a dirt road “with sections of washboards which will rattle your teeth.”
3) I want to go.

Awesome. It was already late so I crashed in a campground and decided to get an early start the next morning. That whole early thing never really works out. I ended up eating breakfast in Pinedale around noon (at Stockman’s Restaurant and Drive-Through Liquor Store) and then heading off to the Big Sandy trailhead.

After a few hours of driving I saw my destination:

There were some clouds but I had good rain gear. Then it started hailing. Then these guys got in the way:

When I got to the trailhead, it was already 2:45, and it was snowing. I still hadn’t even packed my backpack. I packed in record time, forgot a few essentials, changed a few clothes and was underway by 3:10. I had 9 miles to go if I wanted to sleep on anything but granite. The sun goes down at 7PM

I won’t go too much into the hike but it was hard. The first 5-6 miles are easy and flat. Then in the last 3 miles you go up from 7,900 feet, up through Jackass Pass at 10,790 and then back down to about 9,000 feet. In three miles, that’s a lot of elevation change. The last few miles are through rocky terrain so it isn’t fun to do on tired legs. I lost the trail, did some accidental rock climbing to get back on track (not fun with a pack) and made it up the pass. I was happy to finally get over the pass. It was all downhill from there.

When I finally made camp with about 20 minutes of dusk left I was exhausted and cold. All I wanted was a hot meal.

That’s when I learned that my stove’s pump had given out. Cold freeze dried chicken and mashed potatoes sucks. I ate it while hearing coyotes (or some animal) howling in the darkness.

The night was cold. It hailed and snowed more. I’ve never fully used the mummy features on my 15 degree bag but I used them that night and still felt the cold all the way through my body. In the morning when I finally crawled out of my bag, everything was frozen solid. I only noticed the cold until I saw what all the hype was about. The Cirque is incredibly beautiful once the clouds get out of the way.

Breakfast was a frozen Cliff Bar. As the sun broke through to the valley floor, I dried everything out and threw on my boots to hike out. The day before had not allowed a lot of rest so my feet were surprisingly sore and blistered. My boots are good but probably not a good match for my feet.

I climbed back out and down to the trailhead. It was a chore to get out (the last 5 miles are flat, boring and long) but my trip didn’t even compare to these guys’.

I met them at the trailhead. They’d been in for 8 days doing 10-15 miles a day with 9 days of food. After arriving at the trailhead a day early, they wanted to be back to civilization. From experience I knew that all they wanted was a good meal. We’re talking hot dogs, chili and fritos (a favorite post trek food at Philmont). They gave me a number to call to get them picked up early then jokingly said, “But if they can’t pick us up tonight, have ‘em send out some chips and salsa.”

“Chips and salsa?”, I asked.

“Dude, all we’ve been talking about for 8 days is chips and salsa. That’s what we’re all dreaming of right now.”

When I moved out of my apartment, I cleaned out my fridge and pantry. I think I gave away almost 50 pounds of food I couldn’t store or take with me. One of the last things to go in the car was a bag of chips and an unopened jar of habanero lime salsa. I had the feeling that somewhere across America, I would run into a party or some occasion where chips and salsa would be the perfect addition to a situation. This was the time. I paused, looked at ‘em and smiled. I’ve been on long 2 week treks before and dreamed of particular foods while begrudgingly stuffing down backpacking food. 50 miles from the nearest town, I just happened to have exactly what they wanted.

I laughed and walked over to my car, pulled out the chips, salsa, and the (still) cold 22 oz bottle of Heineken I’d been saving in my cooler.

“Get your cups out and dive in guys.”

I threw the bag of chips on the picnic table, opened the beer and popped the lid on the salsa. You wouldn’t believe the look on their faces. The entire mess was gone in 3 minutes of blissful gorging.

Under Sail

2008-09-10T16:00:00.000-07:00

Well I'm currently on the road in Missoula Montana and don't have too much time to spare at this super swanky coffee shop. So far its been a tremendous trip with amazing stops, views and people. I have posts from California, Portland and Montana to share but I haven't uploaded the pictures so they'll have to wait.

Next stop: Cirque of the Towers, Wyoming, then onto Utah.

Portland to Glacier NP

2008-09-08T13:13:00.000-07:00

Well, I made it to Glacier National Park. The general store here only sells 6 packs of beer (“No Exceptions!” says the sign). Fortunately (Uh… unfortunately?), I don’t feel like getting tanked or wasting beer so this entry is going to be fairly lucid.

I left Portland a bit late after getting a really good night sleep and taking my time in getting ready. It was a good stay and I don’t think I really wanted to leave. On my way out of town I picked up a cranberry hazelnut (not walnut) scone (Oooh that hazelnut’s good!) at Grand Central Bakery. That thing was monstrous in taste and stature. It was so large I didn’t even finish it until I got to Multnamah Falls (conveniently located right off of I-84):

That thing is big too.

After the falls it was time to see some fish and big engineering at the Bonneville Dam. The Bonneville Damn lies across the Columbia, the second largest river in America. To allow fish to run up stream and spawn, they built a fish ladder:

And a funky looking fish maze:

They have a viewing room that allows you to spy on the fish as they make their way up the ladder. This year’s run was exceptionally large (and incredibly hard to photograph).

I love big engineering projects so when I realized I was 10 minutes late for the tour of the power generation plant, I sprinted down five flights of stairs and caught up with the group as they wandered over to power generation station 1.

The Bonneville Dam was originally conceived as having 2 generators and 2 technicians dressed as butlers as their early concept art shows.

However, when they realized the dam was to be built in Oregon and not 1730’s Rococo France, the design was changed a bit. As energy demands grew, more turbines and generators were added to the site. Currently they have 10 massive generators in station 1 and a bunch more in station 2:

This allows them to supply 1000 megawatts of renewable power. That’s enough to power a city of 500,000 people.

Legend has it that the early 1940s, the site was expanded by 4 generators in order to supply power to the plutonium manufacturing facilities of the Manhattan Project in Washington State.

The tour concluded with a non-technical but hilarious prop scholar/comedy explanation of hydroelectric power generation. I was the turbine.

From there I was off along the Columbia at high speed (yep, there were trains along the road too)

The Columbia is big.

Real big.

Once I left the Columbia, the drive to Spokane was pleasant, leaving the dry, rolling plains in favor of trees, hills and meadows. The town of Spokane is really quite nice. The downtown has an old factory feel and as you leave town on HW-2 you pass by an awesome antique shop with all the junk I’ve ever wanted but never had the space for.

The sun set on my way out of Spokane so I completely missed all of Idaho and the entrance into Montana. I regret that because, from what I could see with my hi-beams on, it’s a beautiful drive.

Since I set up camp in the dark, I awoke to find that I had entered Pancake Country!

Montana, the land of tah-dah.

And log trucks…

There are lots of those. They go slow.

Finally, after about a week on the road, I made it to my first major destination: Glacier National Park. It’s really pretty here.

RIP iPod

2008-09-06T13:02:00.000-07:00

My iPod died. I’m sad.

However I started listening to the unabridged audio book of Steinbeck’s Travels with Charley”. It’s perfect for this trip. It begins with a letter to his friend, Frank Lesser:

In the fall, right after labor day, I'm going to learn about my own country, I've lost the flavor and taste and sound of it. It's been years since I have seen it. So I'm buying a pickup truck with a small apartment on it. Kind of like the cabin of a small boat. Bed stove desk icebox toilet. Not a trailer what's called a coach.

I'm going alone, out towards the west by the northern way, but zigzagging through the middle west and the mountain states. I'll avoid cities, hit small towns and farms and ranches, sit in bars and hamburger stands and on Sunday go to church. I'll go down the coast from Washington and Oregon and then back through the Southwest and South and up the East Coast but always zigzagging.

Elane will join me occasionally but mostly I have to go alone and I shall go unknown. I just want to look, listen. What I'll get I need badly: a re-knowledge of my own country, of its speeches, its views, its attitudes and its changes.

It's long overdue, very long.”

I’m not an old man like him so I don’t need the truck but I do wish I had a few more months to explore the US and zigzag. One month isn’t enough. I'm hitting too many superhighways and not enough small towns. There’s too much stuff and too many people.

That’s why there’s a Next Time. There’s always a Next Time. And perhaps I’ll bring a dog.

Portland 9-6-08

2008-09-06T12:45:00.000-07:00

Things go by fast on the road. I arrived in Portland last night and have been running ever since. Actually, I feel like I’ve been way behind on stuff for the last few days. That’s the truth. It’s an all out (scenic) sprint up to Glacier and I’ve had a lot to get through before I get there.

Today I finally finished up with the tail end of my Berkeley stuff, final bills, health insurance and a bunch of odds and ends. Once that was taken care of it was time to play quartermaster and get supplied…at REI (OK, that’s the last time I’ll rhyme...no, no, that was). The REI in Portland is HUGE. Much bigger than the one if Folsom or Berkeley. I had a very Targetesque experience while shopping there. I entered needing one item and left with an entire load of stuff and a lot less money. Aaahh, shopping! I love how you make me do irrational things. We killed a few hours at REI and then I was treated to an impromptu tour of Portland by my uncle Bill.

I was really impressed. Portland seems to straddle the line between an industry heavy working town and a vibrant young city. It really doesn’t have a big city feel but there’s a ton to do here. People seem friendly and hip, there’s a lot of activity on the street and outdoor seating. I liked the feel of the town a lot. Now, keep in mind that it was sunny and warm. No, it was flat out beautiful. I’m leaving before I see any rain or grey skies.

We had dinner with my Aunt Lynn and Uncle Ed. Toured Ed’s woodshop/man cave (he’s currently building a wooden kayak), ate ice cream, looked at maps and then called it a night.

Portland? Great.

Redwoods

2008-09-05T12:50:00.000-07:00

I made it though the redwoods and I have to say that Muir woods might be pretty but it doesn’t hold a candle to Redwood national and state parks.

The day started with a beautiful drive up the coast. There’s something absolutely majestic about the rocky and cliff filled Northern California coast.
There were so many scenic vistas that I eventually felt desensitized to the whole thing.

When this:

Begins to feel like a kansas feild, you’re completely spoiled.

Highlights:
Drive through tree

That no look like Bigfoot! Bigfoot much better looking.

Redwood

Big tree

Ferndale, an Old Victorian fishing town with great looking restaurants.

My notebook says:
If you ever decide to chug a quart of milk on a hot day, your stomach will tell you (in no uncertain terms) that it is very very disappointed in you.

I decided to camp in one of the redwood state parks (the national park encompasses three amazing state parks). However, the beach campground was full so I packed in 200 yards to the walk in camp. There I met a really cool German couple. Since we were the only ones staying in that area it seemed natural to hang out and share a campfire and a few drinks.

The evening was a whole lot of fun. Making friends while swapping stories over a campfire is one of the pleasures of traveling. Also, if you’re alone on the road, company is always appreciated.

We’ll actually be in Utah at the same time next week. We’ll see if our paths cross again.

Folsom to the California Shore

2008-09-03T13:10:00.000-07:00

Wow, what a day! I feel like a five year old kid who just ate his first salad bowl sized helping of Fruity Pebbles. The day started off in Folsom at Barb and Flip’s house. I’ve always enjoyed my time in Folsom, it feels like my home away from home on the west coast, and whenever I leave, I look forward to returning.

The trip out of Folsom was really the true start of my travels and honestly, it wasn’t the most exciting start to a trip I’ve ever had. In fact, the first 40 or so miles of the trip was boring, flat and hot. Taking US-50 to I-5 and riding that to Woodland was your average central California interstate crap, only with more suck. I think the highlight of that portion of my trip was a giant sign by the side of the road (I regret not getting a picture) yelling at all oncoming traffic “We sell dirt”. My entrepreneurial mind wondered if they ever thought of diversifying and selling mud. I couldn’t help but daydream about this:

Branching off of I-5 at Woodland the scenery and the drive instantly changed. It was glorious. First, while driving out of the central valley, the interstate was replaced by HW 16, a beautiful 2 lane road lined with oak trees. I found myself winding my way through small farms and orchards. Signs by the side of the road advertised fresh squash instead of dirt.

When the road reached the hills, the farmland gave way to plots of land featuring small family run orchards (I wish I knew what they were growing), smaller houses, and the occasional bush farm (well… I’m not sure what those plants were…).

One fun aspect of traveling along highways instead of interstates is the sporadic stops and slowdowns due to road construction. It kinda’ breaks up the monotony of driving as you wait 5-10 minutes for your chance to share a single lane. People, stop their cars, get out, stretch and even smalltalk.

You can get one hell of a tan working outside in California.

As I continued through to Willits I noticed that there are a whole lot of pickup trucks in Northern California. I grew up in North Carolina and was surprised that we don’t have a monopoly on rednecks.

The guy in front of me at the gas station picked up 6 cans of skoal.

I’m used to seeing fairly dumb, white trash, hey look at me I’m an ignorant sonofabitch bumper stickers in the south but once I saw my second

Uncle Sam want you
to speak English.

bumper sticker, I started to feel that 100 miles north of the bay area…ain’t the bay area.

Whatever… No Problemo.

Continuing on 20 out of Willits, the scenery changed again. As I dropped down through the turns to the coast, the oak and burnt grassland hills began to mix with coastal redwood forests. It’s amazing how fast this state changes.

There’s something about breaking through to the Pacific that never gets old. Meeting up with Highway one was like coming home for Christmas. At Fort Bragg I decided that the sun was getting low and it was about time to eat some dinner and call it a day. Besides, the Burger King chicken sandwich I ate for lunch was getting lonely. I found it fortuitous that, as soon as I thought, “Humm, I should eat” the North Coast Brewery suddenly appeared.

Red Seal Ale and a cup of their famous clam chowder…J’amie! (yes, j’amie is French for “I like”).

Tonight I’m staying at MacKerricher State Park. At the start of the day, I was shooting for Redwood National Park but this place is great. After catching the sunset

I was able to explore their rocky tidal pools. I met me a friend.

And now it’s time to go to bed. Tomorrow’s gonna’ rock.

Folsom

2008-09-02T11:54:00.000-07:00

Well, I finally moved all my stuff into storage. Moving your stuff into storage feels like like Moving Lite. All the hassles of moving out but none of the hassles of moving in. I actually like it a lot. Moving into a new place comes with an entirely new set of problems and anxieties that I’d rather not deal with at the moment. Thus, after sweeping, sneezing, mopping, sneezing, scrubbing and sneezing (obviously I’m allergic to cleaning), I’m finally out of town and on the road.

Well, I’m not really on the road. I’m away from my old home but I’m not driving anywhere. It’s labor day weekend and the last thing I wanted to do with our collective last hurrah of summer is spend it On the Road with every other fool in this nation so I decided to make a quick trip out to my aunt and uncle’s house and relax, take care of business and lay low for the holiday.

Yesterday (Monday) we decided to trick the crowds and made a late afternoon trip up to Wrights Lake in the Sierras. It’s an awesome spot. I'd give it two thumbs up but then I'd drop the camera in the lake.

Wrights Lake is home to many different critters and creatures. As I explored, I took pictures and gave the animals unique names. There were tons of ducks named Fred. Enjoy some duck butt!

And a bunch of noisy geese named Fred.

An old Heron named Fred practicing Thi-Chi on a rock in the middle of the lake. Every time I got close, he’d start doing a nutty one legged balancing act with his wings outstretched. He might have been practicing The Crane from the first Karate Kid or just ticked off at some jerk snapping pictures from a red kayak.

Finally, while paddling back to our neck of the woods I came upon this little bugger lying on his back in the middle of the lake. At first I thought it was a dead hummingbird (eh?) then upon closer inspection I thought it was a dead giant from the Carboniferous period but when I scooped him up with my paddle, he seemed to cling onto it for dear life. Alas, it was simply a really big and water logged dragonfly. I named him Fred.

He fluttered his wings a bit, threw up some water on my paddle and asked for a ride back to shore. I obliged.

Then spent some time nursing him back to health.

After a while he started to feel a bit better and went for a stroll along the top of the kayak but refused to fly away.

When I reached my hand down he eagerly jumped onto it. I wondered whether they would let me take him on the plane to Europe. I contemplated our future. I decided Fred and I would have a long and happy friendship.

Right after I took that picture, Fred the Dragonfly thanked me for my troubles and promptly jumped off my hand and did a back flop…right back into the lake. Apparently he ain’t all that impressed with his lot in life. Or he's really dumb. I rescued him (again) and decided that I didn’t want to tote Fred the Suicidal Dragonfly all the way to Eastern Europe. We said our goodbyes and parted amicably as I placed him on a stump by the side of the lake. Farewell Fred.

Overall, we all had a good (and chilly) time relaxing by the lake in the late afternoon sun. Books were read, jokes were told, strawberries were eaten and a sandwich was sat upon.

Today I’m pulling everything together here in Folsom (plane ticket, shopping, work, blogging, blah, blah, blah) then I’m off to Redwood National Park for a few days. That’s gonna’ be a pretty trip. I’ll tell you how it goes.

OK... Crank It!

2008-08-04T17:25:00.000-07:00

OK, so that problem we were having with the goodbye partying and all? Been fixed.

Quick Update...

2008-07-25T19:32:00.000-07:00

Goodbye partying ain't going so well...

Like the acceleration of a Volvo 245 DL

2008-07-16T12:24:00.000-07:00

So a month has gone by, how much stuff from my last post have I accomplished?

Nothing.

In fact, I've taken a step backwards. I have no idea what the hell I’m gonna do in a month. You see, my original plan was to go out and fly to Bangkok, talk to a bunch of travelers and figure out the rest of the trip from there. It sounded like a great idea. It had been endorsed by a random blogger. Perfect! I ran this idea by my seasoned traveler friends and they said that was the worst idea they’d ever heard. I thought they were Been There Done That morons so I ran the idea by my non traveling friends. They told me I was an idiot. Even people who’ve never been out of the country told me I was doing it wrong.

You know something? They’re all right.

Traveling to Bangkok before doing up the rest of the world is like spending a wild week in New York then moving to Paducah Kentucky for a year. The first part is great but, in comparison, the rest is a huge let down.

So I've come up with a revised plan: Try Eastern Europe and Turkey first. Come back to the states for Christmas and decide between the following two options:

1. Fly out to Southeast Asia and India
2. Return to the west coast for a while, do some consulting here and there, go surfing and snowboarding as much as possible, date a supermodel, then go to Southeast Asia and India.

It’s looking like number 2, if the consulting works out, would be a good pick. It’ll give me a chance to get my feet wet for a few months and come back to reality then plunge into everything again. Plus if the consulting works out, I’ll have a bit more spending money for the journey. With the Dow at 11,000, the idea of selling stocks is about as appealing as slamming my own head in a car door (yes, I've actually done that before…).

I suppose we’ll see how this plays out in the coming months. Til then, I need to get back on track with a bit of planning, purchasing and goodbye partying.

They end up owning you

2008-06-11T18:51:00.000-07:00

Pulling together all the items one might need for an extended overseas trip is a huge pain the ass. Every item feels like an awkward three-way tug of war between bulk, comfort and giving enough of a shit to get in the car and go find the damn thing. So far, I've managed to procure an out of date travel book (I haven't read) a camera (hasn't arrived yet) and Thai lessons (I can't understand).

Of all these items, I'm most fond of the camera. Possibly because it's shrouded in the hazy glow of Amazon SuperSaver Shipping Anticipation. To tell you the truth, I think I'll be quite happy with it once it arrives, too. After quite a bit of research and procrastination, I told The Internets to ship me a Canon PowerShot SD1100. For the sane people of the world who can't keep up with the 3000 different models of digital cameras out there, I'll sum up what this one does:

Small enough to fit in a pocket.
Takes realistic photos.

Yep, that's it. I'm sure there are other cameras that do that too but I'd rather not weed through the 2999 other cameras to find my digital soul mate. It won't matter.

When it comes to photography, I'm a complete dolt. I've never taken a good photograph on purpose. I'm not being modest or putting myself down just to prove a point. No. In order to take a good photograph on purpose, one must actually be able to have some sense of WHAT a good photograph IS. I've never had that. I might take some time out on this trip to read a book or two on how to capture a good photograph. If I was organized I might even do so BEFORE leaving on this tip. But I'm not that together or focused. There's still a lot of stuff to be found before I can rest on my laurels and start reading.

Stuff I still need:

A cheap but reliable backpack to put everything else in.
A few things for my computer
Decent traveling clothes (can I get those when I arrive?)
New shoes
An ultra portable/ultra cheap computer
Portable external hard drive
Leatherman
Rosetta Stone - Thai edition
Tech books for self study

Not a huge list but there's definitely some important stuff on there. I'm curious how much shorter it'll be in a week.

Engage!

2008-06-02T15:46:00.000-07:00

Dear God, what have I just done?

That’s the feeling I have right now, after telling my boss that August 15^th will be the last day I work in the Computer Mechanics Lab at UC Berkeley. For years I’ve had a nice, well paying job with no firm assignments, flexible hours, huge floor to ceiling windows overlooking the Berkeley hills (plus a balcony), amazingly smart and genuine coworkers to learn from and a terrific hands-off boss that has advised my work, gotten me into and through a prestigious master program, let me take time off to go to any class I wanted and get exercise at lunch. He’s even taken me fishing a few times.

And I just told him that I’m leaving it all.

Wait, what?

Yea, and that’s not all. If all goes according to plan, I'll also be leaving my amazingly cozy and bright apartment. The best set of neighbors I could ever wish for (they’ve become great friends). Hell, better than Kramer could ever be. A dear friend down the street that I love and who loves me. Best friends in the city who might not be here when I return and--

Whoa, whoa, whoa partner! This is getting a bit dramatic. Let’s turn down the drama-o-meter a bit. I realize it’s the first blog entry but let’s not blow the top off the emotions. Ease into it. Something simple. Try again.

It’s official! I’m gonna’ be a traveler for a while!