Utah

If you want a gorgeous drive go through Utah. It just amazes me. I think it rivals the highway 1 drive thru Big Sur. These rock formations are just awe inspiring. We went I-15 to I-70 across the state in a day.

We stopped in Beaver for a bite. A bunch of high school kids were there. They were all so nice, shiny, clean, perfect. Even the guy with a mohawk exuded wholesome friendliness.

We pulled off at a view point and met a couple towing their stuff from LA (the valley somewhere) to a new life in Nebraska. On the road later I saw a CA plate with a Santa Cruz bumper sticker U-Hauling their stuff east through Colorado.

We went to Arches National Park and I inaugurated my Parks pass. (The Grand Canyon experience was not a National Parks area.)

It is overwhelming there. Such incredible views. Well worth the trip.

We pushed east and just into Colorado we stopped at Fruita for the night at a pizza at Pablo's. I tried 2 micro-brews. Shriner Blonde and Farmer's Friend. Both were good. Our hotel is next door to the Dinosaur Museum so we may do that in the morning.

Random

This year is the 50th anniversary of the Interstate system. Well we’re determined to get our tax dollars worth this trip.

Listening to NPR’s Fresh Air we heard about a family who crossed the country 30 times by car.

We listened to disc 2 of 10 in the "on the road" collection.

The wife is increasingly amazed by "the rest" (that is the center) of America. Some quotes:
"So you just drive for a long time through nothing and then there's a little civilization again?"
"This is like the I-5 but for a lot more hours. The whole middle of the country is like the I-5?"
"I'm getting kind of claustrophobic. We're really far from any oceans."

Even I was suprised to be reminded how much a shop keeper in a sleepy town will like to talk.

The Grand Detour

Some of you know I’ve never seen the Grand Canyon before. I’ve been there before. I stood on the edge in fact. I just never saw it. The fog was so thick we couldn’t see more than 3 feet in front of us. So the canyon didn’t seem so Grand. This trip the northern rim was closed due to wild fires. I feared a repeat, this time with the view obscured by smoke not fog. But we drove to the western rim on a Hualapai Indian reservation. The direction mentioned 14 miles of unpaved road, but silly me I didn’t process that to mean top speeds of 20 MPH, dust and bumps all the way.

We saw it. It was amazing and impressive and there is a discernable eagle shape in the canyon wall. But the rough road was a drag and was posted with flash flood warnings. As we finished our bus ride back from the view points the driver remarked that rain wasn’t far off and we should be very careful on the road since the flash flooding can come on in no time. Great. It’s not like we can speed away to outrace the rain. But we beat it anyway. Oh and we discovered there really was no better route into Utah than 100% backtracking to Vegas. About 10-20 rain drops hit us near vegas. You can actually see their prints against the canyon dust on the car. It's kind of a leopard print actually.

So today wasn’t much for progress toward the new home. But a great detour that accomplished a 13 year old goal of mine.

Determined to make SOME forward progress (and therefore not spend a second night in Vegas) we pressed on to Mesquite, NV on the eastern border and stayed in a $29 room at The Virgin River Casino. I lost $20 playing roulette. --Yes I know, by my Vegas math that means the room cost $49.

I like New York-New York in June.

Around 10pm the accursed drive to Vegas is over (probably for the last time in my life). We decide to stay at NY-NY since it fits thematically with our destination. The wife is …well…not super comfortable with gambling. But a funny thing happened. After losing $5 on dollar slots I won $48. She was happy but panicked. “Cash out!” [News to me: no longer do coind tumble down to the trough for a payout. You just get a printed slip for credit. It bit less exciting. A while later I convinced her to suffer through a bit of roulette. I hit a few numbers and she insisted I walk away a winner. So all told the winnings paid for our room and we gambled for free.

Escape Velocity

6/28
Today we left LA. The wife’s little brother came by in the morning to see us off. The movers arrived at 10am and finished around 3PM. They were impressive. I felt a little guilty sitting around doing not much while they worked so hard in near 100 degree heat. Even more guilty as they put about $30 of labor in protectively wrapping a $10 chair.

My best friend came by with lunch and a road gift – 10 mix Cds. I’m guessing that’s one for each day we intend to be driving.

As I was leaving the apartment building for the last time a group of guys were gathered around a friend rapping. One said “I told all my boys when I hit LA, it’s on.” A new arrival. I thought there’s a beginning to mirror my LA adventures ending. Again as one LA begins another ends.

So around 4pm we’re off. Out of here. Gone. Not that I was eager to leave but after so much prep we just wanted to be done with it. But it’s hard to feel like you’re on your way when the 101 freeway is crawling along at 10 MPH.

Then the radio news tells us of massive flooding in upstate NY. (Our destination!)

We stopped for a meal and it turned out to be the worst Chinese food we’ve ever had. Even worse than the Homeless Express place on Vine near my old bachelor apartment. I should have known better. In fact I did. There were plenty of warning signs. It sat in a strip mall with Big Lots, $1 Bargains, Food For Less, and Payday Check Advance. I remarked that these were seldom the neighbors of a good restaurant and yet in we went. The wife had orange chicken which I swear was made with Smucker's Orange Marmalade.

We listened to the road mix volume one and it was filled with so many “Don’t go” or “Come back” songs I nearly turned around.

After those 22 tracks we popped in the “Birthday Bash Fusion” CD (a J&E production). It was extremely apropos to drive through the desert at sunset to the sounds of Mutaytor’s “Drop the Laundry”.

The New Arrival

We have a couple friends expecting their first child to be born on the same day we depart. We thought we might delay a day if necessary to greet the new arrival before saying goodbye. But fate and a C-section brought the beautiful new addition into the world the day before we planned to leave. We’re glad we got to see her on day one. So as one life begins in LA ours ends.

Online Again (at last)

Obviously no updates lately. But we're in Fruita, CO now and on a _tipp_ from a friend staying at a LA Quinta Inn, quite nice actually, which has wi-fi. Turns out Casino hotels aren't big on wi-fi...hmmm.

I have been blogging just not posting. So I have a blog backlog to purge now. They'll all have today's date stamp but I'm backing up to the day before we left I'm sure you can sort out the dates.

The Move

I can't say enough good things about MovingScam.com. If you're planning a move -- even a short local move-- and using any shipping, packing, transit or moving company you must read this site first. There's so much to be wary of. I naively thought if you go with a nationally recognized brand name mover you'd be safe. Not necessarily. The big nationals all rely on local independent agents in each city. So if your buddy in Houston had great success with Mayflower moving to Reno, that doesn't mean your Mayflower agent in Atlanta will be similar.

The site has tons of great info. Like a black list of shady movers who might "lose" your stuff and offer you only 60 cents a pound replacement cost (insurance). Be sure to read the forums section.

Comes Around Goes Around

About two years ago an LA friend packed it all up and moved to Florida near Tampa. His movers forbade the transport of household cleaning chemicals so he gave me a bunch of them. We sent him off with a dinner at a Chinese place and a movie (Alien v. Predator -- maybe that should have been an omen). After two years of hurricanes and worse disasters he has returned to LA just in time to see me off.

We'll be catching the tuesday show of Superman and since that Chinese place is now a Cheesecake Factory maybe we'll eat there.



And since I still have some of his cleaning supplies (yes 2 years later) I can return those to him.

The Parks

My National Parks Pass arrived today. At $50 to pay for itself you'd have to visit 5-6 parks in a year. But on this trip I should come close to that. If not the money supports a great cause.

The Long Goodbyes

They've begun. My fellow ex-East coasters threw a great farewell fete. And a motley collection of people I've worked with at different companies gathered for a night of drinks. Plus a friend got married a couple days ago it was a great night. And it provided a large gathering of firends that I might not see for a long while.

I had this list on the fridge of LA-type things to do before I left town. There were maybe 15 items. I've done about 3 of them. Not likely I'll do anymore. But last week I crossed off "Go to Knott's Berry Farm". And I was glad I did. I had never been before. It's smaller than the other SoCal Parks but it's refreshing that while everything is themed it's not all "branded". So there's a wild west land and it doesn't have to be Yosemite Sam Land or Pocahotas Village.

I liked the story of how the Knott family berry farm became a restaurant with an attraction and then grew into the first theme park. And they invented the boysenberry (a graft of loganberry and blackberry, first attempted by Mr. Boysen).

We rode four coasters include Excellerator (shown) which rockets from 0-85 MPH in 2.5 seconds. Now that's a good send off.

The Boxes

So we're packing up all the stuff we can't bear to toss out or give away. Weird what you accumulate, what you hang on to and what you discard. I've got stuff I haven't looked at in my 13 years in LA. I feel like I hauled it from NY to LA and now back to NY apparently for no reason.

The movers estimated our stuff at around 4000 lbs.

Sure, we're in a one bedroom apt. now and getting rid of everything that isn't worth moving but it doesn't seem like much stuff. Not a complaint -- even this minor amount is a hassle to box up. The movers estimated we'd have 100-120 items/boxes. So far 89 boxes are packed and about 16 furniture items will go too, so looks like they estimated well.

The Route

So far we're thinking the route goes like this:
LA to Vegas*
Vegas to Grand Canyon
Grand Canyon to Arches National Park in Utah
Arches to Gambo's new house in Fort Collins
Fort Collins to Mount Rushmore

From there it's interstate 90 from South Dakota all the way east, stops in Chicago and Ohio to see family and friends but no other specific sights to see so if you know where the largest ball of twine is or something equally amazing and it's not far from I90 post a comment.

*As many times as I've sworn to never again drive the cursed route from LA to Vegas it's hard to avoid when headed from corner to corner of this counrty.

I hate blogging.

Okay, everybody's doing it and I'm late to the party. I love the idea of blogs and I'm glad other people do it but I have never wanted to. Still don't. But as I set out cross country from LA to NY stopping to see some of America's greatest sights in between I thought posting a blog entry every time my hotel has wireless would be a lot easier than emailing everybody. Who knows maybe I'll write something interesting or post a gorgeous photo along the way.

We don't hit the road for a couple weeks yet so I won't be posting much til then.

BTW this image shows pretty much the route we'll be taking.