Cross-Country Trip, 2001
6-20-01
  • in oakland now, staying at aunt's place.
  • waiting for pictures to download to computer...
  • went to the jelly belly factory. it was shut down for the only week of the year...what lucky timing. so we didn't get to see it up and running, but it was entertaining nonetheless.
  • will have pictures up shortly.
  • probably going into the bay area to check things out tonight.
  • ...
  • didn't have much time tonight so we went to berkeley and hung out.
  • on my hitchhiking trip i remember feeling really free to do whatever i wanted...whether it was lay down on the sidewalk or look like a bum...i knew i look like a transient so i allowed myself certain freedoms that come with looking like that. if you see a guy in a suit laying down at a bus stop you'll think twice about it, if you see someone who is obviously living out of their backpack then you won't...
  • at the jelly belly factory there were these "bertie botts" (from the harry potter books) jelly bean flavors...they had horseradish, grass, black pepper, buttered toast, booger and (my least favorite) sardine. all of them tasted like crap. funny, but i wouldn't suggest tasting them. i did it just because i was on the trip and figured i may as well go for it.
  • jelly belly has an affinity for ronald reagan because while he was governor he gave them a lot of popularity...it's a sad story.
  • they had these murals made from jelly beans - the first one they ever made was of ronny himself.
  • some of the pics aren't going to be the best quality because of size constraints...
  • tomorrow we'll likely hop the bart into the city and check out some museums and the like...we have plenty of guest passes and such from my aunt and family.
  • not certain how great the quality of these pics is since i'm using the notebook...lemme know if they're subpar.

    • starting mileage...

    A tribute to the man who made jelly belly beans popular...

    Ronny writes to Rowland (founder of Jelly Belly)

    6-21-01
  • busy day...
  • went through oakland and ended up in SF. saw fisherman's wharf and sites along the way. lombard street was among the sites. went through chinatown. saw alcatraz from a distance. transamerica building. coit tower. a wwII submarine. golden gate bridge....the usual SF stuff.
  • ended up going to SF museum of modern art and that was really cool. saw chelsea clinton there. not kidding.
  • walked up and down many many hills. we're pretty sore. did miles and miles of walking.
  • there was this really funny street guy who would scare people walking by...he'd hide behind a few bush branches and when people would walk by he'd jump out at them and scare them. luckily he didn't get us. got a pretty decent picture of him scaring this one couple though...
  • downtown oakland is pretty trashy.
  • saw more homeless people than i've seen in a long time...about the same concentration as santa monica i'd say.
  • seeing chelsea clinton with her boyfriend was pretty funny. there were two bodyguard chicks who were following them the whole time, but they kept their distance.
  • downloading images to the computer right now...taking a while. i've got a 32mb media card so i can fit like 140 pictures on it, convenient it is.
  • ate clam chowder for the first time. also had fish n' chips. both were good. the fish n' chips were better.
  • plenty more sites to see...the exploratorium, the zoo, and the oakland museum of CA are among them.
  • didn't drive the car at all today because public transit is good, though expensive.
  • amores perros is playing in berkeley for 5.75 at 5pm...might check that out tomorrow. we shall see.
  • many options.
  • while we were in SF moma we weren't allowed to take any pictures so that kinda sucked...tried to snap some of chelsea and her boy toy, but didn't do such a great job.
  • also saw a row of chess games going on...some were on the clock, others were not. pretty fun to watch.

    • cover of the next national enquirer..."daddy's little girl picks up some tricks of her own..."


    crazy bush guy scares tourist while the rest of us look on and laugh...


    6-22-01
  • went into oakland today and checked out the oakland museum of california. it was smallish, but still nice. had lots and lots of artifacts documenting CA's history. also had lots of art by CA artists, most of that was good. had a photography exhibit which was also very nice.
  • updated movielist. watched amores perros while we were in berkeley. also ate burritos at the place which was voted best burrito in berkeley in 1997. they were good, not great. melanie had the pesto burrito with a spinach tortilla...it was good.
  • tomorrow we will probably check out the zoo or the planetarium.
  • "science expresses in human terms our dynamic relation to surrounding reality." santayana
  • "nature knows no pause in progress and development, and attaches her curse on all inaction." - goethe
  • two very modern statements which make me made. faith in science and constant evolution hasn't really helped us as a society.
  • can't wait to get onto the next leg of our trip. we'll probably pass through sonoma or something, but the real fun comes in sequoia national park...
  • after all the other activities were finished we watched tv. andy was back on conan last night and that was cool.

    • from the oakland museum of art...an awkward superman.

    6-23-01
  • updated movielist.
  • watched a couple movies today and nothing else.
  • tomorrow we'll go to the zoo or some such activity.

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    6-24-01

  • went to the oakland zoo.
  • pretty cool animals. i especially liked the squirrel monkeys and the chimps. there was one warthog which was a real mean bastard. the tigers were cute, the lions were boring, the elephants were entertaining.
  • melanie made some really good cookies.
  • we also had a great breakfast of potatoes, toast, and eggs.
  • tomorrow we plan on going to the botanical gardens and the planetarium. probably our last day in the bay area.
  • if pictures don't load at first try clicking the reload button or right clicking on the broken link and choosing "show picture."
  • need more batteries for my camera.
  • after tomorrow phone access will be non-existent. won't be able to upload page until we get to melanie's grandmother's place.
  • downloading photos right now...going to take a while.





    • 6-25-01
  • watched south park last night on comedy central and they said "shit" 162 times. they also said asshole. i don't know how they are getting away with it since it's not a cable station like HBO...it's part of basic cable like MTV. it was pretty cool and mostly because it's so forbidden. hmmm...
  • saw a church called "the church of perfect freedom." we all have different notions of what comprises freedom and certainly of what comprises "perfect" freedom, but church wouldn't be anywhere in my definition of perfect freedom. being beholden to a a set of "ethics," rules, and constraints other than those imposed purely by yourself (is that possible?) to me doesn't allow for freedom. that's just me.
  • oh, melanie was on ben stein's money the other day and my aunt was able to tape most of it so that was pretty cool.
  • watching daily show right now but some guy who is in AI is a guest so i left the room. i don't want to know anything about the movie before i watch it.
  • listened the zombies today and the guess who yesterday.
  • it rained quite a bit and that was lame. we were going to go to the planetarium, but it would have been a six mile walk and that wasn't an option in the rain. buses are expensive. think we'll do it tomorrow - assuming it's not raining.
  • BART is better than most public transportation i've seen, although it's just like most of the stuff they have back east i suppose. i'll know for certain in a couple months.
  • the car has a weird smell about it...is it just oil burning from when i had to destroy the oil filter to get it off? who knows.
  • i hope that SF isn't the best U.S. city like i've heard from johnny and vern. it's got character and it certainly has its advantages, but it didn't "wow" me. i'm not much of a big city type of guy. that's weird since i live in LA, but it makes sense since LA isn't really a big city like SF or NYC - all crammed together with tall buildings and the like. LA is more spread out. i also don't spend much time in downtown when i'm there.
  • melanie is the best.
  • year of the guru is a good animals song. eric burdon - the first white rapper?
  • depending upon our mood and the weather we may leave tomorrow. i'm guessing not, but we could...that's freedom - relatively speaking.
  • can't listen to much music because we take a lot of public transit and i don't have a cd player that i can just pop a cd into (unless you count the laptop). want to listen to some autechre. listening to mp3s off a cd right now. it'll do.
  • when i sign online my mp3s will start on a half second loop...makes listening to them impossible. interesting. don't know how to fix it.
  • i'm really glad i was able to get the notebook to work. it took a lot of doing, but i finally got it up.
  • bought some boots for melanie today. bought a camera case for the digital camera. bought some postcards. if you want one email me here.
  • after wednesday we won't have phone/email access for a few days...until we get to melanie's grandmother's place. after we leave here we're probably going to sonoma, then the redwood national forest, then some places in OR then finally the seattle area.
  • it's getting late.

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    6-26-01

  • went into the city today.
  • went to the california academy of sciences.
  • saw all sorts of great exhibits there...from geology to biology to astronomy.
  • walked a whole lot.
  • ate at california pizza kitchen, it was very good.
  • probably leaving tomorrow.


    • 6-27-01
  • leaving pretty soon. going to hit up the santa rosa area and try to find some camping in healdsburg.
  • doing laundry and getting things ready for the next leg of the trip...the harder, less sheltered leg of the trip.
  • it might rain on us. it's definitely raining all over WA, but we won't be up there for a while.
  • ...
  • ended up going to cotati and having cheap pizza for lunch, it was good.
  • went to oliver's market and stocked up on bread, cheese, and gourmet olives.
  • skipped santa rosa and went straight to lake sonoma where there is a free camp ground run by the army corps of engineers.
  • had to hike a good distance (with lots of elevation changes...carrying a buttload of stuff) to the camp grounds. there was a deer when we first arrived and, other than the occasional boater, that was all the life we saw for a while.
  • it was a really nice spot because we were completely isolated. the scenery was beautiful.
  • it was pretty wet though since it had rained off and on all day.
  • oh, the trip through napa valley type scenery was really really nice also.
  • tempted to get drunk on all the free wine tasting opportunities, but thought better of it.
  • set up camp and went to sleep after a dinner of bread and cheese.



    • 6-28-01
  • woke up pretty early (10am) and had some coffee and granola bars.
  • took down camp and got ready for the big trip up the hill back to the car. the hike almost killed melanie, but she's a survivor so it was all good.
  • drove to hwy 1...saw mendecino and the coast...it was nice, but i liked it inland where the sun was up and it was a bit warmer.
  • stopped in mendecino and was going to check out the botanical gardens, but they charge six bucks a pop for entrance so we opted to hit the road for fort bragg...hometown of monique.
  • fort bragg is kind of a hole....maybe some would classify it as "quaint," but it seemed like more of a hole to me.
  • ate dinner in fort bragg and headed off to jackson state forest.
  • eventually found the free campgrounds and we're settled there now.
  • most of the time we've been here we've been gathering fire wood which is hard to come by since it's wet up here.
  • nice grounds keeper guy hooked us up with a bunch of oak.
  • saw a fox about 10 feet from us and a large banana slug while we were walking. also found a small snake and plenty of termites in the wood i was cutting from a stump.
  • listening to santana right now.
  • we plan on going to redwood national park tomorrow. will be a long drive, but it should be nice. will finally get to use my national parks pass.

    • 6-29-01

  • left jackson state forest and headed toward redwood national park...
  • took a while to find a campground because the free campground book i have gives bad directions.
  • we ended up finding a place in the national park right off the ocean...there was forest in between us and the ocean, but there was less than 1/4 mile of a walk to get to the beach.
  • there were lots of tidal pools and such along the beach and we plan on hitting them tomorrow.
  • the hike from the car to the campground is only about half a mile so it's much better than our spot at lake sonoma.

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    6-30-01

  • saw a grey whale, seals, seagulls, ducks, a couple deer, rabbits, a snake, a pelican, starfish, sea anemone, some anchovies which were getting washed up on the beach as the tide came in...lots and lots of wildlife here, it's pretty great.
  • battery runs out quickly on the notebook, kinda lame.
  • out campground has only 5 sites and at least two of them are occupied by a boy scout troop. kids are loud, but neat overall.
  • i updated some of the stuff below so look for new pictures.
  • just before sunset we were watching the grey whale feed on the anchovies or sardines or whatever they were and i decided to run up to the car and get my other camera and some batteries for the digital since they were dead. as i was running back down the path to the beach i saw a fawn just feet ahead of me on the path. it was really small and since its back was to the ocean (or at least that's the way the path led) it wanted to go past me, but it couldn't. it looked really scared and i tried to move aside while grabbing for my camera to take a picture of it. since i didn't want to scare it off i didn't use the flash so most of the pictures didn't come out so well. it was really cool though because it was just 5 or so yards away from me...after that i ran down to the rocks on the beach and told melanie about it...she had been watching the seals the whole time.
  • nature is pretty cool and national parks are really cool. i think i've decided that teddy roosevelt would have to be in my top ten presidents ever, if i were to make such a list.
  • went to cresent city for lunch and ate at carl's jr. cresent city is lame. half of the city was once destroyed in a tidal wave...looks like it hasn't recovered since.



    • 7-01-01 CA/OR
  • packed up and headed south to the inner part of redwood national park.
  • went on a scenic drive and a little hike with some points of interest.
  • redwoods are freaking huge. hopefully in the last leg of the trip we can check out sequoia national park because it's even better.
  • headed off to oregon and that's where we are now.
  • not sure of our exact location....there's supposed to be a campground on this dirt road we took, but we can't find it.
  • we've just settled in a secluded turnout off the road and we're going to camp here for the night. long drive behind us, can't wait to cook up the hot dogs.
  • been satisfied with the cooler's ability to keep things cool. ice can last for days and that's one less thing to worry about.
  • i guess i turn 22 in a few days. whoop whoop.


    • 7-02-01 OR
  • left from the middle of nowhere kinda early today and headed toward crater lake.
  • got to crater lake and finally got to take advantage of the national parks pass - saved $10 there.
  • oregon has some interesting laws...more on that later.
  • noticed that the speed limit signs have a different font than those of california.
  • crater lake is really really nice. some of the nicest hues of blue i've ever seen. definitely worth the drive.
  • went to the info center and learned about the geological history behind crater lake - basically a huge eruption caused a six mile wide and 2,000 foot deep hole in the ground. now it's the home of the deepest lake in the u.s. and the coolest blues i've seen. definitely recommendable.
  • found a place in the park to camp out for free...only a small hike to get there as well.
  • tomorrow we have to wake up early to get melanie registered for classes.
  • probably going to try and start making some time by getting through oregon quickly.


    • 7-03-01 OR/WA
  • long day.
  • first a discussion on the pecularities of oregon...
  • you can't pump your own gas in oregon. an interesting decision by the legislature...possible safety concerns on this one, but i've found that the biggest impact this has is on the economy. from my limited experience it seems that gas pumping is an easy job and as such seems to attract people with limited marketable skills. so what we have is a law which limits personal freedom very slightly in order to employ thousands and thousands of people who either wouldn't have work or would have worse paying work (gas pumpers are often tipped). overall i'm in support of this law and see it as a pretty good use of government power.
  • there isn't a sales tax in oregon. this is really really nice. i'm not sure how their budget works since so many economies depend on this rather large portion of income, but they seem to get by just fine. an added bonus of this is that if you are an oregon resident and flash your id in washington you don't have to pay sales tax. very cool.
  • in portland you must show a copy of your lease agreement and apartment key (or equivilants) in order to buy alcohol. the obvious impact of this is that you can't be homeless and purchase alcohol in portland. i'm not so sure about this one...it serves to rehabilitate (by making it harder to obtain alcohol) the homeless alcoholic and it also probably keeps the homeless population in portland pretty low. an interesting method.
  • went to eugene, salem, and portland today. portland was nice and so was eugene - went to the REI there. salem wasn't so great from what i saw. portland was nice overall. had a good feel to it. some nice brick architechture as well as the first US postmodern building. didn't seem that postmodern to me, but it was a cool building nonetheless. would have liked to spend more time in portland, but olympia called...
  • ended up in olympia which is where melanie's grandmother lives and we're there now.
  • tomorrow there is a fourth of july bbq with her uncle's family so we'll be doing that, but i don't know what we'll do the rest of the day.
  • saw mt. saint helens.
  • so out of the two states we been through so far i'd say CA is definitely better. portland has these guides who wear green jackets and will help you find your way around the city - a plus. portland and eugene combined may match up to the bay area in some ways, but definitely not in others. there wasn't much diversity in oregon and it lost big points for that. la and the bay area have more diversity than you can shake a stick at and thus they have the major edge there. eugene and portland were cleaner and pretty well laid out, but it's hard to compare such different cities. i'd rather live in portland than the bay area, but CA, as a state, easily blows OR away. i don't know that any state can compare to the diversity that CA offers. what i'm saying is that CA has the second biggest city, the highest and lowest points in the continental us, it's got open spaces and metropolitan areas, deserts and redwood forests, ethnic diversity, etc. so it juts seems pretty tough to beat that. OR is still pretty sweet in my book, just different.
  • one of the first signs i saw in WA was on the side of I-5 which read "support the boy scouts' decision for decency"... i'll let you be the judge.
  • oh, saw powell's book store in portland and it was absolutely huge, they say it's the biggest in the US. i think it's four floors high and had everything from philosophy and travel to cooking and self help.
  • the odometer is past 99000 miles now.
  • nothing else of interest i can think of now.

    • truth in advertising...

    7-04-01 WA
  • updated movielist.
  • i've got poison ivy and it's no fun.

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    7-05-01 WA

  • woke up later than expected and my poison ivy wounds were bugging the hell out of me.
  • drove 130 miles to olympic national park and then drove even further to see the rainforests. rainforests only because they get about 150 inches of rain a year. look a lot different than south american rainforests.
  • olympic national park is a huge circle which is encompassed by hwy 101.
  • identified a few trees and went for a small hike, but mostly drove a lot...almost 400 miles in the day. went to the national park and then back to melanie's grandmother's house. taking her to the farmer's market tomorrow at 10am.
  • went through port angeles, but didn't go to the island because of a lack of time.
  • got back home at around 10.

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    7-06-01 WA

  • went to the farmer's market and it was about 50% bigger than the one they have in davis twice a week. had some good looking bacon and stuffed pork and a band playing some decent music. stayed there about 45 minutes.
  • back at grandma's house and there is another bbq planned. WA has lots of bbqs and trees, that's what i've learned so far.
  • oh, and lots of fireworks. there were ridiculous amounts of explosives being used a couple days ago. of course there were 420 (fire) alarms in six hours that night as well. even the local news was able to catch onto the correlation there.
  • alexander hamilton was right. jefferson was a dreamer.
  • ...
  • had another bbq and it was more eventful than the first...all sorts of rugrats running around - made for a fun time.
  • updated movielist.
  • probably leaving tomorrow...
  • going to seattle most likely and might have a place to stay there. if not then the webpage won't be up for a while...

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    7-07-01 WA

  • took about 1.5 hours to get to seattle.
  • went and saw scary movie 2 because we had some time to kill and it was the only movie playing at the local theater.
  • after the movie we wandered the mall and stumbled across an RV sale in the parking lot. we went and checked out all the different sorts of RVs they had (including some vans which were renovated to include toilets and beds=pretty nifty). it was pretty awesome overall. i never realized how much shit they could pack into those things. impressive. asked one of the sales people about prices and found a really nice/new one for 50K. pricey, but not if it's my home and car.
  • afterwards we went to melanie's friend's (jeremy) apartment. it was actually funny because we knocked on the wrong door at first and some irate woman was a bit peeved about it.
  • hung out with jeremy that night and went into downtown seattle.
  • had some really good ice cream for a reasonable price.
  • jeremy had work the next day so we had to go home (and wake up the next morning to get out of his place) on the early side.
  • before we did we checked out this one video store which had an awesome selection of videos and sorted them very creatively (films about artists, car chase movies, by director, movies based on plays, etc.). they even had fear and desire and seafarers - two extremely rare pre-killer's kiss kubrick films. pretty great stuff.

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    7-08-01 WA

  • got up really early and hung out at the university plaza near U of W. got a crappy smoothie and bought a manual for the car.
  • went to the theater and paid for one movie, but ended up watching two - multiplexes are good. updated movielist.
  • went to a nice little hamburger stand type place. very good milkshakes. afterwards we went to the mall and hung out there to soak up seattle consumer culture.
  • then we went to another friend of melanie's (brandon). a couple other people, including jeremy, came over and we ate pizza and played scruples. a pretty fun game if everyone is set in their moral beliefs...it's a game where you try to guess what person A would do if they were in a certain moral dilemma...it's more involved than that, but you get the idea - it's supposed to spark heated, but fun, discussion about what people would do in certain situations.

    • they left and brandon, melanie, and i watched another movie.

    7-09-01 WA

  • had to wake up early since brandon had work.
  • went out to breakfast and had some pancakes.
  • went into downtown seattle and saw the famous pike place market where they throw the fish. it was kinda slow so we didn't see much of it, but we have good imaginations.
  • headed south to pioneer square where the historic buildings are...reminded me of old sac and downtown portland...i like that look.
  • saw the klondike gold rush national park (free) which had all sorts of information on the gold rush of 1896 to alaska...a lot of prospectors went through seattle so that's why it was located there. the ranger guy really knew his stuff so it was neat talking with him.
  • went to an underground (literally) jazz shop...bud's jazz music...and bud was actually there. he was playing some really good jazz kinda ala davis' doo-bop. he had a really good selection and i wished i could have gotten something to support the business, but nothing really called out and i don't have much money.
  • also went to this really really nice map store...all it had were maps, travel books, and globes. i love maps and so does melanie so we spent more than a while there. i wanted to get the world political and topograhpical maps, but they're costly and big. the topographical maps used for hiking and such were really neat to look at as well.
  • went to hot dog on a stick at the downtown seattle mall and witnessed a sorry display of customer service gone horribly wrong. it was neither fast, fresh, nor friendly.
  • after this display we decided it would be best to skip town.
  • headed north and we're in anacortes and getting ready to sleep.
  • tomorrow we have vancouver island on the agenda...it'll be a truly all day trip. have to wake up very early.
  • had basmati rice for dinner, it would have been better with butter.
  • staying in our first pay camp site of the trip. we'll stay here tomorrow night as well since we won't get back from the island until about 9pm. so on the 11th we plan on going through spokane and onto idaho or thereabouts.
  • tomorrow i'll be in a different country for the first time in my life.

    • Seattle Art Museum.

    7-10-01 WA/BC
  • walked  to the san juan ferry station and took the 8am departure for sidney.
  • the ferry took about 2 hours to get there which was less than we had expected.
  • once we were on vancouver island we started towards victoria on foot....later we discovered that it was 14 miles away (we didn't come to the island very prepared). so we found a bus and took it to victoria.
  • saw a gas station selling gas for 73 cents a gallon...comes to about 45 cents a gallon in american dollars...i shit you not.
  • that was pretty much the case for the whole time we were there...everything was really really inexpensive...even though they were giving 1.45 to every 1 american dollar most stores were taking american money at 50% which means that the cds i bought for 14 bucks actually cost me 7 bucks. that was the highlight of going to canada.
  • saw the parliament building and some other really nice building while we were in victoria...some really nice architechture in downtown victoria. most of the buildings looked really nice.
  • went to the cheesecake cafe which is this canadian restaurant chain which is really really good. so far the best shake of the trip was the chocolate chip shake i had there. it had bittersweet chips blended in with vanilla ice cream and was really amazing. my mom would have loved it.
  • bought some postcards, cds (mostly beatles), bakery items, and dried fruit. it was all very cheap and that is good.
  • took the bus back to sidney and walked around there...it's much smaller and not as nice as victoria for shopping and touristy stuff, but it was a nice little town.
  • got on the ferry back to anacortes and walked back to the campsite to eat dinner and sleep.
  • a note about anacortes - very pretty place. yesterday when we first got into town we went to A&W for a root beer float and the people there were so amazingly nice it made me think that utopia might be possible.
  • while eating dinner at campfire our neighbor came over with a lantern (we were eating in relative darkness) and talked to us. he was from canada and worked for an oil company. he said he wanted to take a couple months off with his family and just travel...apparently he does this fairly often...at any rate he was a nice canadian family man.

    • some hotel near the parliament building in Victoria

    Melanie meets a fisherman in Sidney.

    7-11-01 WA/ID
  • packed up our camp and left anacortes around 11am.
  • mostly just driving today...we're on the 90 east heading towards spokane.
  • after we stop in spokane we'll head to the panhandle and camp out in idaho.
  • the speedometer passed 100,000 miles today.
  • melanie is driving right now for the first time.
  • we've driven about 2,450 miles so far.
  • been getting at least 32 mpg thus far.
  • listening to some really bad spokane radio station. "bad radio" borders on being redundant.
  • if you're selfish enough then i think it could help you be a good person. some people need to love themselves first and then they'll be better equipped to love/get along with/be nice to others. how many corny success stories have you heard that start when someone hits rock bottom and is forced to either love themself a little or live in misery? many of them turn to jesus because they think it's the ultimate, unending love and that helps them believe in themselves. others find the strength within themselves and love themselves enough to be a better person. from personal experience i know that i'm more sociable and confident when i feel good about who i am...sometimes that can come from doing well in school or helping old lady jones across the street or because melanie tells me i'm swell....the result is the same. if you can find this power yourself, rather than having your self-image and worth come from what others think of you, then you've got a good grasp on life and you're well ahead of me.
  • ...
  • breezed through spokane and made it into idaho.
  • ended up finding a pretty good lake in the panhandle near killarney lake.
  • it was a nice secluded place and had a dock so i did a few test casts with the fishing rod. melanie says she can't cast a fishing rod and proves herself wrong.
  • there was a water pump at the campsite and we eventually got some instructions in that area...takes more power and more pumping than one would have thought.


    • 7-12-01 ID/MT
  • woke up early and an old couple in an rv gave us some cinnamon rolls, mmm good.
  • another long day of driving...ended up getting to glacier national park.
  • had lunch somewhere in montana and we were the only non-cowboys there.
  • the idaho panhandle and montana are really really nice looking parts of the country. montana has a great mixture of forests, mountains, and plains.
  • had huckleberry shakes outside of glacier.
  • ended up getting to glacier about 5 minutes late so we missed our opportunity to get free backcountry camping permits, that part sucked.
  • ended up having to pay $10 at flathead national forest for that night's worth of camping. it was there that we got a taste of some bad weather...started to rain. at times it was really bad, but it was mostly just a soft down pour. set up a tarp over the tent and it worked out really well.
  • flushed the cooling system on the car so i won't have to worry about that again.
  • keeping the fire going was a pain with the rain, but we were able to cook some turkey dogs so all was not lost.

    • a stiched photo of glacier national park...

    7-13-01 MT
  • spent the whole day driving through glacier and checking that place out.
  • very very nice area...i'm sure none of the pictures will do it justice, but i'll post them nonetheless.
  • came out of glacier on the east end and ended up in choteau.
  • ate at the circle n family restaurant...very good stuff.
  • there was a small free campground four miles outside of town and we went there to set up camp.
  • very very nice place to stay and it was completely secluded and people free (until one rv came later). there was a lake and some mountains in the distance, very beautiful.
  • it got really windy and there were some ominous clouds in the distance so we set up the tarp again...this time we didn't have any trees to act as anchors so we had to use the car and the table which was part of the campsite.
  • ended up not raining.
  • the sunset was really awesome.
  • listened to abbey road and that was pretty great.
  • led zeppelin I came out the same year (1969...i think) and has a medley on its b-side as well, but it doesn't get nearly the same acclaim. big difference is that it was zeppelin's debut and the beatles' last.....
  • melanie thinks she can't skip rocks and today she proved herself wrong, again.
  • cut my finger while skipping a sharp rock. ouch.



    • 7-14-01 MT
  • drove through great falls and helena...unimpressive places.
  • when i was 11 or 12 i chose great falls as my future home...it was one of those uninformed 11 year old things. today i got a chance to see it and see what i'm not missing. downtown had potential, but the outskirts were whored out by target, mcdonalds, and the like. its too bad.
  • montana ain't so bad as long as you stay away from people. the people are nice, but that's about it.
  • on our way to yellowstone we stopped at the lewis and clark caverns.
  • impressive, but not so much as those in new mexico. less accessible makes for fewer people and that was good. the guides were funny and it was a good tour. caverns are freaking crazy, see some before you die.
  • had dinner in bozeman and it was good.
  • it was getting late so we drove to belgrade and parked near the city park. that marked our first night having to sleep in the car.


    • lewis and clark caverns

    7-15-01 MT/WY
  • woke up a few times last night thanks to the train not far from the park where we were sleeping. other than that the sleep was surprisingly good.
  • 100+ miles to yellowstone went by pretty quickly.
  • saw only one black person in montana and he had new york plates.
  • had breakfast outside the west entrance. we both had the all you can eat pancakes.
  • just a few miles into yellowstone we encounter some really awful traffic. i knew yellowstone was crowded, but this is ridiculous.
  • as we move along we discover that there is a bison in the middle of the highway just walking along. it was really crazy to see such a huge animal so close and without any wire fence or the like in between us. got some great pictures of it while we were passing it. indescribable.
  • went to the old faithful info station.
  • saw old faithful do its thing, that was pretty crazy.
  • got a backcountry permit for camping tonight.
  • saw old faithful do its thing again. it goes every 80 minutes or so.
  • learned about the geology behind yellowstone and old faithful and how amazing and rare the geysers are. yellowstone is truly unique.
  • the tour guides here are really really great.
  • saw lost of geysers and really nicely colored hot springs and the like.
  • saw old faithful do its thing, again...that made three.
  • ate dinner and saw some more geysers, read some info about the fires of 1988 - crazy stuff.
  • yellowstone is the second largest national park...death valley is number one (not including those in alaska).
  • off to hike into our campsite now.
  • it's a bit rainy, but we'll survive.

    • this bison is is huge

    old faithful

    7-16-01 WY
  • woke up this morning and noticed that the tree we hung our food from had a lot of its bark ripped off. figured it was a bear, but found out later, by asking a park ranger, that it must have been a bison. they scratch themselves by rubbing against the trees. should have figured it since there were piles of bison dung every few feet the whole way to the campsite.
  • saw the traverstine terraces which are created by carbonic acid in the hot springs.
  • also saw tower falls which wasn't impressive because of the waterfall part so much as it was impressive because of the erosion that formed as a result of the running water...apparently there's some pretty soft rock which erodes more quickly than the harder rock around it. it looked cool, didn't get a picture - sorry.
  • went to the post office and ate.
  • saw a bison exhibit and it was really good. had a picture of a pile of bison skulls...it was really sad.
  • got a backcountry camping permit.
  • hiked a couple miles to our campsite. i hung up the food while melanie was setting up camp. as i was returning i saw a huge male moose about 100 feet from our site. we stood still and watched it pass by. it would take a few steps and stop as if contemplating its life. it was quite majestic. moose are cool.

    • yellowstone had a huge fire in 1988 and its landscape has changed dramatically because of it. it's actually very pretty in a unique way.

    7-17-01 WY
  • woke up in the middle of the night because it started to rain...turned out okay since it wasn't very heavy and the rainfly was on.
  • saw the grand canyon of yellowstone and the waterfalls there.
  • heard a talk on osprey and other birds of prey in yellowstone. got to see an osprey nest...it was about 5 feet wide and had two chicks and one parent guarding it from ravens while the other parent gathered fish. the canyon was really pretty and the waterfall on the north side was about 300 feet tall.
  • saw an exhibit on more birds. it started to rain. weather here is crazy.
  • drove a lot and made it to somewhere in WY. we'll sleep in the car at a pretty nice rest area.


    • 7-18-01 SD/NE
  • left from the rest stop and hit the road.
  • made it to mount rushmore and got to see that. it was pretty impressive.
  • notched up my first road kill today - a snake.
  • we're going to sleep in badlands national park. it's nice and open here.


    • 7-19-01 SD
  • saw the northern lights last night...they were quite impressive.
  • woke up pretty early today because the sun was unfettered by the usual trees and clouds. the badlands national park is relatively flat...
  • checked out the national park and took some pictures...the usual. saw some prarie dogs and more bison.
  • we're on our way to humboldt where we'll stay tonight. melanie is driving. it's very hot right now.
  • ...humboldt turned out to be a dud...there were small town teenagers there and camping wasn't really allowed anyway.
  • went to a 50s diner in madison and it was really good. they had a deck of cards at every table so people could play while waiting to get their dinner.
  • drove to a rest stop and slept there.


    • 7-20-01 SD/ND/MN
  • woke up on the early side and the sun was covered by the clouds.
  • hit the road towards north dakota.
  • along the way we ran into some really really exceptionally nasty weather. the worst storm either of us had ever seen. visibility was probably around 10 feet and we were on the highway. lots of lightning and thunder. had to pull over until visibility improved. it was craziness.
  • made it to fargo and ate lunch there. it looks like a nice town to live in. people talk just like they do in the movie and it was hard not to laugh.
  • checked out an old time theater there and saw a popeye cartoon and the last part of a three stooges episode. it was free and worth every penny.
  • drove until we got to monticello. discovered that our campsite was going to end up costing 11 bucks so melanie decided to spring for a hotel room. that's where we are now.
  • changed the oil on the car last night. going to replace the air filter soon.
  • shaved, showered, and cut my hair tonight.

    • approaching the second part of the storm...

    7-21-01 MN/IA
  • left the hotel on the early side and started towards the twin cities.
  • ended up just seeing minneapolis - skipped st. paul.
  • saw the museum of questionable medical devices...that was pretty insane. some people came up with the lamest inventions to cure everything from impotence to cancer and people bought the stuff. really funny, but sad.
  • wandered around downtown minneapolis for hours.
  • saw the weisman museum of art and it was really really nice. had a good collection of local artists and i really liked the work there.
  • there was a twins game so we got to see the traffic for that, yay.
  • the other day we saw about 75 corvettes (mostly new ones) on the highway and around badlands national park. must have been some kind of corvette owners outing or something.
  • also saw a sculpture garden next to the walker art center.
  • drove to iowa and spent the night at nora springs boulder city park.


    • 7-22-01 IA/WI
  • updated movieslist.
  • left boulder city park and drove to madison.
  • madison looks like a really nice town overall. it's the capital city, but it's not too big and doesn't seem to have a problem with homeless people. looked mostly clean. not very diverse. there's a university there so we saw plenty of football/frat boy types wandering around in their camaros and firebirds.
  • watched the score with deniro and ed norton. it was good.
  • did some laundry and i started making a dashboard organizer for the car.
  • drove to some place between madison and milwaukee. going to spend the night here tonight...it's an official campground, but no one is here and that is nice. lots of bugs and that's not so nice. melanie has been getting bitten a lot

    •  

     

    7-23-01 WI

  • updated movieslist.
  • ate a perkins this morning and found our way to new berlin where the lobergs live. we'll be staying with them tonight.
  • went to the post office, best buy, and barnes and noble. got "on the road" on tape so we can listen to it while driving. a good purchase i think.
  • watched two movies for the price of one. it's a good way to see two middle of the road movies which you wouldn't be willing to pay full price for...or just a good way to spend a few hours.
  • came back to the lobergs' place and slept.
  • going to check out milwaukee tomorrow.

    •  

     

    7-24-01 WI/IL

  • bounced around milwaukee pretty quickly. didn't really give it its due, but such is the nature of a two month trip like this.
  • went to the museum of art and it was the biggest museum we've been to so far. very big and varied a lot in its scope...from renaissance to postmodern stuff. a lot of german art because of the city's history.
  • didn't get to check out the other part of german ingenuity - the beer industry - but then again i don't care about alcohol or how it's made or anything like that so no big loss.
  • checked my credit card balance today, that was a mistake.
  • camping in a pay site 45 miles outside of chicago.
  • we've planned the next few days out to make sure that we make it to nyc in time for the yankee game (august 5th - sunday).
  • had some really good ice cream while in milwaukee. made me want to become an ice cream maker...seriously. i love nothing in life like i love good ice cream, if you know me then you know it's true.
  • ate at this quasi fancy italian restaurant in milwaukee for lunch. there was a bald chef who reminded me of the chef at the peninsula (the only five star five diamond hotel in southern california)...at any rate my dad would always tell me how annoying he chef at the peninsula could get...very demanding and such. this chef was the exact same way. he was in the front briefing all the women who worked there as bus girls and waitresses on what he needed to be done differently, etc. then a bread salesman came in to close a prior deal with the chef. the salesman had his associate bring in a large tray of breads and the chef looked down upon it and scoffed. "that's not enough...do you know how big this place is? i've got 40 seats outside and 70 inside, plus a 2 hour wait list." the salesman nodded. "this is going to be a huge account for you. you guys are going to be superstars." i shit you not, that was what he said - verbatim. it was pretty hilarious.

    •  

     

    7-25-01 IL

  • woke up in the middle of the night thanks to a rain storm which had moved in over our heads. had to put on the rainfly in the middle of the night - that sucked.
  • it rained for a good 5 hours or so, but the rainfly did a decent job. since it rained so much, though, there were some puddles on the ground which got the bottom of the tent a little wet. didn't roll up the tent as usual. instead i just folded it and put it in the back so it would dry out in the car.
  • took a little over an hour to get to chicago.
  • the drivers here are very aggressive.
  • finding a parking spot at a reasonable rate proved to be the most trying part of our chicago experience. ended up having to pay almost 20 bucks for all day parking. lame.
  • went to navy pier and checked that out. nothing too special...mostly just shops and boat tour offers. touristy. they did have a neat exhibit on the history of stained glass in chicago. as a result of the fires they had back in the early 1870s.
  • walked to downtown and saw the museum of broadcast communications. it was in a really nice looking building.
  • a lot of the architechture in chicago is either of the 1870s style or the more modern style (sears tower, etc.). it makes for an attractive contrast. i like it. we both did.
  • ate lunch and walked around downtown some more.
  • chicago is the most noisy city i've ever been in...between the EL, the buses, the honking taxis, and other street noise (one guy was driving around with a bullhorn on his car denouncing gore and bush) it gets to be quite loud.
  • went to the art institute of chicago and saw all sorts of classic pieces...from van gogh and picasso to manet and monet. saw "american gothic" and "nighthawks." those were really neat in person. i like van gogh. the museum is huge and has a great variety, it's well worth it. in fact, to go to chicago and not to go to the museum would border on sacrilege.
  • saw the sears tower and it was impressive.
  • didn't end up going to any plays or improv shows on account of the money situation.
  • paid for my parking and drove out of the city.
  • we're going to spend the night in the car in some small town outside of chicago.



    • 7-26-01 IL/MO/IN/OH
  • ended up sleeping in a school parking lot and that worked out pretty well.
  • got on the road towards st. louis.
  • got to st. louis and parked at laclede's landing. ate at a pretty good place there and played some video golf afterwards - melanie whooped me.
  • determined that st. louis was smelly and not very interesting so we left for ohio.
  • listened to 'on the road.'
  • got to dayton really late - around 11pm (after the time change).
  • this was probably the longest driving day of the trip. covered a time zone and four states.

    •  

     

    7-27-01 OH

  • stayed in dayton with melanie's uncle jim. they were nice and accomdating.
  • we went to his nephew's house and saw pictures of melanie's side of the family and all that jazz.
  • he has a pre-civil war house and that was interesting to take a gander at. you could tell that he had spent a lot of time renovating it because it was in real good condition.
  • left dayton and went to the outskirts.
  • watched two movies and that is always fun.
  • updated movieslist.
  • drove to bellefontaine ate there and slept at a rest stop not far from there.

    •  

     

    7-28-01 OH/MI/ONT

  • left the rest stop and headed out towards detroit.
  • got to detroit in a couple hours and found parking in the cultural district.
  • detroit is 80% black so technically it's not very diverse, but i think i'll make an exception in this case.
  • i like detroit. i thought i'd hate it. i thought that it would be all industry, but for as long as we were there (which admittedly wasn't very long) i didn't see any industry.
  • i was disappointed to find that there wasn't anything in the way of automobile museums. at least there weren't any which were listed in my guide books. there is a henry ford museum, but all he did was make people replaceable cogs...i give no props for that.
  • the detroit institute of arts is a darkhorse museum. i've never heard anyone speak of it in the same sentence as the guggenheim or the art institute of chicago or the j. paul getty...i think that it should be. it is a fantastic museum featuring a wide variety of work, some really nice interior architechture (including an indoor dining area with a glass roof above, with all brick walls and old style arched windows) - it's really nice. then there's the diego rivera mural which is really really great and made even greater by the fact that it survived the stupidity of people who wanted it white-washed because it had marxist themes...they did succeed in white-washing the one he was working on in NYC because it had a picture of lenin. when will people learn? didn't get to see the rembrandt because that portion was under construction, but they had a really good section on modern art with some educational placards along the way. they also had a nice exhibit on african-american photography. had a great picture of ali and X together. also had the last picture taken of X alive. great stuff.
  • left detroit feeling good about the city and sad that i didn't get to see more of it.
  • got into canada without much trouble.
  • drove to london and got a hotel there.
  • london is nice, but i haven't seen big ben or the queen yet.
  • going to niagara falls and buffalo tomorrow. will be my first time in NY.


    • 7-29-01 ONT/NY
  • checked out of the hotel and got on the road towards niagara falls.
  • drove through london and got a quick idea of what it was like. nothing really appealed to us so we kept on towards niagara.
  • listened to ontario radio and they were talking about a "fat tax" - taxing fatty foods because canadians are getting too fat. the government up here is much more liberal and powerful.
  • there was also a story on the radio about a road rage incident in toronto. some toronto resident attacked a u.s. visitor. shame on him.
  • finally got there and the falls were really nice. i think it's true what they say - that it's better to view them from the canadian side than the u.s. side. they were different than i expected, in a good way.
  • crossed over the border once more and made it to NY for the first time in my life.
  • went to rochester and cooked dinner there.
  • played some frisbee at this really huge park.
  • went to a movie theater and watched 'what's the worst that could happen' for $1.50. great deal. very funny movie.
  • updated movieslist.
  • found a good place on the outskirts of town to sleep.


    • 7-30-01 NY/VT/NH/ME/MA
  • woke up at the usual time and got some breakfast for the long day ahead.
  • went to seneca falls and learned about the women's suffrage movement. got into the national park for free. yay.
  • hit the road again and pretty much didn't stop unil we got to maine.
  • we had planned to hit five states and eat a lobster dinner in maine, but we got there around 10:30 and everything was closed by then.
  • ended up having to go to bickford's in new hampshire. never heard of the place, but it's like a denny's style 24 hour diner.
  • the seat melanie sat in had a pool of water on it, the waitress was a troll who had no concept of service, and the food sucked. the menu apparently wasn't up to date, the milkshake was litterally the worst i'd ever had, and when it came time to clearing our plates and giving us our bill....well we didn't wait long enough for them to do that - we just left.
  • drove into MA and slept in a parking lot.
  • long long day.

    •  

     

    7-31-01 MA

  • drove to boston and checked the place out.
  • they're working on a really cool bridge somewhere near fenway park. didn't get a good picture of it, sorry.
  • boston is a brick city. it's the kind of architechture you'd never see on the west coast because of earthquakes and such.
  • i think we got to see a good amount of the place despite only spending a day there.
  • we did part of the freedom trail. we went to harvard and BU and MIT. saw boston commons and the public gardens. went into cambridge. nice place to visit, but i wouldn't want to live in the city. we missed the museum, and that sucked, but we hit a lot of other things.
  • drove to concord late that night and slept there.

    •  this was taken in boston...near harvard. the text on the statue reads "never again should a people starve in a world of plenty."

    8-1-01 MA/RI/CT day 43
  • went to walden pond and saw it. thoreau must be turning over in his grave...the place is really trashy and they charge $5 for parking. it's not isolated, it's got fences everywhere, it's not what thoreau stood for at all.
  • new england is almost devoid of national parks and forests and good milkshakes.
  • went to rhode island and had lunch.
  • ended up getting a cheap motel in branford.

    •  

     

    8-2-01 CT/NT day 44

  • checked out of the hotel and ate at friendly's.
  • drove to new haven and checked out the town real quick.
  • from there we went to stamford which is really close to the NY border.
  • watched a movie and tried to get into a second for free, but the usher came in and found us.....asked for our ticktes and we said we lost them. he left and returned later telling us that the computer only had jurassic park 3 for three people and we were numbers 4 and 5, so we had to leave. 3 people in the whole theater and he kicked us out. just seemed a bit dumb to me. if the movie was anywhere near sold out then i can understand them being picky, but he was just be ridiculous.
  • updated movieslist.
  • we did laundry after the movie.
  • tried finding the uconn campus, but couldn't. accidently drove into NY - never accidently driven into a state, so that was new. found a park in CT and made dinner. played some frisbee and decided that since it was so secluded we should sleep there. later that night a maintenance person came by and cleaned up the bathrooms and the pool area, but he left...w wer all alone so we put down our sleeping bags and called it a nihgt. woke up to a car pulling up to the pool area (which is also a sort of childcare area) and they took their time doing their business, and then left without saying anything.
  • woke up a couple hours later to another set of lights - this time it was a cop. he told us we needed to leave and that we could get arrested. CT authority figures are lame....first the movie theater guy, then the cop. at this point it was around 1am so we go in the car and i drove around until i found a parking lot. slept there for the night.

    • this trip has made me realize even more how great and screwed up the world is...it's got all sorts of great people and both natural and manmade sites and at the same time it's got some real morons and makes you pay to sleep on the ground...there are litterally zero free campsites on the east coast. you have to pay a minimum of 12 bucks to sleep on the ground.

    8-3-01 CT/NY day 45

  • started towards NYC. had breakfast and then drove to laguardia airport. found a decently priced ($13) long term parking lot near the airport....it was actually part of the plaza hotel's parking lot. it'll be our home for the next few days.
  • went into times square and the midtown area. we're based near queens so we were able to see a bit of it along the way. we took the seven train (the same that jennifer lopez took as a little runt) into times square. yay. times square is the epitome of big city craziness...for better or worse. i personally don't like having my senses overwrought by advertisements, noise pollution, and filth. despite all that, there are some good things about nyc.
  • we checked out rockefeller center and all the sites in that area - empire state building, the south end of central park, fifth avenue, etc. after that we went back to the car.

    •  

     

    8-4-01 NY day 46

  • the plan was to hit the met, guggenheim, the american museum of natural history (which houses the hayden planetarium), strawberry fields in central park, the museum of the city of new york, and possibly malcolm x's mosque in harlem. a word of wisdom for those planning on ever visiting NYC...set aside 5 days for the city. 2 days for the american museum of natural history and 3 days for the rest of the city. i'm not kidding. it's huge to the power of ten and it's really dense. it had the most comprehensive exhibit in the world regarding genomics. we were both really really impressed by the variety of interactive exhibits, the depth and range of information, and the way everything was laid out. we spent pretty much the whole day there and still had to skip through a bunch of stuff and skim through more than we would have liked.
  • we checked out the stuff about the solar system and despite taking a class on the subject and reading up on it myself there was still a lot of stuff they addressed which i didn't really know about...dark matter, origin of time, shape of the universe, the big bang, etc. they didn't dumb any of it down, yet if you hadn't ever taken a course on the stuff you'd be able to take some information away from that section of the museum; and this held true for all the sections - from dinosaurs to genomics to geology of the earth.
  • they also had a tribute to TR because of all the steps in conservation he took.
  • after overloading our brains with info we headed off to the guggenheim...the buidling was designed by frank lloyd wright and had a relatively small collection of some great stuff...lots of picasso and a moderate amount of pollock and some other greats who i can't remember now. it had a special gehry architecture exhibit which was different and good.
  • after the guggenheim we headed off to the met, but could only stay there about 30 minutes before it closed so we went straight towards the van gogh, rodin, gaugin, seurat, monet, manet, degas, cezanne, pissaro, and renoir. it had one wing which was really great with pretty much all of the above. van gogh is like kubrick to me...there isn't anything he's done which i don't like.
  • after the met we went "home" and slept.

    • 8-5-01 NY day 47

  • had donuts for breakfast, washed up at the airport and headed off to yankee stadium.
  • we actually had to go to shea stadium in order to get to yankee stadium, just because they were doing some work on the subway system. at shea they had some huge ecuador festival and every ecuadorian denizen in the world was there.
  • took the subway to yankee stadium and it turned out to be more difficult than we had thought just because there were some awkwardly worded signs. made it there about an hour early anyway.
  • the seats were closer than i thought bleacher seats would be. i've never sat in the bleachers, but given the price ($8) i'd have to say they're they best in the house.
  • the fans in that section were classic yankee fans...rowdy, loud, knowledgeable, and affectionately grumpy. it was interesting to see them hassle each other more than the angels players. one guy hated knoblauch - i guess because he's a bad fielder and is having a bad year at bat. another couple guys talked about how jeter was gay and a pretty boy. others would hassle the box seats holders - "box seat suck, box seats suck!" was the cheer they used at the very beginning of the game.
  • it was a really good game overall. the angels won 4-3. jeter had a really good game, the angels played well and the yankees tried to make a come back in the last inning but could only get one run.
  • the food wasn't as good as dodger stadium, there weren't any beach balls, and the seventh inning stretch song lasted only one verse and was followed by "cotton eye joe" (a cheesy country/dance song). yankee stadium has more history than any other stadium i can think of (26 championships - babe ruth, lou gehrig, mickey mantle, yogi berra, mattingly, torre, etc.) and for that reason alone it was worth going. the fans were great and didn't disappoint at all...in fact now i want to go to a knicks game.
  • the stadium wasn't anything special - as one fan put it "we were voted fifth ugliest park, or some shit. but do you really want a carnival in a baseball stadium? X (i forget which one) stadium has a video game machine behind home plate...i mean, why would you want to play video games during the baseball game? yankee stadium is about baseball and that's what the fans want." she was very right...yankee stadium isn't like the giants stadium or like safeco field or any of the others with palm trees, ponds, etc., but it's not about that - it's a park where the fans are there for the game and for fans who know the game.
  • after the game we went back into times square and walked to the library. it's big and looks impressive. built in 1895 i believe.
  • we're at the airport now.
  • nyc kind grows on you. the people have pride and despite what samuel johnson would say about patriotism ("it's the last refuge of the scoundrel), i think it can be attractive on the micro level. the place is dirty, but it's got lots of culture and diversity and i value those. i wouldn't live here, but it's a nice place to visit. central park is really nice and fitting of the city. the stuff on fifth avenue is just gross - the super rich make me mad.

    • melanie eats beef. wow.

    is this not funny?

    8-6-01 NY/NJ day 48
  • went into manhattan.
  • saw ellis island and the statue of liberty from the coast.
  • from battery park we walked to the museum of the american indian. saw a lengthy video on the importance of buffalo to the dakota people. it was a really good video and got me thinking.
  • the biggest differences in culture seem to be caused by two things...the first is one that jared diamond always talks about - the culture's land sets the limits on how far a culture can reasonably go. the second is refers to the story a culture tells about their history - where they came from - their religion. europeans believe they were made in the same image as god and that (as genesis states) they should go forth and conquer the land. native americans believe they are all made of the same mother earth and are thus brothers with all living things. so even though they kill buffalo they do so with respect, they pray before slaughtering it, and they don't kill it unless they need to do so to survive.
  • from the museum we went to the world trade center area. those buildings are really really big.
  • saw the j & r superstore...it was pretty impressive.
  • walked to the brooklyn bridge and walked on that. it was also impressive.
  • took the subway to grenwich village and ate some pizza there.
  • walked around the area and worked our way over to ludlow st. which is featured on the cover of the beastie boys album paul's boutique. walked up and down the whole street, but didn't find paul's boutique, it is most likely out of business since it is 12 years later.
  • got a milkshake and headed back to the car.
  • it was insanely hot both outside and in the subway.
  • drove to new jersey and got a hotel. sleeping in the car everyday is starting to get annoying.
  • changed the oil not too long ago

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    8-7-01 NJ/PA day 49

  • i'm feeling sick...i definitely have a cold and that's no good.
  • drove through princeton and went to a mall. we took it easy because i'm tired and sick.
  • updated movieslist.
  • drove to PA and slept in a park and ride parking lot.
  • it was extremely hot even at night.

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    8-8-01 PA day 50

  • hit the road toward philly.
  • went to the third largest museum in the country - philly museum of art. the building is really impressive. it's a lot like the met in terms of size and architecture. had a lot of the same stuff...a bit of van gogh, picasso, cezanne, gaugin, etc.
  • lef the museum and got a bus pass for this special tourist bus line which goes to all the big attractions in philly. it proved to be a convient substitute to the buses. the first guy who was driving the bus was basically a tour guide - he called all sorts of interesting sites to our attention. he was funny. the other bus drivers pretty much just drove.
  • saw the liberty bell, independence hall, and that area. wasn't that impressive. the liberty bell was just a bell with an interesting history. the ranger who gave a talk about it was a real cornball "the liberty bell is cracked, but it isn't broken. just as it called james madison, thomas jefferson and the rest of the founding fathers, it has called you here today." ner.
  • saw the us mint and got to see some coins being made. apparently they make like 18 million pennies a day or something crazy like that. i don't see the purpose in that, but i suppose they know what they're doing.
  • had a philly steak sandwich, only it was with chicken not steak.
  • i don't have much of an appetite since i'm sick.
  • at the end of the day we went back to the museum and they had some ukrainian fair inside...folk arts and crafts, ballet, and the like. it was interesting, but not entirely my thing and my cold was making things less enjoyable.
  • we drove to lancaster which is amish country.
  • went to a mall and watched a late movie and then slept in the parking lot.
  • updated movieslist.

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    8-9-01 PA day 51

  • went to an amish culture museum. learned a lot about mennonites and amish people.
  • there was an exhibit for children called plain pig's alphabet which had pictures of things for each letter of the alphabet...a cow for C or buggy for B. the picture for X was of a pig covered in some brown muddy looking substance. for the longest time melanie and i were trying to figure out what it could have stood for. at the end of the exhibit it had all the answers...the picture corresponding to X was supposed to represent eXtra mud. hmmm.
  • melanie wanted to look at the crafts and quilts and all that stuff so i sat inside and waited for her to finish that business. i guess i should be used to that kind of stuff since my mom would always drag me to antique stores and the like.
  • got hotel, again.
  • took a long nap and now i feel better.
  • watched two movies on tnt and went to sleep.
  • updated movieslist.

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    8-10-01 PA day 52

  • woke up feeling more sick today than yesterday. this sucks.
  • it's really hot outside.
  • didn't do much of anything today.
  • went to eat breakfast, went to a couple crafts stores and then got another hotel.
  • i hope that tomorrow my cold is significantly better. maybe i got the west nile virus from a mosquito or something.

    • rained really hard while we were in the hotel...turns out that getting a hotel was probably going to be the only way we would have been able to go tonight so that justifies the money spent. the rain hasn't made it much cooler and that is amazing.

    8-11-01 PA/DE/DC/MD day 53

  • checked out of the hotel and it was raining really hard again. got soaked just from loading the car.
  • drove to DE and had brunch.
  • drove to DC area and watched a couple movies.
  • driving took longer than it should have so that made for a long day.
  • updated movieslist.
  • sleeping in a market parking lot.

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    8-12-01 day 54

  • woke up in the middle of the night to some guy bumping his 2pac at 4am. i could think of worse ways to wake up.
  • didn't sleep so well. my cold is now in the coughing stage and that's always an annoyance.
  • started off the day by going to the smithsonian museum of natural history. a lot like the one in NYC, but not as up to date, interactive and well laid out. still a world class place which everyone visiting DC should make a point of seeing.
  • from there we went to the smithsonian museum of american history which had a really good exhibit on the presidency. jon sent me an article by howard zinn (the author of "a people's history of the united states") which laments the fact that we admire presidents so much when there are so many other worthy people to make into heroes (fredrick douglass, helen keller (not because she was blind but because she was a socialist), and a bunch of un-heard-ofs make zinn's list). i agree with zinn that none of the presidents should be worshipped and that none of them were flawless. i also think that the presidency makes it pretty much impossible to be a perfect person. firstly i doubt that optimists of the highest order would even get elected, they'd be deemed dreamers and unrealistic and thus unsuitable as leaders. assuming anyone as optimistic or liberal as a douglass or keller would get elected they be hard pressed to be uncompromising of their values in a political system that relies on compromise. add to that the fact that the united states it the most powerful and richest nation in the world and you have a situation in which a president would almost certainly have to compromise their values in some way at some time. obviously this doesn't let wilson (who was a racist) off the hook. it doesn't justify abuses of power and it doesn't imply that bombing the shit out of a country for not kissing our ass is okay. i'm merely recognizing the inherent drawbacks of being a president. the exhibit does a decent job highlighting the duties of the presidency.
  • i didn't know that 8 presidents had died while in office...i knew of the 4 (lincoln, garfield, kennedy, mckinley) who were assasinated and 2 who died while serving (FDR and harrison), but i don't know who the other two were.
  • walked to the washington monument, the FDR memorial, the lincoln memorial, the korean war memorial, the vietnam memorial, and the einstein statue in front of the national academy of science building. the fdr memorial was new since i had been there last and was really good.
  • then we went back to the car and watched two movies.
  • updated movieslist.


    • 8-13-01 DC day 55
  • woke up on the late side...both had a good night's rest in the quiet park and ride parking lot.
  • took the metro into town and stopped by the fbi building to see what the deal was with the tours they offer...we would have had to wait for two hours so we decided to skip it and visit mulder and scully another time. har har.
  • visited the national art gallery. for the first time we got the audio tour wands. they turned out to be pretty nice additions to the art. saw some van gogh, cezanne, gauguin, degas, rembrandt, five by raphael, the only davinci in america ("ginevra de' benci), and plenty of other great works. it was a really good collection and was well laid out. the courtyard areas were really pleasant and overall the place was very good.
  • melanie is officially sick.
  • from the museum we went past the capitol building to the botanical gardens.
  • from there we went to the most visited museum in the nation - the national museum of air and space. it was pretty sweet overall. learned about the space race and airplanes in general. melanie got a good explanation on how planes fly and then we left.
  • walked to the metro and got on toward union station.
  • ate dinner there and checked the place out a bit.
  • caught the metro back to the car and here we sit.
  • while we were in pa we went to a museum in Intercourse. intercourse, PA. funny.

    • in front of the capitol building with many japanese tourists

    8-14-01 DC/MD/VA day 56
  • went to the white house and got the scoop on the tours...had we shown up at 5am then we could have gotten tickets to the daily tours. needless to say we didn't get to tour the white house.
  • ended up spending the day at the holocaust museum. from what i remember the holocaust museum in la wasn't as big, but it did a good job of addressing what we should learn from the holocaust. both of them are great.
  • after the holocaust museum we hit the road for georgia.
  • planned a route via the blueridge parkway, west virginia, kentucky, tennessee, north carolina, and south carolina...that way we can be sure to hit all 48 states on the trip.

    • ended up in front royal where we stayed in a cheapo motel.

    8-15-01 VA day 57

  • hit the road planning on putting some mileage between us and DC...ended up driving to shenandoah national park and spending the day there.
  • got backcountry camping permits and headed off for the heart of the park.
  • as we were packing up the backpacks for the hike into the backcountry we saw a deer near our car. it came really close to us and just hung out for a while looking at us...there's a picture below. we think it had been fed before since it wasn't skittish at all.
  • after it left we got our stuff together and hit the path.
  • shenandoah is nice and filled with overlooks. that's basically what the park consists of - overlooks and hikes.
  • took longer than we expected to get to anywhere which would be suitable for camping. once there we set up camp and ate dinner. before we knew it a deer passed by us. then after it had left another deer, this time a young buck, passed within a few yards of us. then another, smaller, deer, came by for a visit. a few minutes later they all came by and ate some grass within 20 feet of us. they just stood there eating and occasionally stopping to look at us. it was very cool.


    • 8-16-01 VA day 58
  • drove toward west virginia, but melanie was feeling really crappy from the long uphill hike after camping...as well as the lingering cold.
  • got another cheap motel and just watched tv all day.
  • updated movieslist.

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    8-17-01 VA/WV/KY/TN day 59

  • woke up and got some breakfast while the laundry was in the washer at the laundromat across the street.
  • drove many miles and found a nice mall with a post office and a dollar store. got oil change supplies, sent a bunch of things which needed to be sent and bought food stuffs.
  • ended up in tn after a long day of driving. slept in a mall parking lot.
  • in the middle of the night a cop drove up and asked us what we were up to...i explained and he said he'd leave us alone.

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    8-18-01 TN/NC/SC/GA day 60

  • updated movieslist.
  • ate at ihop for breakfast and it was good.
  • drove to greenville, SC and watched two movies for the price of one there.
  • after the movies we headed to ga.
  • stayed at the visitors center there.
  • in the middle of the night a storm came by...good thing we were in the car and not in the tent. rain isn't so good when you're in a tent.

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    8-19-01 GA day 61

  • updated movieslist.
  • gap and pepsi commercials are exceedingly lame.
  • the anti-drug commercials have really good music...looper, aphex twin, etc.
  • headed towards atlanta and athens georgia.
  • an hour later we were in the birthplace of REM and the b-52s (athens, GA). it's a nice little town which has a double barrel cannon which ended up being a failed experiment and a tree which owns the land it's on. the tree was officially granted ownership of the land that its roots occupy and as a result the streets weave around it. interesting. the cannon was supposed to fire both barrels at the same time with a chain connecting the two balls...it was intended to mow down an enemy as well as blow them to pieces. yay.
  • from athens we went onto atlanta.
  • atlanta has the MLK national park...it includes the church he and his father preached at, his home until he was 12, and his grave. we watched two videos, did a tour of his house and looked at the exhibit they had on his role in the civil rights movement. the picture below is of gandhi and me hanging out in front of the visitor center.
  • drove around downtown atlanta for a bit and then headed out of town.
  • atlanta was a nice city overall. i liked the buildings.


    • 8-20-01 GA/AL/FL/MS day 62
  • the other day while in athens we went to a botanical garden and saw all sorts of wildlife, but the most interesting were the really tiny frogs which were all over the ground, they were cool. it was tough to not step on them while walking on the walkway.
  • did a whole lot of driving today, close to 500 miles.
  • drove to FL and skirted pensacola.
  • from there we drove to biloxi and spent the night there.
  • biloxi is a gambling town and that's about all i can say about that.
  • tomorrow we'll head to new orleans.

    • 8-21-01 MS/LA day 63

  • woke up and hit the road towards new orleans.
  • drove into the french quarter and got some parking. walked around the french quarter area quite a bit checking out all the buildings, the sordid bar scene, and the like. saw a statue of louis armstrong and an above ground cemetary. ate at some creole/cajun food place and i had a shrimp po boy sandwich, it was good. melanie had some jumbalaya.
  • i really liked the look of new orleans, but not the smell so much.

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    8-22-01 LA/AR/TX day 64

  • another long day of driving today...drove from alexandria LA to texarkana to about 50 miles outside of dallas. lots of driving...in fact i believe we passed the 11,000 mile mark for the trip today. going to need to change the oil again in a couple hundred miles.
  • updated movieslist.
  • while we were in athens we saw sorority row and it proved to me what i already suspected - davis has a relatively small greek program. there were hundreds of sorority girls along this one street we were driving down. the funny thing is that it was about 9am and they were all dressed as if they were going to a dinner formal or something. sorority girls are funny.
  • it has been really really hot lately.
  • lots of driving on this part of the trip...the southwest is really spread out. we've got austin, dallas, carlsbad caverns and denver coming up, but over 1600 miles of driving along the way. so there's a lot of nothing in between sites.
  • after denver we plan on hitting bryce canyon, zion, and the grand canyon national parks.
  • we're watching pee-wee's big adventure right now. pretty great movie.

    • speaking of good movies...a couple good ones are coming out in a few days.

    8-23-01 TX day 65 (update by mel)

  • drove into Dallas.  highlight was the museum on the sixth floor of the Texas schoolbook depository, where Lee Harvey Oswald reputedly shot JFK.  the exhibit thoroughly covered all the events leading up to and following the assassination. didn't endorse any one conspiracy theory outright, but did mention a few of them and made it very clear that the Warren commission did a fairly poor job of the investigation.
  • also saw the dallas art museum. pretty standard, there was one cool short film called "middletown" which showed a neighborhood with all kinds of activity going on in it while this soothing, danny elfman-esque music played.
  • still too hot.

    • Wells Fargo building in Dallas

    8-24-01 TX/NM day 66 (update by mel)

  • lots more driving.  made it all the way to Carlsbad, NM. will see the caverns tomorrow.

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    8-25-01 NM/TX day 67 (update by mel)

  • enjoyed the carlsbad caverns. national parks pass didn't do us any good, since today and today only is founder's day and everyone gets in free.  the caverns are vast, though ... far more impressive than the Lewis & Clark caverns in montana. seeing the smaller caverns made it that much easier to appreciate the greatness of these.
  • sonic drive in has awesome milkshakes. they need to open up some locations in california.
  • saw roswell.  they sure love their status as UFO capital of the world, and play it up plenty.
  • drove up to Amarillo, TX on the panhandle so that we can hit OK and KS tomorrow, then CO.

    • 8-26-01 TX/OK/KS/CO day 68 (update by mel)

  • did over 500 miles of driving today. that was pretty much it.
  • in liberal, ks they have an OZ-themed roadside attraction, complete with yellow brick road and all.
  • kansas highlight: the enormous field of sunflowers.
  • oklahoma highlight: a town there called texahoma (there's also a texico, on the NM border, and of course texarkana)
  • denver feels a lot closer to california.  not just in distance, but in attitude.

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    8-27-01 CO day 69 (update by mel)

  • had two factory tours on the itinerary but only made it to one: the Celestial Seasonings tea plant in Boulder, CO. it began with free tea tasting (as much as we wanted, of any of their 50+ flavors), then a video depicting the company's 1970s hippie origins, then hairnet distribution, then a walk of the factory floor in which we got to see the actual tea creation and packaging processes firsthand.
  • when we first entered the factory we saw the employee breakroom board, which mentioned that it has been 13 days since the last workman's compensation incident, and that the record is 48 days.  for a factory making something so innocuous as tea, that doesn't seem like a very good rate of 'incidents'.
  • cruised downtown Denver, toured the US Mint (virtually identical to the one in Philly, but with a much more knowledgeable tour guide), walked the little outdoor mall and saw the capitol building.
  • drove to Golden to do the coors brewery tour, but got there an hour and a half late.
  • now we're going to see a movie or two.

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    8-28-01 CO day 70

  • updated movieslist.
  • drove from somewhere outside of denver to grand junction, pretty close to utah.
  • visited the colorado national monument and it was really beautiful.
  • watching high school (by wiseman) right now...masterfully directed. very very good.


    • 8-29-01 CO/UT day 71
  • drove to arches national park and saw the sites there.
  • spent a while at the park and then headed towards bryce and zion.
  • stopped in a town called junction and found some really good free camping at fishcreek national forest.
  • along the way we encountered some road construction delays which were completely unwarranted. kinda lame.
  • while at arches we met a lady who was from chicago and returning from the la area. she had just dropped off her daughter at occidental college. it is a small world. i told her that i almost went to occidental and that we had recently gone to chicago. she drove a subaru.
  • the campsite was really really nice....secluded, maintained well, had good firewood, and was easy to find. it was extremely windy and that was my only complaint since we had a tarp up to keep potential rain from getting us drenched. as it turned out the tarp turned out to be quite the noise maker when the wind was at full blast. annoying.

    • some great formations created by erosion


    8-30-01 UT day 72
  • drove straight to bryce and spent a few hours there. went to a ranger talk and found out about the colorado plateau and some of the interesting geological events specific to the area. the canyons there are really extraordinary...from the colors to the amount of hoodoos (see picture below).
  • after bryce canyon we bounced over to nearby zion national park. it is also beautiful, but in a different way.
  • it's amazing how bad my memory is...i went to both of these parks but 8 or so years ago and i didn't really remember them.
  • zion is less of a desert type terrain and much more the kind of scenery you might find in forested areas. the valley created by the virgin river creates a deep, but not very wide, canyon which provides consistent waterflow (from melting snow and occasional summer rains) thus making a remarkably green and forested area pretty much in the middle of the desert.
  • the zion tunnel is cut out of the sandstone in the mountain and extends for over a mile...pretty impressive. so in one place you have a marvel of man and a marvel of nature, without the former being too much of a nusaince. good place.
  • tommorow we'll goto grand canyon.

    • bryce canyon national park...all the rock formations created by various weathering are called hoodoos.

    me standing in the virgin river at zion...flowing at 34 cubic inches per second...summer flash floods can turn that into 9,000 cubic inches per second in a matter of minutes.

    8-31-01 UT/AZ/NV day 73
  • woke up in kanab utah (near the az border) and bounded over to the grand canyon. saved yet another 20 bucks because of the parks pass.
  • as a side note...saw rahman and lewis get into their little tango the other night on tv. boxing hasn't seen that much excitement in a long time.
  • the grand canyon was impressive. been there before and actually went to the north rim last time as well as this time. according to what we've read the north rim gets only 10% of the visitors.
  • yesterday temp at the north rim (about 1200 feet higher than the south rim and 6000 feet above the canyon bottom) was 76 degrees, the south rim was 81, and the bottom of the canyon was 101. gives you a good idea of the temperature differentials. i can only imagine the view in winter when the north rim has snow, the south rim has less, and the bottom is still basically just the desert.
  • the anasazi (native puebloans) would live in the canyon in the winter and migrate to the top in the summer.
  • can't wait to goto mars and see the biggest canyon in the solar system...10 times longer than the grand canyon and i believe it's also twice as deep.
  • met a couple from holland who were touring around the us. that was pretty neat. most of the people we've talked to on the trip have been from another country.
  • after the grand canyon we drove to indian springs, nv. farted in las vegas on the way over here.
  • i played a dollar's worth of video poker in the general store next to our motel and lost. melanie played a dollar's worth as well and won 75 cents.
  • going to death valley, kings canyon, and yosemite. also going to stop in davis to do some business...then la.

    • grand canyon picture stitched together...

    9-1-01 NV/CA day 74
  • left nevada and headed out towards death valley.
  • took about 90 minutes to get there. drove to dante's view first and that was quite a climb...about 7,000 feet above sea level looking down on the lowest point in the western hemisphere. on a clear day you can see that point and mt. whitney at the same time. as it was we couldn't see whitney, but we did see some nearby peaks which were around 11,000 feet high. pretty impressive.
  • drove through death valley and as we got closer to sea level it grew hotter and hotter. by the time we got to the visitor center it was around 107 in the shade. the visitor center is -190 feet below sea level.
  • drove through the rest of the park .... saw some sand dunes which were really pretty.
  • drove the rest of the way through the park over the pass until we got to somewhere outside of yosemite.
  • planned on getting a campsite somewhere in the bishop vicinity, but couldn't find the two which were in the free campgrounds book. kept driving towards yosemite until we passed mammoth lakes, and then got to a town right outside of the tioga pass. ended up having to sleep in the car because every campground along the way was full...it's labor day weekend and we're in prime getaway country - mammoth lakes and yosemite...just bad timing.

    • from dante's view...

    9-2-01 CA day 75
  • woke up at the base of the tioga pass ready to visit yosemite.
  • drove through a very crowded yosemite...came in on the east side so it was less crowded there, but as we drove into the valley it started to grow more crowded.
  • went to bridal veil falls and half dome...the falls were pretty much completely dried out - just dripping a bit.
  • we decided to drive through the rest of the park and then head out to davis. since i've got the parks pass and we're so close to yosemite we can make a visit on a less crowded day if we decide to do so....preferably in the late spring when the falls are going stronger.
  • made it to davis and picked up the key to our apartment. went to visit vern, but he wasn't there. went inside and got my mail and other such items he had for me. him and johnny have a pretty nice place.
  • went to our new place and made sure everything there was kosher...we had electricity, but no phone so things seem to be working out so far. plenty of furniture, and probably enough room for everything i've got in storage.
  • walked to the theater and watched two movies. updated movieslist.

    • the captain

    9-3-01 CA day 76
  • took care of some business in davis - moved a few things from storage to the apartment and went shopping. then headed out to fresno.

    • got to fresno and saw my dad's aunt (tete evie). hung out at her house for a bit and then went to my dad's cousin's (chris) house. he used to have a glass eye, a beard, and dredlocks down to his waist, but when i saw him this time he didn't have the glass eye, the beard, or the dredlocks so he looked a lot different. he and his family have a really cool backyard. it's full of random things gathered from junkyards and flea markets. they have a pond with koi in it and all sorts of interesting things lining the border. definitely a unique backyard. chris's wife does sculpting and we saw her artwork and that was good too. after seeing his place we went back to tete evie's. a bunch more of the family came over and we had dinner and such. wish i had gotten pictures.9-4-01 CA day 77
  • left fresno and went to kings canyon/sequoia national parks. seriously impressive. saw general sherman.
  • from there we went to melanie's house and the trip ended. total mileage 15,553. 48 states. many national parks. many museums. many cities. many memories.
  • from here on out i'll update my main webpage instead of this one.

    • general sherman himself...i didn't hold the camera perfectly inline so there are some white spots, but you get the idea.

    some stats on the largest living thing on earth...general sherman.

    this marks the end...