Mason's Great Adventure

Banks (My farewell to HSBC)

2010-10-25T17:00:00.001-04:00

So after being on the road this long its pretty clear I need to dump HSBC. Its been great, but you won't travel with me and you might (just might) have a branch in 1/5th of the places I've been. I'm walking around w all kinds of outstanding checks to deposit when we are finally reunited (for the last time).

That being said, I wonder if you being a foreign(ish) bank helps at all. I don't think you took bailout money like my 1st choice to replace you did (Bank of America). And even so is that a problem?

I'm not sure if you'd have a more cut and run attitude when sh*t hits the fan either. You are FDIC backed but then again it really would be nice to have a local branch to participate in a run on the bank scenario, if I so choose to, when the time comes.

So goodbye and good luck. I hope I don't develop an once of regret for this decision; a fleeting goal in so many of my previous breakups.

I'm in Juno Beach on my way to Miami. Ill fill in the Houston to FL stuff soon.
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Houston

2010-10-24T21:51:00.000-04:00

So the road from Austin to Houston was cattle and oil/gas rigs. Even in town there are oil rigs. I had arranged to stay at another one of Jon's (formerly of Brooklyn) friends places. This one is Courtney, a friend from back in high school. He lives outside of the central city in a rental addition that is connected to a nice Mexican family's house. It was at the end of a cul-de-sac and had a huge open area for Max next to it.

I went to his grandfathers town in La Grange, TX to pick up special venison sausage. It was awesome.

Courtney is a very interesting guy: musician, producer and science geek. His religious beliefs lead us on a on hunt for a rooster the second day I was there. There is a lot more to the story if any one is interested! I learnd a lot from Courtney in the short amount of time that I was with him.

We toured around downtown Houston and went to the Montrose district to bar hop and hand out with some of his friends who he plays music with. Houston is super spread out, has little or no zoning, and has a thick air that I'm not used to at all. It was also really hot and humid the days I was there.

I got to meet up with Nadine, also from coushsurfing, and from the Danimal experience in Flagstaff. That being said, she is good friends with CJ, so I was a little nervous that I was going to be in hot water for the potential mess I left in Austin (which I now have been reassured was not a big deal). We went to Angora Cafe, then went to one of Houston's premier dog parks (which wasn't that special to us sophisticated dog park travellers). After dinner we said our farewell. It was really cool to hang with Nadine. She is a real traveller and a great spirit.

So I was off to New Orleans....

Austin

2010-10-24T21:17:00.000-04:00

So a quick note on Amarillo...

The drive south through Colorado into Oklahoma and ending at Amarillo was interesting. There comes a point about when you are entering Texas when you start to see cotton growing on the side of the road. Pretty soon you realize that there is cotton surrounding you for miles. I was luck to be there right around the beginning of the harvest so there was no doubting what type of farm you were seeing. Rows of cotton balls as far as the eye could see. This lasts for hours and you suddenly have an appreciation for where your $4 for 3 white undershirt deal comes from, or while you are at it, where most of your clothes come from for that matter. So that was North Texas.

Amarillo to Austin was a little more cotton and then cattle country all the way to the outskirts of Austin.

NOTE: I'm getting towards the end of my trip and the pressure to have quick answers to "What are you going to do next" and "Where are you going to move" are all starting to weigh on me. My trip has turned into getting back in a reasonable amount of time while covering the ground that i wanted to cover and maybe just maybe enjoying it as I go along. Back to the story...

I had arranged to stay in Austin with CJ, a really cool girl I met through couchsurfing in Flagstaff. She stayed with the Danimal while I was at his place. She works full time and I basically drove around for two days and saw the town and talked with folks. Everyone kept emphasising "coolest place in Texas". After a while I started to envision it as an island of "OK'ness" in a sea of "Not really coolness" (Texas). The problem to me with that analysis is that I like travelling and exploring my surroundings and I don't anticipate that my current trip will end that urge (probably just strengthen it actually). Therefore it would be nice to move to a place where I feel more comfortable in the outskirts and had more of a diversity of things around it to go and explore.

The city had two nice dog parks that Max got to enjoy. CJ's development also had a fence in dog walking area. We thought that was pretty cool!

We went hiking in a really nice canyon. CJ's roommate and I, Katrina, lost track of CJ in the woods and it resulted in us having to look for her in the woods by flashlight. Not fun! We had CJ's house keys and cell phone in Katrina's bag so that really didn't help. Come to find out she jogged out of the park to a friends house and got a lift home. It left me thinking that this was all revenge for hitting it off pretty well with Katrina. So I go from love starved lonely traveller to messy love triangle in about a day. How frustrating is that! That in mind, I ran before it got ugly and crashed at Victor's house.

Victor is the long distance, long term boyfriend of my friend Jon's (formerly of Brooklyn) sister. Got that? Boyfriend-in-law of a friend of mine. Here I had my 2nd experience with an air mattress (1st was in Denver with Robin). I had to reinflate it five times in a night, but it has a built in electric pump so it wasn't that bad.

We went out that night and took a tour of downtown Austin and all the bars and clubs that are down there. There is also an over the top amount of food trucks that are catering (and many owned by) the hipster crowd. One, we located using twitter, specialized in Korean bulgogi taco's. Yes, Korean-Mexican fusion cuisine, from a truck. It was good. The bar scene was over the top and very young. In a two hour walk we probably passed 100 establishments that served liquor.

The next day we went to a breakfast taco place that was really cool. Then I hit the road to Houston.

Usually wouldn't share this but it needs to be shared...

2010-10-12T11:35:00.001-04:00

Amazing findings if they are true:
http://4closurefraud.org/2010/10/10/4closurefraud-exclusive-president-obama-falls-victim-to-chase-robo-signer/

I'm in Armarillo TX on way to Austin.

Thanks to Jon (from Queens) for sending this link to me.

I drove from Greely, CO to TX. Its was a nice rural drive on 287 south. About an hour of the day was on the interstate, and almost two hours at night. Ahhhh! My rules are breaking down! My lodging streak will not be broken though ;)

I had dinner at a Texas style roadhouse place (a brit would see it as just a pub with huge bull horn racks on the wall, but here we have a special name for it). My waitress showed some interest in meeting up for a drink after her shift so I went along with it to see where things would go. After a brief tour of her tattoo's and explanations as to what cup size she choose for her implants and a full history on her long term BF who is in Austria for the year, it actually became apparent things wouldn't work out. I live in my car, she lives at home and has too much baggage in the distant BF guilt dept that all it was going to be was a nice chat (and tattoo tour). Holiday Inn could have gotten my money for once last night but it didn't.

I slept in Walmart and yes, this blog post is being written from a stall, LOL.

Let me brush my teeth and get out of here!
Have a good day,
Mason
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Moving right along... (Eastward Ho!)

2010-10-09T17:56:00.001-04:00

San Diego - I thought I was going to like San Diego, a lot! I miscalculated this and given that it was at the end of my end to end PCH run, I felt like I had to push on to reach it because I was of course going to fall in love. It felt like a police state. As much as or more than NYC. Its a Military, Border and Shore Leave town all in one and that's just not my crowd. I know that about myself. The water part of the water front is obscured for miles by military ships parked in the harbor. I wouldn't want to go sailing around all of that. Then you add the in-place AND roving Border Patrol check points (bright lights, shotguns and dogs) inside and outside of the city, and it was just a non starter for me. I'll trade you winter for not having to feel like I need my passport to be on me all the time.
Jan Brewer took Arizona off my list for that same reason.

Mohave - So if you can overlook the "hiding in plain sight as I sleep every night" routine, I do have to admit myself that sometimes I do stuff that seems very suspicious. Like taking local roads to get out of San Diego
at 8am on a Saturday morning and then staying off the highway all the way to Las Vegas, through the Mohave, skirting around Joshua Tree. Whatever! I want to see what I want to see. Why should I feel paranoid about it or let others convince me that these are things I shouldn't do. As I am nearing the end of this first great trip of my life, I'm suddenly looking back at all the warnings and "You're crazy!"'s and realizing that I'm so glad I didn't let them stop me from just going out and doing what I do. Its been fun and Max has enjoyed and benefited from it too.
So the Mojave was interesting, but it was no Utah.

Las Vegas - so I expected to not like vegas. I wanted to not like vegas. I really loved the experience! I'm glad got there about half an hour after dark set in, spent the night walking around, talking to people, and riding roller coasters at the casinos. It was way bigger than I thought it was going to be. It felt like Disney, but adult sized. The crowd was young too. I made it from MGM (where I parked for free), to Bills Gambling Hall and back before I was ready to hit the sack at 1am. I was so tired and on auto pilot all I could think of was "Leave me alone" when I was approached by two hot younger girls in the MGM lobby that I'm sure were looking to just ask me the time, LOL. I regret not having enough mental energy to at least play along w the conversation. It would have been fun to see the "You live in your car" reaction from them!!!
I stayed a few blocks away in the Days Inn (or was it Super 8) parking lot. No problems at all.
The next morning I drove the strip in a hazy daylight. It was cool to see the curtain pulled back on the movie like set I had fallen into the night before. But it didn't make me want to not want to go back again. In fact, when I do I will try my best to not see the sun the whole time I'm there. Its better that way :) but this time I was up by 9 and trying to make it to the South Rim of the Grandest of Canyons by sundown.

GC - I got to the grand canyon sunday just past sunset, so it was pretty desolate and I remember more people being at the North Rim, but that was in the middle of summer. The view is just as good. The south is "larger" to accommodate more people but it gets used too. I'm so glad I was there when I was, it was so slow. So slow, no one noticed a clutzy move I made in the parking lot that left me needing one new tire. If you have been then you can understand, its 80 miles to anything that might have a tire and they are all south and west, not in my direction. So suddenly Big-O in Page Az came to mind. They did my serpentine belt during my figure eight loop tour of Utah. But they were 142 miles of agonizing, is my tire going to exploded at 65mph on a wet road in the middle of the desert. Yes, it was raining and it seemed like the storms that I started with Sunday morning were going to just keep following me until I was to get over the rockies onto the other side of the continental divide. It was awesome being able to see the clouds and what was to become a confirmed tornado touchdown (It happened in Page, AZ, 24hrs after I left but was moving at us as I blew out of Hite, UT towards Denver.

Page - Aside from having to deal with the not as nice as the rest of the crew, Wayne, at Big-O Tire in Page Arizona, it was good to be back in a place I really liked the first time. I storm watched for most of the drive and got poured on many times especially during the tire job. Then I went to Lone Rock beach, paid my 10 bucks and found my camp spot for the night.

As small side note: While I was back on the reservation, out of curiosity and to get a few of you off my back about it, I finally called Vanessa (lives on Navajo reservation and joined me for 8 or so days earlier in my trip) and neither number I have for her worked. I will have to scour my email to see if I can find one for her and still then I'd say its only a 25% chance she will reply. I don't think I'll ever have a 100% answer for some of our suspicions that she lied about having to go back to Albuquerque for summer school. And for anyone who maybe thinking that I was thinking of setting up a drive by booty call, just picture me in the hot sun frantically setting up a tent in her parents "front yard"with her standing there patiently waiting LOL.

Hite - Officially proclaimed the "Best Middle of Nowhere in America" by yours truly. It was great to see my friends Arthur and Mellisa. Art (avid gun collector), finally heard me say for the third time "I've never shot a gun" and we both resolved to fix that as soon as he could finish cleaning a few to take with us. About an hour later we were getting in the car with a Glock 9mm and a HK assault rifle. Both are highly illegal in my home state, like minimum mandatory sentence illegal. So about a 20 minute drive was enough for the two of us to be far enough on BLM land to "target practice". We pulled a boulder from the side of the road and set it about 200 feet from the car, turned on the high beams and I got my safety lesson that culminated with shooting a few magazines of both guns. Afterwards, I gently insisted that we pick up the empty brass shell casings via the headlights which arthur complied. I got a good hoot out of him dismissing my suggestion that people use "Brass catchers" (a small mesh bag to catch empty shells, for recycling and not leaving evidence of your fun). "Those are totally gangster. That's like something out of Die Hard". I don't know what the hell that was supposed to mean because this guys entire collection of guns are like right out of Die Hard. One of the things I don't like about guns is finding used shells and wanting to pick them up but then thinking i might be putting my prints on something I shouldn't be. I guess that mind set is from growing up in the city.

Denver - I drove from Hite to Denver in one day. There was a confirmed Tornado touched down just as I was leaving near Bullfrog. This was just after I saw my second full double rainbow of my trip (Salida CO was the first). I stayed with Robin from my high school in Boston. It was good to see her. We looked around Denver and it is definitely on the short list of places that I could see my self relocating, short or long term. I really liked her neighborhood and the rents were like 450 a month for a 1br, with parking and a fitness room in the basement. What a deal!

FT Collins - so now I am in Ft Collins CO with Stephanie, Clarisse's doula from Brooklyn who relocated with her family out here (Greeley, to be exact) about a year ago. I met a cool girl last night at a birthday party that Steph threw for her husband.

Today we went out and drove around downtown Ft Collins. Its nice, reminds me of a toned down version of the idealic town setting that Pasadena was designed from scratch to be.

We are hopefully going to go out tonight and maybe I'll get to see the girl I met last night again.

Next up - Austin, Houston, New Orleans, Miami, the Keys, hang glide again in GA, NYC.

The only things that come to mind that I might want to do in addition to these items are take 1 day motorcycle class (just for the experience) and maybe go hunting in the south on my way north.
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LA

2010-10-08T16:30:00.001-04:00

So I was in LA for about a week. I got to see my two cousins from New Bedford and Wakefield Massachusetts for dinner. I had dinner with one of my moms closest friends and he husband in Pasadena (its lovely but I still want to rename it Phoney Town).

I stayed with Mike and Steve (twins, but separate houses) from the South End (Boston). We went to the same HS years apart from each other. I also got to hang with their other brother Paul a lot. He recently found himself hit with the "I'm pregnant" news but with a twist. He is paralyzed from about the chest down (can't feel his nipples) and wasn't expecting natural insemination to actually occur. That said, his lady is 3 months now, moving in and he has tons of work to do on his place. I helped for two days (11hrs the 1st, and 14 the 2nd which was also LA's hottest day on record, ever!). We cleaned up his drive way, yard work, planted a tree, threw out about 3 cubic yards of stuff and set aside another half dumpster full of stuff for a "yard sale". We organized all of his files from his accident (motorcycle), medical records, mortgage info, you name it! Then there was the pile of unopened mail that had been building up since March LOL.
I'm glad we got what we could get done out of the way. I just hope his lady notices it and appreciates it before she arrives with all her stuff.

Paul and I hung out a lot outside of the project I helped him on. He showed me around from his handicap accessible van and we always got the best spot in the lot :) I learned a lot about what a disabled person goes through every day.

I also went with Steven to an exhibit/memorial that he helps set up every Sunday on the Santa Monica beach. Its called "Arlington West" and there are crosses representing the lives lost in Afghanistan and Iraq, civilian and soldiers. It was interesting seeing the tourists and locals alike trying to make sense of the memorial. In addition, there were a lot of post battle, rehab and injury photos that were just gruesome and not like what you see on TV at all.

Coincidentally there was also a charity dog walk that day at the beach. Max and I stumbled into a 500+ dog event. We passed on the dog walk and the dog yoga session, but we did get to pay close attention to the doggy CPR session which we will hopefully never need to use. Anyway, we got to say hi to about 300 different dogs in the course of about 2 hours, so and we got along with all but maybe two!

I had two confrontations in LA that were very surprising...
I was at Steve's place leaving with Max when we came out and Peanut the crazy dog from next door when wild on Max. I got Max backed away when I noticed a fat big turd on Steves welcome mat. I said out loud, "Oh, Peanut, you think shitting on the welcome mat is going to get rid of us?" We walked away and when I got to the door from the courtyard to the street, a voice behind me was calling at me "Hey, buddy". I turn around and the other neighbor, not a dog owner, gets in my face saying "aren't you going top pick the shit up or are you just going to leave it there." I just turned and walked away. I'm not getting into a "Its not my dog's shit" argument with a stranger!

Next: I was staying at Mike's and he was coming to pick me up to go hiking (in a park that a movie editor died in a few days later in due to heat exhaustion). When he got there the parking lot was full so he pulled in at an angle behind my car. A older chubby guy came out and said something to him (please move your car, I found out later) and Mike started to put his dogs in the car so he could move it. Suddenly the man jumps in his car, throws it into reverse and repeatedly hits a fence trying to un wedge himself from the hastily taken angle in the packed driveway. It was just at this point that I even realized they were in an argument...

It was on Mikes mind the entire time we were hiking and I kept telling him to blow it off.

Then two days later I come out to go to my car in the morning and the same guy is at his car removing tool boxes and buckets from his car. I wait for him to get away from the rear of his car and I back up leaving at least a foot between me and his tool buckets (yeah, I though about it before hand and used my mirrors to execute). The guy comes running from around the front of his car towards my car at the rear of his, wielding a broom stick which suddenly is repeatedly stuck on my windshield! Like five times! I jumped out and starting screaming at the guy "what the F do you think you are doing". His reply is " you are about to hit my tools". What kind of tools can't take a 2000 lb car? Dork. He just wanted to attack someone and as I pulled out I let him know "Hey dipshit, I just want to let you know, you picked the wrong MF to F with today"

Flashback: Three days earlier the kid who lives downstairs from Mike, also named Mike, came up to ask me to use my cell phone. Seems that he had misplaced his and needed to make some calls. Come to find out he grew up in this complex of two houses and his parents still own the whole place. They let him live there for free I think. Well, cutting to the chase, his car is also messed up and his is flooring it up the hill at night and then rolling it back down to get it started every morning. He called his mom and asked her to pick him up from the garage that he needed to drop off his car at... No answer, no message left and so ten minutes after he leaves I have a Type A litigator calling me back wanting to know who I am and why I have her number,etc. By the end of the conversation we are fast friends and she is recommending me places to eat and see. So there is the gem: I know the owner of this property, she likes me, she is a lawyer and you don't have a lease (and you started crap w my friend who is a tenant two days ago too).

So I gave her an innocent call about 20 minutes after I left the house, 930am Sunday LOL.
She was actually working in the office, if you can believe that, and was pissed to hear about what happened. She took my info and 20 minutes later I was BCC'd on the badest ass legal threat letter I have ever read. I will share it with you individually if you are interested. Bottom line, get that man out of here ASAP or everyone vacate within a week. Let's just say, I'm sure we won't be hearing from that cat again. Silenced!

So what the hell do I attract these confrontations or is something else?

This article doesn't come to mind but maybe it should: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/07/opinion/07Wideman.html?th&emc=th
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Made it to Mexico!

2010-10-08T16:09:00.000-04:00

(One week ago Friday)
So I woke up today in La Jolla California. I drove more of the coast and then went to see Dan (a guy from couchsurfing that lives in San Diego). I'm going to stay with him for about two nights.

So my impressions of San Diego so far: Its much more of a military and border town than I thought. It seems to have a lot less of the laid back California vibe that I have come to expect as I worked my way down the coast.

I decided to be prudent and park at Dan's to take the San Diego trolley system to San Ysidro (a part of San Diego that is the US side of the border). The train let's you off and everyone goes charging up a concrete ramp bridge that winds over all of the car traffic. Its been stormy all day and the rain really began to come down when I cross the border. It was like a sign saying leave or be prepared to stay a while. Well I didn't even stay long enough to get a photo of myself. It was due to a lack of people in Tiajuana that looked like I wanted to hand them my camera (or blackberry in this case). Even in the rain it was a bit of a zoo. Hole in the wall pharmacies, taxi drivers barking "Taxi" and lots of street food that I want going to eat. That was about it so I turned around, walked over two more bridges and was suddenly in line for the US. There were only 15 people in front of me so it took about 5 minutes. I was surprised. Then again all I have is a licence, a passport, 50 bucks, a map, keys to Dan's and my phone all packed into my cargo shorts.

So I'm kind of on schedule (Oct 31 return to NYC)! This doesn't mean that I'm not nervous about wasting too much time along the way back.
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Crazy Signs

2010-09-22T12:42:00.000-04:00

Photos of signs that stuck out to a guy from the East Coast.

Today

2010-09-18T23:29:00.001-04:00

Ha! Finally a daily post...

I'm in... Los Angeles. I'd need to look up what area to be exact. Beverly Hills is what google maps says LOL! I laugh because I can't believe it (that's the feeling I get when I show up anywhere whose name I recognize).

I'm going to stay tonight w Steven, son of a family friend that's so close she is basically an aunt which makes her three sons like cousins of mine. They all also grew up in the south end, so I'm just thrilled to have familiar folks to hang with (and stay with, can't emphasize that enough!) especially in a big city. Let me also not forget that I have two blood cousins here too, one that can't host (he's an RA on a campus) and the other, well I'm not sure, but he is farther down near san diego.

So I'm in the area for a while. I want to be done and heading east by Oct 1st at the latest and I just might meet that goal.

Max got to visit the Westminster Dog Park in Santa Monica! It was fun. We even met a woman who was walking her dog there that was living in a cave on the beach with her daughter until she could find a job. You'd never had know it either LOL. Who am I to speak, I look homeless right now with my dirty jeans, sandy crocs and I last showered in San Fran on Sunday night. so I kind of stand out here in Beverly Hills and yeah, I'm so glad that I'm going to get a shower tonight. Its like the new "getting laid" LOL.

Mason
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Big Sur to Lompoc

2010-09-18T16:01:00.001-04:00

LOMPOC- sounds like a military acronym but it actually a native american named town just outside of a military/NASA base. They shot rockets off two night ago and have another launch that I will miss in three days.

So I stayed at Holiday Inn last night! "AT" not "IN", LOL. And apparently my appearance at the front desk this morning wasn't well presented because when I asked to use the bathroom I was shot down with a skeptical "Are you a guest here?!?". So I had to cross the street to Starbucks instead.

Big Sur was really nice. Desolate, very undeveloped for a vacation spot and nice beaches that all have a unique feature (this one has a freshwater waterfall into the ocean, this one has Jade deposits loose in the sand, etc.). The people, locals and tourists alike, were all friendly (oh, my!).

Max's tooth is healing fine. He ran around yesterday on the beach for most of the day. Sand Dollar Beach was a winner.

So I'm driving south, staying on the coast road ("1" which merges into and away from the more major "101" every 60 miles or so. "1" is a hell of a road. I counted 15 turns in 1 minute a few days ago and aside from a few 10 mile stretches of straight road one or twice a day, its rollarcoaster the whole way (with steep drop offs to keep you awake). The fog is another thing. Its either thick, thin or looming nearby. The whole way from Canada.

So I'm trying to get to Malibu today. I just got delayed by 5 hours to have my brake calipers replaced. Milea will be owing me money from the work they did or didn't do before I left NYC and I have the old parts in the car for ammo.
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I'm in Big Sur

2010-09-17T00:10:00.001-04:00

So I'm not going to make excuses for not blogging for a while.

I'm in Big Sur staying on the side of the road next to a fancy bakery and restaurant that didn't get $25 from me for dinner (cheapest entree). Dai, the attendant at the gas station gave me permission. Its funny how I have a 100% success rate at getting permission from gas station employees after I cozy up to them. In Dai's case, I asked him is he was Buddhist (he has beaded necklace and his name is Dai) and he was impressed that I could call him out like that. (Rewind to Val Mason and the look on his face when I asked him what part of Virginia his family was from...) People are funny when you surprise them with what you know, where you have been or what you can tell about them from subtle clues. It can be hard for me not to take it personally, like "oh, you think someone like ME wouldn't know a thing about that, eh?"

We started today in Ocean Grove just south of Monterey. We stayed in a residential neighborhood on a third tier little path. I found a box truck parked there so I just pulled head in as to kiss the truck. Got my blinds set up, magnetic sunroof screen installed and then realized that there was a dog in the yard that knew Max and I were in the car.

I skipped the Monterey Aquarium. Their main exhibit is closed and they still want $30.

While we are on the topic of skipping stuff because they are blatantly over charging: Pebble Beach. Its a peninsula that they have convinced everyone is private property and you are either an owner, an invited visitor or a person like me that they want to charge $9.50 a car to drive through their town. Telluride (Mountain Village), Aspen, Jackson Hole, or East Hampton... None have descended to this bullsh*t and I hope they never do.

Carmel by the Sea however was great. The main beach is all off leach all the time. Amazing view but it still has a little off the snob oozing over from Pebble Beach, which is half of the two peninsulas that make the cove that is Carmel. Very nice area. I wish I knew how to make a living there.

I met numerous nice people in Carmel at the beach that wanted to talk. It was great.

This is in opposition to an experience that I had recently with a man and his wife (its really his wife) at a sunset overlook on the pacific in Marin Cty. She thanked me from her window for "Being such a good dog owner" for picking up Max's poop in front of her. Fine. A little condescending but fine. Then I said I was from NYC and I was used to having to pick it up so it was 2nd nature and not a problem to me. We got into the basic, "Oh, you drove from NY" talk, which was interrupted by the dreaded "But how are YOU paying for this?" (which can feel like a double standard question depending on who it is coming from and how it is said.)

I explained and she took off on "I know you... You are a liberal from New York and belong to a city union and are taking advantage of that to go on a long trip".

I set her straight that I didn't live in distressed neighborhoods while I had good jobs for nothing. This is my payoff.

Next: Obama...
My response "He's OK, and you have to remember what he was handed to begin to measure him."
She came back with: "Do you believe in or follow Black Liberation Theology"
At first I though, "WTF is that?!? And who the hell do you think you are talking to?!?." Then I realized that it tied into her quickly mentioning Rev. Wright. At this point, I was ready to explode; Laughter, Disgust and Offended. In hindsight I should had said "Hey, you are white. Doesn't that make you a Klan Member? What White Power gang are you guys affiliated with? How many crosses did YOU GUYS burn last year?"

This story, I realize, is in direct opposition to the cool feeling I get when I deal with folks like Dai, here at the gas station. I read him but didn't go negative on him and we shared a brief but common moment of coolness along the lines of "Hey, someone from very far away recognizes things about me that are important positive identifiers of me as an individual."

I have someone that just parked next to me that I'm going to go check out (they are lingering way too long). I'll try to blog tomorrow and fill in the last missing month.
See the map below for my progress up until a few days ago.

Mason
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San Juan Islands, WA to San Francisco, CA

2010-09-13T22:14:00.000-04:00

View San Juan to San Fran (x2) in a larger map

Portland and back to the coast

2010-08-20T23:24:00.001-04:00

So I'm back in Cannon Beach for the second time. I took a four night trip to Portland on Monday and now its Friday and I'm back in Cannon Beach. It was a sunny day and I'm waiting for the sun the finish setting before I go find some seafood and a free wifi connection.

We've been at the beach for 7 hours now and its been cold the whole time. I have a long sleeve thermal, a sweatshirt and a gore tex shell on and long johns and jeans on the bottom... And I'm still cold.

The beach here has a great little feature called Haystack Rock. Its worth looking up.

Portland was great. It was like Boston, more laid back because it is west coast, and I didn't find any of the tense busy bodies I met in Seattle. I stayed with Bryan from Couchsurfing and he was a great host. He had a total of 7 other couch surfers during the time I was there. 2 girls from North Dakota, 3 college students (one from Newton MA), and 2 hitch hiking girls.

The two hitch hiking girls are worth mentioning... They were unemployed, both done with school, one was a fire dancer (flaming hoola hoop style), and they said they were hitching down to Florida and the Gulf to document the oil spill.

I drove around Portland, sat around in Pioneer square for lunch, tried to go sailing twice (no wind), went to Mt. Tabor and the dog park there, visited a few other small parks and walked around town with Bryan and two of the other surfers he had.

So I'm back on the road.
My next stops are as follows:
Continuing on the coats highway as much as possible through Oregon and Cali.
Redwoods Nat. Park
Eureka
San Fran
Yosemite
LA
San Diego
Movaje Nat Preserve
Death Valley
Las Vegas
Grand Canyon S. Rim
Austin Tx
Houston
New Orleans
Miami
Lookout Mt. Georgia (hang gliding)
Hunting in Virginia or N. Carolina
DC to say hi to Family and friends
New York (hopefully in time for the Halloween Parade)

I have a map to show this. Comments and suggestions are welcome :)

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Verizon has me covered

2010-08-20T23:05:00.001-04:00

So I've been w them for a month and aside from not being able to get me data coverage in Canada, Verizon's coverage has done shame to ATT's. And Verizon's customer service has been A+ so far. My battery died during a call with them and they tried me back 45 minutes later to continue the call. Wow!

So let's just hope I get coverage when I get back in my apt in NYC, LOL

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

My 1st Casino

2010-08-14T23:44:00.000-04:00

So I left Eugene in Seattle this morning and drove on I-5 for about an hour south (interstate=painful). Then after cutting through Olympia, WA via the streets, I broke off onto local roads and out to the coast. I hit the coast at Aberdeen. I could have thought I was on a Cape Cod beach or on the Hamptons. It was straight, light gray sand and had all the looking of a great east coast beach. It was a little hazy when I hit the beach and within a half a mile of walking the haze had turned to fog and suddenly you couldn't even see where the water was.

So I headed back to the car and kept driving south. The area, although ocean front is surprisingly poor looking. Like the area missed the whole last two real estate booms entirely. Not too many places to car sleep that I felt comfortable with so I kept driving knowing something would come... Zoom out the map of the GPS and what's that yellow area coming up? Another reservation. And that just might mean a Casino! Its saturday too, so this might just be a hoot.

The security guard working the parking lot just informed me to speak to Sharon about overnight parking. Let's see how this goes :)

Mason
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

San Juan Island

2010-08-13T21:20:00.001-04:00

So after getting back from Canada (Sidney to Annacortes Ferry) I spent a night in Bellingham Washington again and then took the ferry to San Juan Island. The island is the largest of the San Juan archipelago and is located in the waters north west of Seattle. Its like Seattle's version of Martha's Vinyard and Nantucket, etc... There are many different islands out here and you need to take a washington state ferry or a float plane to get to them. The ferry is actually a labeled part of the Washington Highway system.

I had the opportunity to do a bunch of cool things... I saw a great sunset everyday and one of them even included breaching orca whales just off the coast. I got to hang out with JQ and we went meteor shower watching two nights and saw amazing shooting stars. Some of their tails took up half the sky (45 degrees long). One we saw over the horizon clearly broke up into like 10 fireballs as it dropped from the sky.

I went to a great spot called false bay. The slope of the sand is so shallow that when low tide pulls out, all of the water empties from the entire bay. Add to it that the evaporating water on the drying sand turns into fog and you have one wild sight!

I got to see the marine labs that U. Washington has at Friday Harbor. And I had two home cooked meals by JQ.

I found 72 hour parking spots that were for locals that walk to the ferry terminal. It was great for repeat overnight stays and I didn't have to mix it up at all. So three nights in the same car sleeping spot might be a record for this trip.

Max is doing well. You can definitely see that he is maturing and always listens to commands and knows when its time to play and when its not... When we were in line for the ferry I was able to walk around with him to go to a piss spot, tell him to pee and then got him to drink on command when we got back to the car. He's great!
He also has learned to appreciate swimming lately and will swim after sticks and balls I throw in the water for him. He picked this up first in Magneson Park, Seattle.

Speaking of Seattle, I am on my way there for a night before I continue south. I'll be staying with Tim's girlfriend's brother, Eugene :) Thanks Regina!

Mason

PS. My short list of places to live so far:
Vancouver
Bellingham Washington
Salt Lake City, UT
Moab, UT

I'm going to go back and look at the ones that "towns you should enjoy living in" list.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Colorado to the San Juan Islands

2010-08-13T01:20:00.000-04:00

This map is huge. Click through for the detailed map.

View Breck to San Juan in a larger map

Garmin Tom Tom and Magellan (the worst thing to ever happen to exclusive resort towns)

2010-08-12T17:25:00.001-04:00

So you live in a wealthy exclusive resort like town... Martha's Vinyard, East Hampton, Aspen, or my recent visits to Tofino and San Juan Island come to mind. You think you are secluded by some ferry or a long dirt road or some other mental barrier that are going to keep the riff-raff out.

But then comes the GPS and every jackass (I'm one of them) with 4 wheels (or 2 for you cyclist) comes along seeming to know where they are going, not asking for directions and making no apologies for enjoying what you consider "My road" and "My town". Well the GPS has arrived and so have the rest of us exploring your little part of the planet.

And Ooops! Did you happen to negotiate the privatization of your little part of road that was built with public dollars? Well chances are that it is still on the public base maps and showing on my screen... When my lady friend says "Take next right on 'Road'", I never know where we will end up. And even worse: Sorry, this road is too narrow to turn around on and I'll just have to keep driving through! LOL

Actually, I'm pulled over at the end of your driveway right now typing this blog post. I can't apologize for enjoying my freedoms as much as you might like to enjoy yours. And please don't elevate your freedoms above mine because you spend more to enjoy it.

Nice house btw!

See you on the road :)
Mason

PS I'm in the San Juan Islands, staying in Friday Harbor, and hanging w childhood friend, JQ.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Tofino

2010-08-07T16:28:00.001-04:00

So its a nice day in Tofino when then clouds thin enough that you wish you had a hat to shade the glare. I haven't worn my sunglasses since I got here and haze, fog and this mornings rain mist we par for the course for a Tofino August.

Coming from the East Coast, this is weather is unacceptable for a place that bills itself as a vacation resort spot, especially in a peak month... But the place is packed and I have had to strategically place myself at the two resorts I've been sleep parking in to avoid taking someone's precious last parking spot. The Cox Bay Resort and the Long Beach Lodge are excellent establishments. I hear that Long Beach is actually 5 star.

I got a nice 3 hour surf lesson. Stood up on my 2nd wave, LOL
I'm going to go on a second one right now.

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Lewiston, Washington to Tofino BC

2010-08-06T15:29:00.001-04:00

So I left Lewiston the day of my last post and drove through South East Washington State entirely on backroads. It was cool to see Idaho's wilderness hit the rivers then the landscape turned into a desert that was well irrigated but it was clearly a desert. This is where Washington States famed apples, pears and cherrys come from.

I booked a night at Walmart (in my head) and got there at about 10pm. What a long day of driving. When i posted my last blog post, i was at a McDonald's in Lewiston and spent some time looking for someone to stay with on couchsurfing.org along my way to Mt. Rainier and Seattle. I got a reply while i was on the road that day and when i got to Walmart, I had a chance to speak with Raina who was inviting me to stay at her (grandmothers) place for the night. It happened to be back in Ellenville, WA which i had just passed 30 minutes ago.... This is one of those moments in the trip that really feels like a "Choose your own adventure" novel that i used to read as a kid: Do you A) Turn around for the bed, shower and company or B) push on forward, save on gas and stay in your favorite retail parking lot for the night.

Well option A is obviously was more appealing when you haven't hung out with anyone really since Andy outside of Glacier NP. So I hauled back over two mountains and in 30 minutes was following Raina and her friend Savannah from the Circle K station to her grandmothers house. We hung out in her kitchen for a while when i heard a noise down the dark hallway and turned to see that I was alone at the table and Raina and Savannah were already running out the backdoor. Oh crap! So i ran too. From the backyard we could see a light turn on, then a ghostly face appear in the window. "Don't move! Don't move! She wont see you if you don't move." says Raina. I'm thinking WTF is going on here, i could be playing with the demo video game consoles in Walmart right now.

So grandma retreats and goes back to bed after closing the door and locking us all out. Raina has a second way in so it was an inconsequential lock-out but it still was a little too much adrenaline past midnight for a guy who had been driving for most of the day.

I had a room to myself and a bed. Wow! Although at this point I've gotten so used to my sleeping bag that I use it whenever I'm in someones house too.

The next morning we had fresh eggs and sausage with Grandma. She couldn't understand who i was and why i was there... It was uncomfortable but totally not threatening.

After breakfast I was going to be taking off to Mt. Rainier and then to Seattle in another day. I invited Raina and/or Savannah to join me for a day trip out to Mt. Rainier and possibly an over night and I'd drive them back the next evening. Raina said yes and so we headed off together into the mountains.

Mt. Rainier has a main north-south road and a main East-West road that follows the southern end of the park. We were traveling North on the N-S road and missed the E-W road. Subsequently we only found 2 nice views of Mt. Rainier one of which was on a really long side road to the Sunrise Lodge.

The sun was setting up at Sunrise and we needed to get our butts to a place to camp. I wasn't leaving time for tent setup etc. since its been so long since I have needed to really set up camp. Sleeping in the car is so easy and comfy at this point I laugh at the idea of going out of my way to set up a tent.

Once out of the park we took the first right off the main road and started looking out for a place to camp. 5 minutes turned to 10, then it was 30. We were high up above parking lots on a dirt road that I had a hunch had something to do with a ski lift (why such huge empty parking lots in the middle of the woods???). A few minutes later, we pulled up to the top lift house for a simple bench style lift that was off for the summer and could bring you up from a bottom that we could not see from where we were at the top. We didn't realize it but we had stumbled upon into Crystal Mountain Ski resort and were on the slope that has all the private cottages and homes on it. It seems to be a ghost town except for one pickup truck in a drive way. Raina and I foolishly snooped around killing our little precious light that was left. It was a cool little vertical village of huts, chalets and modern mountain homes.

Its getting dark and we have to get out of here so we headed down a steep steep dirt road that seemed to go back to where the chair lift reaches the bottom... Once we get down we cross a small bridge, turn a corner and almost run smack into a huge bulldozer that takes up the entire road (trees to trees). Oh, crap. We have to turn around and somehow get back up that impossible hill. We only have like 25% of the light left, its quickly disappearing and the slope of this hill is sick. Raina gets out, I back up all the way to the bulldozer and floor it trying to get enough speed to carry me up the hill. I can't get up the hill. I spin out a few times and have to back down it and on the third try, the spinning wheels start to turn the car diagonally on the narrow dirt strip and I almost loose the car to the hill. Ok, time for plan B... We go back over to the houses and look for any sign of life. The only vehicle, the red pickup, seems to be parked at a house with no lights on. We knock on the door a few times and after two minutes a man pops into the hallway with just underwear on. Thank god I had a woman with me. It also didn't hurt that Raina is white and from Washington. But all that wasn't necessary because the guy who answered the door was a great guy who would have helped anyone. Ross is a master carpenter and gets paid for about 6 weeks a year to hang out and do projects at this mountain retreat home that has remained unused by the rich family that owns it for the LAST FIVE YEARS. WTF! What a waste of a home and and and... don't get me started. Actually don't get Raina started... She was a tree sitter for six months in California protecting old growth stands from loggers.

Anyway, Ross makes super quick work of getting me that last 20 feet up this crazy hill. Between meeting Ross, finding the huge discarded chain that we used to tow the car sitting 10 feet from where I was stuck, to getting invited to stay in the chalet for the night, this was a crazy lucky day! (No, not THAT lucky LOL)

The next day we woke up took a short hike to a waterfall, took amazing showers in a great shower that Ross had finished two years ago but only he had tried and we made a nice breakfast. Back on the road, the right road to descend the hill, we continued our adventure...

The ironic part is that we were as far as we could be from the parts of the park that we really should be checking out. So back through the park we drove, this day it was much clearer that it was the day before and Mt. Rainier was out on full display (not totally common).

We made all the stops and took a few quick walks into the park. When we exited we went to get gas and this Asian man with a deep accent refused to let me take a look at a map after I bought $25 in gas from him. " I sell map only" he said. I gave him a piece of my mind that concluded, "I hope he comes to NYC and get's lost in the subway and runs into me asking for directions." Prick.

We drove from Rainier, to Tacoma (just outside of Seattle), and then back East to Cle Elum, where Raina has a small farm plot and a few trailers that her and some friends live in. The next morning, I went to Leavenworth a Danish themed town up in the mountains that was a tourist trap surrounded by amazing hikes. I had just gotten in touch with my mom's friend in Seattle, Alan, who was inviting me to stay at his place. I continued to drive as the prospects of a place to stay for more than a day was too appealing.

I got into Seattle and it was nice and sunny. We went straight to Alan's house, met his wife Carol and got a lay of the land. We found a really nice dog park at Magneson Park that was over 9 acres. Max loved it. It had a sailing center very close by and I rented a laser and used my wetsuit to stay warm. I got to meet up for dinner with my Aunt that I haven't seen in years. I also got to meet up with a childhood friend from Boston, Jaquan. We haven't seen each other since high school although we sailed and worked at the same place for years. It was really great to catch up. He is living in the San Juan Islands in Washington part time doing bio-research so I am going to go visit him out there on my way back south.

I went to the flagship REI store. Mecca at last, right??? Well check this out: Went in to pick up a backpack that I ordered while I was in Bozeman MT. The funny thing is that while I was leaving Crystal Mountain, I found an empty backpack in the woods. 80 Litre backpack (same size as what I had ordered) with just a wrist watch in it. Weird. I brought the bag into REI and wanted to weigh it down to compare it to the one I had ordered. The woman working in bags were hesitant to help and had this attitude of "Hey, I'm not available". I felt like saying "Hey, I'm looking for a backpack not for what's in your pants" So then they ask me "Why would you want 44lbs in your pack?" in a condescending and almost suspicious manner (Like I'm going to respond "That's what my mom told me to carry" or "That's what my bundle of illegal good weights") Anyway, so now I have a full backpack and am walking around with 44lbs that feels more like 35lbs., great!

I need food so I go up to the cafe. Gyoza dumplings is what I order, pay for and them and am told I have to wait 10 minutes. So I ask if I can have a couple fortune cookies to munch on while I wait. I'm given one and ask for a second and am told, "No, one cookie pear person"! So I'm getting pissed....

After I eat standing up (pack feels great), I go down to the famed Garage Sale. At this REI, the garage sale is continuous. As soon as they get a return it pretty much makes its way to the basement and any REI member get pick it up at a huge discount. I get downstairs and it is all picked over and over priced crap. No gems at all. I'm standing next to a guy looking through bins and say "Damn this is all picked over crap and expensive at that. For instance, how much is that bag your holding" This cat jumps backwards, clenching the bag, and screams "Hey man, that's not how this works! You cant shop for something that is still in my hands" I say: "Dude, take it easy, I just asked you how much is was." He follows with "Hey, around here that's not the way we do things." That was it for me. I let it loose and basically tried to verbally knock the man into submission. Let's just say it started with " Does your wife know how much of a total f-cking as-hole she is married to?".

So I moved on and went up to cancel my backpack purchase at customer service. Customer service cuts me off mid sentence and says "Oh, all that stuff is at equipment rental/pick up downstairs next to the garage sale" I just came from there and begrudgingly go back, passing the klepto-maniac prick on the stairs (without the precious bag he found on sale), and after 10 minutes at equipment rental, I am told I need to pick it up upstairs at customer service. I was so ready to explode but didn't know at who... The REI gods?
Canceled the backpack and ran for my dear life before anything else went wrong.

I left Seattle and went north to Bellingham WA. It was a great little town and had sailing, hang gliding, cool people, a university and tons of outdoor stuff all around. It's also half way between Vancouver and Seattle. I also met a disproportionate amount of African Americans in this town. Like almost 15 individuals. That's like the same amount in one day as I met in Seattle in 5 or in Vancouver over the course of 4 days.

I crossed the border in about 3 minutes only stumbling on "How long do you plan on staying in Canada?" I said one or two weeks and was asked: "Well which one is it, One or Two weeks?" I clarified 5-7 days and was in.

Vancouver was nice. It was like New York, much better natural views, most people were very laid back and sunny. I rented a Laser and went sailing at the Jericho Sailing Center. This is by far the best for-profit dingy sailing center I've been to. It was really nice and made me like Vancouver a lot. I happened to be in town on a really busy long weekend. Monday was B.C. day, Saturday was the last show of a multi-week fireworks festival (my favorite) and Sunday was the Gay Pride Parade. So I went to it all. The parade was awesome. It was super multi cultural, at least half of the crowd were straight people just out supporting the parade. Lots of straight and immigrant families were out just to check it out. Then there was an outdoor music festival at the end of the Parade at Sunset Beach.

Vancouver is known for its liberal laws towards drugs. They have heroin injection sites where a licenced nurse will shoot up customers and lounges with pool tables and vaporizers for marijuana smokers (no not at the same place silly). They also have a lot of prostitution but I'm not sure how legal or illegal it is. None of this seems to phase anyone and its all just a matter of fact in town. The word I kept hearing people use was that "We are a tolerant society". Interesting.

So I took a ferry from Horseshoe Bay to Nanaimo BC and drove to Tofino. This is the farthest North and the Farthest West I'm going to be going on this trip. I've reached Canada, the Pacific and my turn around point. The weather here sucks and they call it "Summer". I haven't seen more than a mile in two days and was told that the day before I arrived the sun was out for 3 hours and that was amazing. 3 hours??? I'm going to take care of business here and get to a place with actual desirable weather. Its the surf capital of Canada and not the sun capital.
I'm taking surfing lessons today for the first time ever! 53 degree water. 57 degree air. LOL

Wish me luck,
Mason

PS. My tab so far...

16,000 miles, 23 States, 2 countries, 1 flat tire
1NY
2NJ
3DE
4PA
5MD
6DC
7VA
8NC
9TN
10GA
11AL
12MS
13AK
14OK
15TX
16NM
17AZ
18UT
19CO
20WY
21MT
22ID
23WA
BC Canada

In Washington (State)

2010-07-19T14:15:00.001-04:00

So I'm in Lewiston, Idaho or Clarkston, Washington depending on what side of the convergence of the Snake or Clearwater Rivers you are on.

In the last few days Ieft Glacier Park, drive to Kalispell MT, south to Missoula on 93 (around Flathead Lake and through the Flathead Indian Reservation) then a little south of Missoula, in Lolo, I picked up US 12 and drove along the clearwater river for a hundred or so miles all the way across Idaho, into the Pacific Time Zone. I camped at Hungry Horse (in the woods with Andy from Virginia) Walmart Kalispell, Elk Summit Campground (in the Clearwater/Nez Pierce NF), then in Walmart again last night....

In defense: Walmart is free, safe (safer than a lot of other options I've looked at or used), usually bug free and well lighted. I was able to do 2 quick car projects last night at 10pm and all the happened was a cruiser pulled by slowly and then took his break while watching me reassemble my car's door (I almost fixed the window scraping/clicking problem)! Most on that and my trip to the junk yard later...

Anyway, I'm in Washington. I got teary just thinking about seeing the Pacific. I'm planning on going to see: Hansford Reach (Columbia River), Mt Rainier, hopefully Mt St Helens, Olympic NP, ad North Cascades NP. I hope to be able to couchsurf in Seattle then go over the border to Canada!

Where should I hit the Pacific? I was thinking Neah Bay given its symbolic position in the US.

Anyone know anyone that knows Washington State well. I want to make sure I'm not missing anything...

Worst Haircut Ever and 31 MPG

2010-07-15T15:25:00.000-04:00

So the title says it all...

Her name was Donna and she was a really nice woman except that she messed up. So much so that the haircut was free... So I'm 2 for 3: My head feels like I just got a haircut, I didn't have to pay for it. The only complain is I look like a weirdo. Well and then there was the fact that all conversation with her kept coming back to how she had lots of friends from all different backgrounds and was a really open minded person. This must have come up 8 times (on her own accord). Then when the haircut was ruined she tells me that when she worked in Louisiana, she would always send the Black people to the black hairdresser in the shop, not be cause she is a racist, but because she knew they would get what they wanted from someone who knew their hair. I guess I'm too light skinned for this woman, cause she dove right in, head first, no helmet or hesitation.

Ok, so ut was my fault for going to get a haircut at Walmart. The thing is that I didn't go there... I woke up there LOL. So it was a no brainer since I've been on the lookout for the last 3 days.

Anyway, she didn't even let me tip her. It took her an hour and fifteen minutes.

I just filled up on gas in Ovando, Montana on my way to Glacier NP via Kalispell, MT.

Look it up on a map.

Ill fill you in about the last few days when I stop next...

Salt Lake City Update

2010-07-05T16:56:00.000-04:00

The 4th of July is my favorite holiday. Its always warm, there are no implied family obligations, always has fireworks and you get to sit around and eat flame cooked meat outside. Its all about us being equal and proud Americans. Having just easily quadrupled my exposed to our country over the last four months, I can say I am certainly one proud American.

A few things that I haven't mentioned:
I don't think I want to live in NYC for more than another few months when I get back.
I wish I had another 2-3 months tacked onto the end of my trip. I want to see New Orleans, Miami, Florida Keys and more of Canada than I have allotted for. I wonder if my subletor would agree to this. If I plan it right, I can be in warm places for Nov and December.
I have a great business idea.
I wish I had 4x4 and higher clearance on my car. It seems like 50% of the land in the US is only accessible by dirt roads some of which would love to devour my little car.

Now down to business... I have 10 months left on an ATT contract which comes with tons of roll over minutes. I have three days to decide what to do with it. Its going to cost me $105 to get out of it. I've already tried a hail Mary attempt at forcing them to let me out and it didn't work. All I have left is that I'm pretty sure they couldn't produce my signature on a document since I signed up with Cingular (which then merged with ATT). BUT someone can rescue me if they want to change plans, I can give you ATT at their old prices, and with rollover minutes and a much shorted contract than they'd require otherwise. A Blackberry Bold could be worked into the deal too.

I am posting this entry and created the map below by tethering my blackberry with my laptop so my blackberry is like a wireless modem working over Verizon's mobile network. Now let's see how it works in the woods!

I'm going to go cruise Salt Lake City for the afternoon and stop in and say hello to the Amy, who hosted the BBQ and fireworks viewing that Kyle (couchsurfing) invited me to.

I need to find a few things in Salt Lake today. A) the cheapest place to live B) the place I'd go sailing C) a non-Mormon girl, LOL

Enjoy the Map:
Breckenridge to Salt Lake City

View Breckenridge, CO to Salt Lake City, UT in a larger map

Got to Salt Lake City

2010-07-04T12:40:00.001-04:00

So I just drove for 3 hours this morning after waking up at 7am parked in front of the Little America truck stop/restaurant/hotel thing. It was a scene. Humvee's and camouflage painted porta-potties on flatbeds, moving vans and a pickup truck towing a small plane all surrounded me. I slept fine.

Now I'm back in Utah and it feels great. I really like this state. If it wasn't for fear of the Mormons, this place would have been overrun with rich urbanites a long time ago (cough, cough, Colorado). I haven't met enough of them to judge, but the state is "Beautiful around every turn" (my new tag line for Utah. I'm retiring "Like Mars, but with some paved roads".)

Wyoming (I-80 corridor) on the other hand is 400 miles of kind of green grass, some bushes, lots of signs for Little America's 50 cent ice cream cones (that don't mention the fckin machine is broken), at least one of every type of mining and drilling I've seen so far, and a nice spattering of wind farms along the way (6 or so). This is all interrupted for about 3 minutes when you hit the northern tip of the Flaming Gorge at Green River, Wy. You get so see one cliff that is "flaming" and on a overcast day near sundown with my sunglasses on, it looked like it was a big airbrushed mural of flames (a mile wide of course). This is just a reminder that I need to not be cynical about "oh I've seen enough of X thing" I can pass this one. I suspect that if I had detoured and let my self get to Salt Lake a little later today, I would have seen one more of the great things hidden in the US. Instead I'm sitting in a car, watching Kyle's inter racial lesbian neighbors make out in their driveway, while wondering what time he might be showing up from his camping trip last night. I could have seen the gorge!

So I got to watch a nice little sting today on some prick going at least 85. It seems like once you get out to 75mph country, most people go between 65 and 77mph. The 5-7 over the limit rule doesn't seem to be used out here, which is fine with me, because I'd rather be going 57-65mph. Anyway, a guy flew by me at like 85. 3 minutes later a cop goes by at over 100mph easily. Scared the crap out of me. We are in open country and just getting to the top of a hill so the rest I got to see at a distance. He eventually gets up to the white car going 85+ and stay behind him for like 3 seconds before the lights come on. As I get to this I hit a workzone-speed reduced to 55 sign and then 50 feet before I get to the cop and the target car, there is a 35mph-Double Fines in Work zone sign. Holly crap that sucks. He's going to get basically a double fine for 50mph over the limit. Anyway, I will not say anything judgmental about this guys ride or the dumb sticker he has on his car or the fact that he's actually a she. In the next 100 miles I didn't get passed by that car, which I hope goes to prove my point that in the long run, doing the limit CAN be faster than speeding, LOL.

Anyway, I'm going to take a nap. Which is like rolling from the drivers seat to the passenger seat, so easy, I love it :)

Breckenridge, Boulder, Denver and now... Little America, Wyoming

2010-07-03T23:23:00.001-04:00

So I stayed in Breckenridge for two nights with Dara. He owns a Vegetable Grease recycling company and I got to stay in a bunk room he has above the garage/plant. He converts diesel vehicles to run on recycled waste grease. I met him through his business partner, Dan, at the rafting company I stayed at in Moab, Utah. Thanks guys!

While Max was in Breckenridge he got into a quick fight with a big dog (The swiss mountain rescue breed). Max got bit once and has a straw size hole that he is tending to. After 4 days, it still looks like its healing on its own.

The I went to Boulder and stayed with one of my Mom's former students (soon to be assistant principal at a school in Colorado) and her husband
(a sheriff's dept park ranger at a reservoir near Boulder and a ski patrol guy by winter). They have a dog too and Max and her we're tense but fine. I bought a new phone while In Boulder. I'm going to try Verizon for a few weeks and then drop ATT if all goes well. Its a Blackberry Curve 2. It doesn't have a trackball to get clogged with sand so hopefully that will be an improvement.

While in Boulder Max decided to chase a deer while on a hike and only got 5 steps into his charge when he either pulled a muscle in his back leg or stubbed his thigh on a rock. He made it back to the car but then limped for two days. Half an Advil later and he was walking within 6 hours.

Today I left Boulder with a walking and wound licking Max and drove through Denver. I stopped at the biggest REI I have been to and then didn't open until 10 but I decided to roll by to orient myself before finding breakfast while I waited for the store to open. There were hundreds of people in the parking lot. What was going on? It was their semi-annual garage sale when they sell off all the stuff that has been returned. I got a bike computer that's missing a unnecessary small part, a pair of waterproof binoculars to replace the ones that were waterlogged when I wanted to push the canoe away from the shore with Lewis. I also got a small hammock to experiment with (most likely getting returned after I play with it a little). I also got a new floppy fisherman's hat to add to my silly hat collection. A mini bike pump... And I exchanges a sitting pad and a sleeping pad that both had holes in them as well as a stove that's igniter has become untrustworthy (but let me not make it seem like I think its igniting behind my back while I'm away from the car).

I drove through Denver. Industrial to downtown to trendy residential to lower income inner city residential and back to industrial. It was a 2 hour tour, but I liked what I saw. I like Colorado in general so to find a real city, sized slightly bigger than Boston, was a nice way to finish off Colorado.

So then I drove through Wyoming for the majority of the day on Interstate 80. It sucked trying to stay up between 65-75mph but the trucks coming up on you at 80mph kind of helped. I stopped in Cheyenne, Green River and have decided to call Little America "home" for the night. Its a one property town: gas station, full service truck stop, auto mechanic shop, motel with pool, RV park and one whole area in the back with homes for the staff. Ranjeet, my server at the restaurant, just informed me that "Yes, we DO have a post office". And it DOES have its own zip code, ehem!

I have about 130 miles left until Salt Lake City for tomorrow morning. I'm going to be meeting and staying with Kyle from couchsurfing. We've already spoken on the phone a few times, I have his fancy got-to-get-it-in-Boulder beer in my car and he doesn't have a dog. Max says "Thank God!".

Did I mention I saw a full arch, double rainbow in Salida that lasted for easily 25 minutes. I saw a pewny little attempt at a rainbow today and it made me laugh.

Its funny to me when people find the truckstop and Walmart sleeping fascinating... Anyone have any questions? I'm sure people would like to hear the answers.

Flagstaff to Torrey UT then Torrey to Breckenridge

2010-06-30T12:21:00.001-04:00

So I am in Breckenridge, CO now. Aspen was nice but it's really a playground for millionaires. Maybe I'll go back one day :)

Here is what I have done over the last 6 or 7 weeks. I had to separate it into two maps because google doesn't like maps with more than 25 waypoints.

I'm trying to get to Boulder, Denver and then Salt Lake City for the 4th of July.

View Flagstaff, AZ to Torrey, UT in a larger map

View Torrey UT to Brek in a larger map

Arkansas River Whitewater by Moonlight

2010-06-27T06:25:00.000-04:00

So today after buying two new tires, I walked around Salida and enjoyed a Saturday afternoon of talking to random interesting folks (and there are a lot of them here). This brought me down to the river kayaking course that runs right through town and has a pedestrian path that follows it.

Here I met Tanya (40's) who was playing with her dog and her neighbors dog. Her neighbor, Kay, was kayaking the rapids and practicing righting the boat from a full flip. They invited me over afterwards for a drink and that when things got interesting...

Kay has a friend that was putting together a big float down the river by moon light party... Kay didn't want to stay up all night and suggested I go in her place. So Tanya's boyfriend, Mark, runs next door and gets me a wetsuit and a PFD. Tanya lends me her croakies and shows me on my gps where the bonfire pre-party is.

I arrived at a green house with stone chimney, as described, and roll up to the group of folks having a bonfire in the back yard. I'm wearing a wetsuit and carrying a helmet and everyone at the fire is wearing preppy casual wear. Yeah, I was at the wrong party at the wrong green house with a stone chimney... But some folks at this party know of the actual party I'm supposed to be going to and point me in the right direction.

Long story short: I went with Jon and Akaska down the Arkansas river flowing at 1800 cubic feet per minute (think one basketball of water is one cubic foot). We put in at Fishermans Bridge (Deb's house) and pulled out at (damn I forget the name, but it was like 11 miles or so). Its called Brown's Canyon. It included at least 10 class 3+ rapids and it was all done by moonlight on a cloudless night. Totally awesome!

We met up with a few other rafts of rafting guides and had a fire on a remote beach mid paddle. Then a few of them decided to jump into the river from a 15 foot cliff. Its 50 degrees tonight, and the water is no more then 60.

Best of all: I didn't have to paddle and Max got to sit this one out.

I have no idea what I'm doing tomorrow but it better include sleeping in. Its 4am now and I've been up since 7am.

All the best,
Mason

And then I got a flat...

2010-06-26T10:17:00.000-04:00

So think of the worst places I could have had a flat tire... It could have been on Monarch Pass yesterday, 11,312 feet up in the Rockies with no cell service. Even better, it could have been on a dirt road above the pass...

Well I pulled into Salida, Colorado (elev 7500 ft) yesterday wondering where I was going to sleep and the first thing I passed was... Walmart LOL.

It was twilight, so I did a quick loop through town and came back to Walmart. I got a bigger cooler and was organizing the car when some kid came up and pointed out that I had zero air in my front driver tire. Weird, but whatever! I'm in a town, with cell service, parked in a 24hr stores lot, with AAA on the phone and 3 tire shops to pick from in town.

Wow, I dodged a bullet!

So I'm within a day of Brekenridge, or Aspen, whichever I decide to do first.

Funny story: I chatted with a medical marijuana "patient" yesterday who was buying a jumbo Visene in Walmart. She was wearing a T-shirt from one of the 3 dispensiaries in town. I asked her if she was an employee or just a fan and she whipped back, "I'm a patient!" without even a crack of a smile. Whatever, a year ago you were a criminal and now you are a patient and a righteous one at that. Who the hell drives a car with a "I'm a pot patient" T-shirt on. What a dork... Then again, who puts a Budweiser vanity plate on the front of their car.

I'm going to go wait for AAA...
Can someone explain why I only blog in Walmart bathrooms? Its soooo consistent but unintentional.

Done w Utah :)

2010-06-25T10:33:00.001-04:00

So I need to go back and fill in some blanks... But everything is going well. I spent 5 days in Moab Utah, 4x4 capital of the US and where all the colorado rafting trip companies are based out of. I did a day float with just me and Max down the Colorado, visited Arches NP, and Canyonlands NP (Needles and Islands in the Sky sections). I took a jeep tour up Schaefer Road (finally I found a road my car wouldn't have handled).

I really lucked out too. I met John, owner of Navtech, a rafting company, and he let me park in the back of his shop for four nights. Funny thing was that there were 4 staff people of his also crashing in the backyard, so that was cool.

I tried the slickrock bike trail. I got 1/2 way through the practice loop and called it a day. There was a young family of adventure seekers with their two <10 year olds that hit the trail around the same time. As the trail was kicking my butt (there are things to make you fall every 10 feet), these kids rode on with dads "Yeah, Cody!!!" attitude in tow. I felt like a dweeb, until I heard the screaming (Cody's), and am so glad I stopped riding before I ended up hanging with Cody in the Emergency Room. Sorry your injury vindicated my suspicions, I hope the wrist heals up soon ;)

Yesterday, I drove South from Moab on 191 to 46 East, to 90 east through towns like Nuclia and Naturita, then I went sort of backwards to see Ouray, and Silverton which I missed on my last time passing through Telluride. The drive was crazy, really crazy! Look up the Million Dollar Highway in Colorado. It was the kind of road that 4 cars could disappear over a cliff and no one would even know.

I then double backed up to Montrose where I called it a day at Walmart for the first time in weeks.

Today I'm going to Black Canyon of the Gunnison NP and then I want to see Aspen, Breckenridge, Denver and Boulder before swinging back over to Salt Lake City for the 4th of July and then pushing north through Iowa to get up to Yosemite and Canada.

Max is doing well. I have a lot of car updates to share when I get around to it.

Albert Pike Rec Area

2010-06-13T02:01:00.000-04:00

That's where I stayed when I was in Arkansas with Randy and Floyd on my trek from GA to AZ. I haven't seen photos or much info yet, but I do know there were deaths.

Back on land

2010-06-10T12:11:00.001-04:00

So we had a nice overnight trip around the lake. Camped in what we think was Ice Cream Cone Canyon.

I'm off to have my serpentine belt replaced and deal with some house keeping before I leave Page for good. Its been 100 degrees here for the last 4 days and I've had enough :)

I wonder what the weather is like in Telluride right now.

Mason

Going on a canoe trip on Lake Powell today...

2010-06-09T09:51:00.000-04:00

I met Lewis: from NJ, also unemployed, also sleeping in car. We have very similar setups and laughed when we found each other parked next to one another on lone rock beach just outside of Page, AZ. Small car, Thule box, no bike and no dog.

We are on the boat ramp packing a canoe we rented for at least a one day camping trip around the lake. Lewis kayaks so that's a good thing. Paddling is the sign of a bad sailor, but I'll make do :)

Thanks to everyone for their well wishes and comments on the blog :)

Mason

My Trip Part 2

2010-06-07T20:10:00.001-04:00

Val Mason, Grand Canyon Park Ranger

2010-06-04T12:02:00.000-04:00

A park ranger named Val Mason just had the nerve to ask me "how'd you get such an anglo name as a Latino"? At the main gate upon showing my ID and calling out that I was a fellow Mason and met his wife yesterday at the same gate.

Some nerve coming from a guy who's name has "such a feminine" sound to it! LOL

I should have said that my name was Albierto at birth, but I changed it when I realized that I was going to be running into Fcks like him.

Utah is grand

2010-06-02T13:09:00.000-04:00

So after 3 days staying at Monument Valley (2 there and one day trip to Blue Canyon and Coal Miners Canyon) I have continued through Utah. I spent one night on BLM land, One night at Natural Bridges National Monument and two nights in Hite UT. All nights included meeting interesting fellow travelers.

Hite is the farthest inhabited point north in Glen Canyon/Lake Powell. Its basically a huge boat launch, a water plant, a ranger station and there a a few "housekeeping" trailers that rent for way too much a week. So its basically a Park Service town, all the residents are either employees of NPS, Aramark or a spouse. And there is nothing around for 70 miles or so.

The first day at Hite, I got really lucky. I hit it off with two rangers, that happened to be married and this quickly turned into an invitation for a boat ride, swimming and fishing on the lake afterwork, 2 BBQ's, a shower, laundry time and and and... a couch to sleep on! It was awesome. I even got to hold an M-16 LOL

I stayed the second night in Hite camped near some MIT students that were out doing "technical" climbing in the canyons around.

Fry Canyon, RT 95 in Utah is amazing! The word of the day for days now has been simply "WOW!".

Stopped in a place called Valley of the Gods. Look it up on google for photos. The whole place is like a different world altogether.

So I keep meeting cool and interesting people and they love to hear about the other people I have met so far.

So I'm off to continue the southern Utah part of the trip with a stop at the north rim of Grand Canyon. BTW, if u are willing to travel in a similar manner as me, Utah is soooo cheap. There is practically nowhere to spend your money anyway!

I do want to build a small sleeping platform for inside the car so all the sleeping surface is level. Then I can also put a few large drawers under the platform. I also sent my mom a 2nd box of "don't need this in the car" items, which includes Max's first deer antler we found just north of Flagstaff.

I'm back in traveling mode. Over the whole Vanessa abrupt departure thing. Ready to see the rest of the country. Its funny to me that there will still be some places in the US I still won't have been to when I get back east. I've seen so much already :)

Another thing... Its so easy to see how the Mormons just stopped dead in there tracks when they got out this way. The scenery is biblical (in beauty and proportions).

Monument Valley

2010-05-27T12:45:00.000-04:00

So after the epic Telluride to Albuquerque to Gallup to Pinion trip, I finished off the day with a 30 mile dirt road trip that took me past the Black Mesa Coal Mine (very controversial place on reservation, look it up on Wikipedia) and then to Monument Valley where I have been "camped" for the last 2 nights.

Monument Valley is a beautiful spot. Its much more photogenic than it really is hospitable to people. There is a top notch Navajo trading post, which is the first one I have seen of this caliber. Attached is a hotel and an overpriced restaurant with a great view. Meanwhile over here at the campground its just a big dusty parking lot for RV's with a few ledges below for a tent or two. After driving around all over the place on the reservation, I have finally intersected with the Euro-tourists. 90+ % are living out one of two fantasies: A) drive around America in an US sized RV (not that Westfalia crap they have at home) or B) rent a Harley, form a bike gang and do the West. These bike gangs even have their home country flags flying on the antennae of the two tail riders. Its funny as hell seeing german tourists trying to look like the Hells Angel's and their wives done up like biker chicks.

Navajo public radio: Local news in Navajo, BBC Worldwide for international and NPR for national news at the top of the hour and half hour. The rest of the time is filled with Navajo chants and straight up white country music hits. The chants are cool though.

So its Memorial Day weekend and I seem to be the only one aware of it. The Europeans have no idea what I'm talking about and the retiree set can't seem to agree on when it falls. Either way, I recognize this might be the first weekend of headaches as I continue to check out the sights in Northern AZ and Southern UT. I'm going to try to go check out an unmapped canyon called Blue Canyon today.

Max is well and I could use a shower, but aside from that everything is going well.

Let's get this out of the way...

2010-05-27T12:22:00.000-04:00

So after running from the sand storm up to Telluride, CO (miss spell checked in an early post as: "Tailored"), Vanessa got a call from her college saying they had a room for her for the summer session which was already a week in progress. Although she wasn't officially registered for classes the cue she was getting was to get her butt down to Albuquerque, NM ASAP (this is where she goes to school). I had not been to Albuquerque yet and was ready to drive back to the desert area of the 4 corners, but Tailored to Albuquerque and back to Pinion (on the Navajo Reservation) to get the few boxes I left at Vanessa's mom's hogan was a lot to suddenly realize you are about to drive. But I did it anyway.

IMG00227-20100523-0826.jpg

2010-05-23T11:26:00.000-04:00

Tailored....

2010-05-23T10:19:00.000-04:00

So we've been moving. Friday afternoon the winds in AZ were 30-40 steady and the Navajo Reservation (where Canyon De Chelly is) was in the process of being consumed by a dust storm. Being the lightest and most agile camper in the campground meant that we were packed in 10 minutes, taking refuge in the car and on the phone with Tim in NY looking for options.
We high tailed it North East through the night to Mesa Verde National Park, arriving about midnight. Vanessa got to try my in car sleeping quarters during the ride ("Uhhhh, Max is sitting on my face again!") LOL

We got to two overlooks before the wind and dust made the view almost completely obscured. I went back to the campground, got our money back ("I have asthma and can't do this air" worked!) and we headed for the mountains. About 30 minutes north of Cortez CO we hit the real forest. The ooohs and ahh's started up and I realized that Vanessa has never been on the real woods, seen a stand of trees over 20ft tall or played with snow. Well it was all there at once for her to see. We pulled over a lot. We we're aiming the GPS at Aspen, and I knew we'd find somewhere before then... Suddenly we are passing Telluride. Hey, I know that name... Fancy ski resort right? YUP! We did a nice real estate shopping drive through of the mansion district (mountain village) and then went down to the historic part of town. Hey, wouldn't you know it, its the total off season here (between Skiing and the summer festival seasons), feels like a ghost town and the town park has a campground, half empty right in the middle of town on the river. We have a tent site 20 feet from a raging river, snowy peak views on three sides and a 5 minute walk into the main town. Wonderful!

The air is clear, sun is shining and it couldn't have gotten lower than 45 last night. We went to a local bar last night for dinner. We are going to take a day off here and see when the dust settles in UT and AZ so we can continue our tour of the four corners.

2010-05-23T09:54:00.001-04:00

Canyon De Chelly

2010-05-21T12:42:00.000-04:00

So I'm sitting at the base of a Canyon Chelly next to a river about 300 feet from ancient cliff dwellings watching my new traveling companion exploring the river bed. I have a small clay block drying next to me that I fashioned out of clay I found on the trail down.

Having a good time!

We are going to Window Rock (the Navajo Capital) and then to Monument Valley. Its great getting to see all these Native American sites with an actual Native American. Vanessa's grandmother is also a medicine woman so she knows a lot about the stories and cultural stuff that is in the background of these places. But she's never explored any of them so that's great too for both of us. Its called adventure and we are on one together now!

Update... (AZ still)

2010-05-20T08:41:00.000-04:00

So I spent 5 days in Sedona which were great!

Then I spent like 6 days In Flagstaff couchsurfing with Dan(imal). Great guy with a great couch and great fun. We went out to parties with his friends and I got to rest too. I got a bit of a cold while I was there. I think it was allergies and/or something to do with altitude (7000+ ft) but I'm feeling better now. My PC's hard drive crashed, but was replaced by Dan's friend Jesse at a great price (yes, I lost some data, no, I don't care much). And Flagstaff is a really cool town. Finally, Arizona! I was starting to think god spent 100% of her time making the beautiful parts of the state and subsequently forgot to add a good amount of nice people.

So while I was in Flagstaff, I met a lot of people. One of them is named Vanessa. She is Navajo and lives on the reservation with her family. She is on summer break from college in Albuquerque (I spelled that right on the 1st try!!). And.... we hit it off and agreed to make it Vanessa, Max and Mason's Great Adventure of the next week or two. We are going to do the four corners area stuff together (Chelly, monument valley, page (antelope canyon), glen canyon (day off), Vermillion cliffs, North Rim, South Rim. Look at them in that order, they make a nice loop.

So yesterday I went to the painted desert and the petrified forest with Max. It was cool. He got to chase a crazy fast lizard and took a picture perfect piss on a statue of a dinosaur. Stay tuned for the photo in my next slide show.

I spent last night here in the picture you see and today I am driving up to the reservation (just outside Pinon, AZ) to meet Vanessa's family and pick her up. It should be quite interesting :))

Mason

PS. I had another great camping party with Toadie at the south gate to the petrified forest. 60 years old, loves country/western and has the coolest TAB trailer. Look it up. We were like two people from different planets that wanted to trade shoes permanently. It was wonderful.

PSS My mom's B-day is on the 22nd. Happy Birthday Mom!

In Flagstaff

2010-05-13T02:38:00.001-04:00

So I'm in flagstaff staying with Dan, who I met on couchsurfing.com. He's super cool and I'm so lucky to have him for a 1st CS experience. If everyone is this cool on CS, I've totally been missing out on the first parts of my trip.

We went out last night and made some friends. The were in town for one night and on a road trip too. The coolest part is that they were two female trail maintainers that work for the park service. If that's the type that Flagstaff attracts, I might really (and I mean it) like this town.

We are at a Toots and the Maytails concert right now. See photo.

I don't know how to encapsulate my time in Sedona. Its an amazing place. Videos are to come :)

I'm going to spend one or two more days here, then get back on the road to see Grand Canyon, Antelope Canyon, Bryce and Zion. That's going to take me 10ish days, but I'm not sure. I took much more time than I planed in Sedona and it was well worth it.

Have a good night :)
Mason

My route so far...

2010-05-06T22:23:00.000-04:00

Here is an accurate map of my route so far. It has tons of waypoints so be patient in letting it load. If you load it in google maps (blue link at bottom of map) you will be able to see it full screen and zoom, click on "More" and choose the "wikipedia" or "photos" overlay layer to see what the different places look like.

Enjoy! Doing this map was almost harder than driving it, LOL

View Actual Route as of 5-5-10 in a larger map

I'm heading to Sedona tomorrow with close to zero plan aside from how to get there... Should be fun!

Home Search

2010-05-06T17:47:00.001-04:00

So I've been staying with my Aunt in Glendale, AZ, Phoenix's neighbor to the north. Its 96 degrees again today and I'd really like to get the hell out of here (strictly because of the heat). It was 117 inside the car when I went out to drive yesterday. That's with tinted windows and custom fit silver sunshades on the windshield and both driver side and passenger side windows (unique? Yes! I made them myself.). So its hot, but it is going to get worse and I got here before it did and and and... I really had fun on my crazy drive from Georgia. It was like a mission. And so long as I did my 6-8 hours a day, I was going to get here in time (as my friend whose place I stayed in was going out of town and I wanted to arrive before they split).

Anyway, I'm supposed to be researching where I am going next. I'm afraid of leaving here with 5 days of info and then not getting to a good Internet connection for 10 days. It wasn't that big of a deal in the past, but I have a feeling that the next part of my trip if going to be a pendulum between two extremes; total solitude in harsh environments and a total zoo of tourist at convenience stops and particular sites. And I don't trust a lot of the info they are going on. A lot of them have their kids, their RV/trailer and their extra 50lb. gut in tow, so I don't see our comfort zones lining up exactly.

Instead of researching, I got distracted with an interesting biz idea: "Where you should live" calculator. So I looked it up and took someone else's quiz...

http://www.findyourspot.com/survey/Results.asp?ID=879194B8B5944B2732A1392D4DBC0D75

Here are my results, I'm glad that most of the places are still on the road ahead :)

Olympia, Washington

Chattanooga, Tennessee (Already been, hot women and hang gliding, CHECK)

Eugene, Oregon

Tacoma, Washington

Greenville, South Carolina

Corvallis, Oregon

Kent, Washngton

Johnson City-Kingsport, Tennessee

Asheville, North Carolina (Already been, Beautiful and if I was a lesbian my trip would have ended here)

Fayetteville, Arkansas

Bloomington, Indiana

Bellingham, Washington

Seattle, Washington

Roanoke, Virginia

Charelston, West Virginia

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania

Salisbury, Maryland

Salem, Oregon

Clarksville, Tennessee

Frederick, Maryland

Medina, Washington (Hey I could be Bill Gates' topiarist!)

Knoxville, Tennessee

Santa Cruz, California

Tulsa, Oklahoma

So I'm going to link these all to their respective wikipedia pages (any volunteers?) and then we can really hash it out about who knows what about which city is where I should live when I'm don't with the trip (Yo, I gottem' all it! (5 W's))

Have a great, cooler day than I am having :)

Mason

Phoenix Tour

2010-05-06T02:53:00.000-04:00

Took a nice long drive through Phoenix today for the sake of looking around.
Here is a map, clich through to the google maps site if you really want to look at it closely:

View 5-5-10 Route through Phoenix Area in a larger map

Quick checkup

2010-05-04T14:29:00.002-04:00

So I started the trip at 165lbs. I'm down to 154lbs.
So as a friend said, maybe you should all be switching to the campfire Indian cuisine diet and try not to miss a burger for lunch. But no other indulgences are allowed and no eating after the sun is going to set.

Don't be afraid to squirrel away your desert and save it for breakfast the next day.

Just an idea :)

Equip Report

2010-05-04T04:15:00.000-04:00

A quick report on gear:
You know and I know my FlipHD camera has been great to have. My Olypus camera took the photos in the slide show below.
Having two tents has not been a burden. Its a nice change of pace to have one for backpacking and another for car camping. I used the heavy one in Georgia for like 9 days straight. I left it open and was under some trees (to reduce UV exposure).

I have upgraded tent stakes to MSR metal triangular types. They are red and much lighter and better than the ones the tent came with.

My neo air is like the gift that keeps on giving. Thank god that when the first one got a hole, I was 1 day away from a visit to REI (free switchout, no questions asked). So now my $150 air mattress has only cost me $75 since I got two for the price of one (and they held it for me until I needed it enroute).

My REI sleeping bag has been great and my coolmax bug resistant liner has been a great security blanket everyday, a nice sheet on warm nights with my clothes on and a life saver on those frigid nights below 40.

My Asolo boots are holding up fine so far.

I love my crocs. They deserve their own post. So lightweight, so comfy and great to drive in. My feet look forward to them after a long days hike. And the bright red color that I'm sporting are so easy to find in the dark, impossible to forget at camp, and simply say "I don't care what you think I look like" from the get go.

While we are on that note. I don't care... I have decided, it's simply this: "I didn't get up and get dressed for YOU today. It's not my prob, it's yours" :) This is how I deal with all the weird looks I get and cold shoulders I run into along the way. And I have had my fair share, thanks.

The plastic bins are working out great. Tough, and easy enough to handle. I can also fit 2 perfectly in the car go box above, so it's great that my cabin and roof storage are semi compatible.

I have too many stuff sacks and organizational doodads. I keep them because I keep telling myself they will be needed when I decide to get REALLY organized. It's always next time...

GPS is holding together. It is not accurate with US Forest Roads (it knows some of them, it doesn't know others, and it imagines some too). It also stinks in places like Phoenix because it is all based on many different moments in time that A) aren't now and B) aren't all the same. This makes for a GPS that knows roads that haven't been built yet, wants to avoid construction that is over with and wants to take you on the quickest way possible even though a new road has opened that goes straight where you want it to. Then when it comes to the directory, in rural places a lot of the stuff has closed, in new developments it has very little data yet and with therefore take you past 3 of what you are looking for on the way to the one it knows (Gee, thanks!). It also got me from Georgia to Arizona without ever going down the wrong road. Well there was some driver errors (my fault!), but nothing compared to the navigating errors I would have made trying to route my self all the way out to Phoenix.

Car is running great. I got my 2nd oil change when I got to Phoenix.

What other pieces of equipment would you like to have an update on?

While I'm typing I need to make a shout out to two fine gentlemen (Eric C. and Tim S.) at the Ace Hardware store today that helped me fabricate a screen for my sunroof (attaches with industrial strength velcro). I have my fingers crossed! I'll share photos and a review sometime soon. I should also include my custom driver/passenger window sunshades I made.

Slideshow of my Trip Pt1

2010-05-04T01:53:00.003-04:00

Many of the hang gliding photos were not taken by me (Thanks Bob!)
If you want to see the photo captions, scroll over the photo (once) and click on the little caption icon in the lower left corner.

New Videos

2010-05-04T00:17:00.000-04:00

I would strongly encourage you to watch these at Youtube instead of here since Blogger seems to be cutting off the rightmost part of the videos...

The trip west:

Max playing king of the picnic table at Cosmo Dog Park, Gilbert AZ:

My 9th Mountain Launch from Lookout Mountain:

My 2nd Aerotow at Lookout Mountain:

A bonus for Jon (go get a paper towel first, LOL):

Phoenix (well not yet really), ATT and Best Buy (Your Stuff Somewhere Else)

2010-05-03T14:43:00.000-04:00

So its come to my attention that I've not really been to Phoenix yet.
I've been in Scottsdale (sometimes referred to as Snobsdale). I've been to Gilbert and Mesa to run errands.

And my impression is that these places seem to be filled with nothing but new stuff. Its like nothing is older than 10 years and they are still building.

There are walmarts etc right across the street from (signed and sidewalked) square mile blocks of hay fields. "Hey, we'll just grow hay to pay our taxes until we can develop this whole square mile at once." It makes sense, but its funny to see.

We went to a dog park from heaven. Cosmo Dog Park.

And we took everything out of the car, re-inventoried everything, cleaned, and repacked. And I reorganized how the car is set up, so hopefully my storage bins will be easier to get at.

Not sure where I'm going next exactly. Probably north to Flagstaff, Sedona and then the Grand Canyon/Four Corners area.

I visited Best Buy and ATT. They are both on my Sh*t list. ATT's coverage sucks, and they gave me a new sim card, like that's going to help. Best Buy continues to amaze me. They install car alarms that they don't have the programming tool to fully activate the alarms features. So you can by $500 alarm and they will install it so it has the same features working as a $300 alarm. The customer service manager, is trying to tell me that this is because it came with "basic installation" included. BUT if they don't have the tool, how does it matter what I paid for? They couldn't do the job right even if I paid for "Luxury Installation" (which they don't offer any way) because they don't have the right too.
I have been to or called 20 Best Buy stores before I left Georgia. Every time it was the same line: "We don't have that tool because we are required to buy our own tools and I'm not responsible for buying that". So Best Buy makes their guys the scapegoat on the East Coast. Once I got here to Phoenix, it was "Oh, ours got stolen by a former employee" and "We have it, but our software is old so it won't work on a brand new alarm like yours". My favorite was a Best Buy employee that was sympathetic and so he turned me onto a friend of his that left Best Buy and now does installs on his own (Gee, could that be the guy who took the tool from the other store?)
Anyway, I refuse to pay to buy the tool myself or to have it programmed correctly.

All I want to do is to set the temperature parameters for the Smart Start feature. This will then allow the car to start, cool itself to a temp I choose, then turn off and repeat the cycle until I tell it to stop. This is a definite requirement for me to leave max unattended in the car in the desert for a few hours. I could just keep the car running (it will idle for more than 7 hours on a full tank), but that's why I bought the damn expensive alarm in the first place.

So, Best Buy and ATT. You suck. And I will tell everyone as I promised you on the phone when you blew me off.

2010-04-29T19:59:00.001-04:00

It was 47 when I woke up, 36 during the sleet storm in the mountains and now 73 here in phoenix. I have arrived safely. Seeing Georgia, Alabama, Mississipi, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico and now Arizona, in a week, all driving done during daylight, and staying at public campgrounds at night was a good idea. Didn't have any problems.

This has turned into my cars "Great Test Across America"
Max's : "Birds Across America"
And the tick population's "Max's Great Buffet Across America"
They should have all started blogs.

Scottsdale has palm trees planted in the medians all around town. Its so fake. I was really liking Arizona and warming up to the thought of Phoenix. Let's see how I feel about it later. After seeing the surrounding country, Albuquerque and Phoenix sound like appealing places to live.

I want to bury my head into a pillow right about now. You'll be hearing plenty from me over the next few days as I upload all the stuff I have so far and plan out the next parts of my trip.

New Mexico

2010-04-28T10:45:00.000-04:00

So I spent last night at Oasis State Park in New Mexico, just south of Clovis.

Its a nice park, nice facilities. Desert sand dune hiking trail and a nice little man made pond (more the size of a reflecting pool). The water is also surprisingly good tasting.

We have been "camping" in the car the whole way from Georgia. It really helps to not have to set up the tent and break it down in the AM (15min each way).
The park managers haven't minded either.
Each night has been costing me about 10 bucks. I'm sure I could sleep somewhere for free, but starting and ending the day in a wilderness area has been really cool and has helped make the trip west much more fun.

I haven't found my destination for the day yet, but I am going to be getting to Phoenix on Thursday. I am meeting my old friend from college Christina who has been living out here for at least 6 years. She is going to Maryland this weekend to visit family and has been gracious enough to let me stay at her place while she is gone. So I should be in Phoenix from Thursday until Tuesday. I plan on uploading a lot, planning out the southwest portion of our trip and getting some much needed rest. My body is tired from driving so much and my brain is tired from being on alert all the time.

On another note, Clarisse's baby is walking and talking so if you haven't spoken with her, you can talk to her and the baby now :)

Got to Red Rock Canyon State Park (Oklahoma)

2010-04-26T17:30:00.000-04:00

Its nice. The campsites aren't very secluded, but after driving past more farms than I've ever wanted to see today, its nice to be in a place with some interesting features.

I don't have a plan yet for tomorrow.

Sunday

2010-04-26T07:50:00.000-04:00

So I got to about 100 miles from the border of Oklahoma and Arkansas today. I went through Mississippi, Alabama and most of Arkansas.
Totally broke the 6am-12pm rule today. I started at 730, drove until 2pm took a 2hr nap and then drove until 8. It was light here until 830 at least!

Skipped Memphis when Dave S. summed it up with "Graceland and MLK's murder scene" ("Yeah, dude. You should go!" LOL)

I'm in the Ouachita National Forest at the Albert Pike Campground for the night. How on earth do you pronounce that?!?

I met two cool guys in their early sixties from Mississippi, Randy and Floyd. They are motorcycle camping on a three day trip. They are clearly old salts at traveling across America. We talked about everything from Vietnam, to the negative consequences of Reconstruction on Whites in the South to the fact that they (regrettably so) think Obama is a one termer.

They gave me my Oklahoma map and laid out a nice scenic route for me to continue west on tomorrow.

Randy is involved with the real blues down in Mississippi and has invited me to swing through on my way back. His website is www.highway61blues.com.

I'm being serenaded by owls, yelled at by crows (that sound like baboons, and stalked by a few raccoons right now as I stand outside my car typing this by headlamp.

I'm off to take a scenic route into Oklahoma today and my goal is to get to Red Rock Canyon State Park to stay for the night. Floyd and Randy suggested it :)
Now I just need to avoid OK City.

Alabama, Mississippi, and now Arkansas

2010-04-25T13:47:00.001-04:00

So I drove through Alabama (yesterday and this AM)

Street signs

2010-04-24T18:04:00.001-04:00

I've found some interesting signs I haven't seen along the way:

Runaway Truck Ramp 1/2 mile ahead

The rivers name and what watershed it belongs to (all of NC's waterways are labeled really well)

Water district ending and beginning signs

Popeye's BUFFET (WTF?)

And my favorite sign: 9 pickups and two cars at AutoZone. This means A) they will not have what I'm looking for B) I'm in the South now. LOL

Back on the road

2010-04-24T15:31:00.001-04:00

So after a nice sleep in the car last night and a hot shower with my rainfly to get all the pollen off, I have hit the road again.

I left Lookout Mountain this morning and am heading West. I just stopped at the Unclaimed Baggage Center in Scottsboro Alabama where I got a cool straw hat and a cooler for the car and am now going to drive to the Bankhead National Forest to stay for the night. Its saturday and hopefully there will be a few people around to hang out with, although it is raining and there have been severe storms (think tornadoes) throughout the south today.

Anyway, I have bypassed Atlanta and am pushing west to the four corners area at about a 300 mile max pace per day.

Course Correction...

2010-04-24T09:37:00.001-04:00

So its basically the last week in April. I need to get out west ASAP because of the heat in June and July. I might have already blown the perfect weather window, but I have to at least make up for it.

Seeing and enjoying the West is important to me because I haven't seen that type of terrain or experienced those sorts of climates before. Georgia on the other hand is surprisingly just like the states just north of it when it comes to terrain and forest types (from what I have seen so far).

Here it is:
Go to arizona ASAP (leaving GA this morning)
Spend 3-4 weeks in 4 corners states.
Drive north taking 2 weeks or so to get to British Columbia sometime in June.
Then take the west coast in over July and August (traveling southbound)
Then shoot back East with Texas and Louisiana as stops.

I've been mulling this over for the last few weeks, but haven't bothered to share it because I didn't know how long I'd be here at Lookout Mountain.

I'm going to straighten up the car and go to a breakfast buffet with my glider buddy, Bob, first.

3 things I learned in Georgia

2010-04-23T16:23:00.001-04:00

The back of a pickup truck is a bed. Don't call it a trunk!

When a pack of dogs come out and chase your car, just gun it. Don't stop or they will surround you for a half hour.

When you plant grass, cover it lightly with hay. It still let's the light through and keeps in the moisture from the morning dew.

Thanks Mike :)

1st Hang Gliding Mountain Videos (Georgia Mission Accomplished!)

2010-04-21T21:58:00.000-04:00

Hey, I flew off the mountain today!

Flight 1:

Flight 2:

Instructor Scott was great and got me off to two good launches and coached me to a much better 2nd landing. Thanks!

Some thoughts

2010-04-21T08:38:00.001-04:00

I haven't been blogging as much lately.
Why?
I haven't been traveling. I've been at Lookout Mountain Hanggliding School. (www.hangglide.com)

And as you know its usually easy for my to go on and on about where I've been and where I'm going. Well, let's just say I have a 1 ton critique on 2 hang gliding schools that I don't want to drop till I get out of here. The way I've been putting it to the other students (which a few seem to share my concerns), is that I don't want to torch the house while I'm still inside of it. Either way, there are some people here who have pissed me off beyond belief and shouldn't be working at a school.

Let me be clear, I'm safe... In the air and on the ground.

Its just that when you pay for first class instruction, you tend to expect first class treatment and accommodations. Being directed to an outhouse to take a leak when you are taking a class at a 3 building complex on a main road, while the staff gets to use a fully plumbed restroom, is like being sent to the "Colored" fountain. There are people here on the $1600 VIP package and being sent to a an F-ing outhouse.

You know this isn't masonspoliticallycorrectadventure right? Well, be advised ;)

My pilot light has been lit, LOL

Max says hi. He's cool and loves chasing me flying off the training hills.

On watch at the Lookout Mountain Landing Zone

2010-04-21T07:15:00.000-04:00

Here is Max this morning trying to decide how long the fog will be here. Once it is gone, I'm taking my first mountain flight :)
Stay Tuned :)

A lot to catch up on...

2010-04-14T21:25:00.001-04:00

I'm in Wildwood, GA at Lookout Mountain Flight Park.

I went to Raleigh, Durham, Acheampong and Blue Ridge Parkway in NC. Then camped on the AT for 2 nights and hung out with the thru hikers then drove one to Franklin, NC and I got a shower out of it! (Who Hoo!)

I also got a shower from John in Asheville. He was definitely the "Trail Magician of the Week" thanks for everything :) BTW, did I leave my shower kit around your place? I need it. LOL

I need to be at the training hill tomorrow at 745am, so gotta run.

Everything has been great for the last four days, so I hope it keeps up. Only bad news is that I sprained my middle finger and have it in a splint. I guess my new trail name might have become Middle Finger!

Mason

You know when you are lonely when... #1

2010-04-08T12:45:00.000-04:00

You walk for 10 minutes to go to the camps bathrooms and when you get there and realize that you have the place to yourself, you are upset because you won't be meeting anyone.

Well then I end up taking the other way back (all the NPS campgrounds I've been to so far are set up in some configuration of circles, looks and figure-eights). Mind you that it probably doesn't help that I'm walking by myself in silence with my headlamp off. And I come across a GMC delivery van with the parking lights on and the lights on inside seemingly unattended. I continue to pass as I strain my eyes to see and them am surprised by the sound of a single guitar cord being played at me as if to say " I am here..."

I say Hi and the voice in the shadows strikes up a tense but conversational tone. Come to find out he is a belgian green card holder who has moved from California to the Chapel Hill NC area and has basically run away (w permission) for the weekend to clear his head. It was good company and we talked for about an hour and a half (this seems to be peoples limit of me in spontaneous conversations).

All the while Max was back at camp, sleeping in the car and continued to do so until I woke up this morning. He really hates the dark or night time at camp. Doesn't matter where we are (VT to NC) and I wish I could figure it out and help him get past it. He will disappear about a 1/2 hour after dark to sit in front of the tent door or (in the case of last night) the car door. And he is determined to do everything outside of breaking a window or busting the tent wall to get in. Whining, digging for effect, and pouty faces. So I have tried giving him a headlamp before in VT and it worked. Actually almost too well, he chased shadows into the woods at one point. Anyway, we tried this again last night and he was unphased. I put his bed up on the picnic table and he laid on it for a while but still retreated to the door after some time. My only other idea is that it is temperature related but it seems like it doesn't matter what I put on him for clothes, he still wants to "go inside". Anyone want to speculate on what to do?

My overpriced and undersized scallop special plate is done and I need to catch a ferry back to the mainland of the USA. Then I think I'm going to Raleigh, but the place has been giving me bad vibes for the last few days so I'm still just 85% sure. Its mainly a function of not having a backup plan though LOL. I won't get off the ferry for a few hours so maybe something else will present itself. Either way, its probably going to be a Walmart night. I hope hope hope its a Super one that's open 24hrs :)

Mason

Thinking aloud...

2010-04-04T20:17:00.001-04:00

Max is a great conversation starter. He's been great at greeting people and then allowing me to get into convo mode. Unless they have a bigger dog that is, then all bets are probably off.

Tonight is resupply and crash at walmart night.
Tomorrow is last lesson in Kitty Hawk.
After that I'm going to drive south to oregon inlet and camp one night then drive the next day to frisco campground (rainbow gathering remember) and the next day take two ferries and drive to Raleigh and spend at least a day there (thanks jon for the hookup).
Then driving south to atlanta and lookout mountain for some heat and hang gliding.
Then to FL. Miami and the keys at least.

My car alarm isn't sensitive enough but its turned all the way up.

I'm standing in someone's driveway and need to make this quick.

I hate it when sunsets are cut short by mysterious clouds in the distance. I was really looking forward to a drop into the water tonight.

Max got me arrested today because he was barking too much in the car. The cop takes me from the sand dune he found me on. "Is your name Mason?"...
And takes me back to the car in his dune buggy at top speed. He says I can take Max up on the hill and stake his leash down (w the corks screw dog stake I brought). No ticket, cuffs, or penalty. Just a "Oh, that's it???" in my head. LOL

I let max out of the car and he explodes 10 seconds later w diahria. Getting arrested w no charges cost me a near heart attack, but not sleeping in a car that smells like cacca for the next 5 months??? PRICELESS

Thank you to the a-hole dime dropper who called the park patrol over! You saved my trip LOL

This blog post isn't really about anything. Sorry

My back is killing me from carrying the glider up the sand dunes. It sucks more than anything!!!

I got some great flights in today with really turbulent winds 15mph from the southwest. At an angle to the face of the dune so I had to run off diagonally down the slope. Landed on my feet 5 times, on my belly twice. My shoulder and lats are hurting from carrying the glider and nothing else. If I had spent the last 6 days playing basketball, you can be sure I'd be injured way worst than I am right now. No biggy.

I'm gonna jump off a monster sand dune for Easter :)

2010-04-04T11:50:00.000-04:00

Hey, I'm Grits Diner in Kill Devil Hills (that's really the name of the town).

Last night was uneventful. I drove around to the street ends that access the beach to see evidence of a party to crash, but all was quiet. The one guy I know in town that might have come out ended up choosing to stay at home and hung out with my blog instead. Then he calls me while I'm driving around by myself to talk about it...

I did some driving this morning on the west side of the main highway here (the Sound Side). It was much nicer. Trees, shade, houses with more than an 1/8 of an acre, and a constant bird orchestra. It reminded me a lot of the part of Oak Bluffs that my mom likes to stay in Martha's Vinyard. A real nice change of pace from the ocean side area.

A guy I met yesterday on the beach just 2 hours after my last blog post, is worth mentioning. He was practicing his extreme kite flying skills in preparation to move up to the large ones used for kite boarding. He like me fly his kite and it was wild! It was 3.3 sq. meters of sail and had three control cords connected through to a bar. I got the hang of it on the 3rd try and it was super responsive and my only complaint was my neck being sore after keeping the kite up for 7 minutes. I haven't looked straight up like that with out a break for that long since 9/11 LOL. So if I decide to pursue it as a hobby, the post car accident neck brace might be a good thing to have as equipment. He has a blog too. I haven't had a chance to look at it yet, but I will post the link right [here] after I do. Stay tuned and look backwards sometimes because I do update and add pictures to old posts when I can.

I should be doing trip planning but instead I'm messing around with videos LOL.

Enjoy!

This one is in HD automatically. Please let me know if it loads so slow that you want me to link them in low-quality leaving YOU with the option to watch them in full 720p HD at my youtube page when you want...

How could I say no???

2010-04-04T11:37:00.000-04:00

Hopefully before I get to Florida... I'll be sending you one of these :))

Today's my day off...

2010-04-03T16:08:00.000-04:00

Here is a pic of the beach up here in the Cape Hatteras National Seashore ;)

So I paid the 20 bucks because there was a guy with a wild tricked out van that he said he was taking with his wife, dog and two kids around the country. That being said, it was well worth it.

After hanging out for a few hours and learning a lot about how they are doing a totally connected, still running my business from the road, while raising my kids and managing one of their type I diabetes, trip. Wow, that's way more than I want to try and handle right now, but they were totally normal and seemed like they had it really figured out. They are also blogging and I'll be sharing you their link once it has its grand opening. They are webtrenurs and have a bunch of sites they operate about travel out west. Max got along with their dog really well and so it was a party.

I ate their leftovers. It included shrimp folks...

They let me record them giving me a half hour rundown of car camping and traveling out west with a dog. Priceless! If they are cool with it, I'll try to strip the audio from it and post it here.

We then got approached by our other neighbor who offered us a beer and when I graciously turned him down he asked if scotch would be better. I haven't had a drink since my birthday, so it went strait to my head LOL.

We all hung around. 3 guys from 2 or 3 hours away with their 4x4 Jeeps. 2 Parents/Business owners on the road. And then the guy who pulled up late with the camper and pickup also invited us over for some sausages he had going on the grill. He was a trip! He bought his pop up camper trailer used at 9pm the night before he came out here to the beach. He was from Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill NC and highly recommended considering moving there to live. I might put it on the itinerary but it would have to basically be my next stop, given where I am right now. Hopefully its on the way to lookout mountain :)
www.hanglide.com

So more on the pop up guy... I was so jealous, he had a gorgeous wife, who likes camping, who doesn't particularly want to have kids. And they met in church. Wow!

It was funny too because where he is from its so far inland from here that its about 20 degrees warmer. Its been mid sixties here most of the week and it was 80 in R-D-CH. So by the time he got here, and the fog had rolled in it was like 45 and 100% humidity and he was chillin (literally) in shorts and a T-shirt with two beach towels mummifying him into a soggy cold mess. I would have fallen over and died from hypothermia with my wearing long johns on the beach during the middle of the day self. (As I am on the beach wearing LJ's as we speak)

So this morning I had breakfast with my neighbors and got a tour of their van in the full daylight. They have done long road trips a bunch of times and they were impressed with my set up. I hope when they read this they can jot down some critique points on what I might want to work on (aside from throwing out half of my stuff, thanks, I already know that LOL).

We took a walk on the beach at the campground. Its basically the beginning of the end of the main outer bank. There were at least 25 pickup 4x4 trucks out tearing up the beach with our governments full endorsement. They even have signs and access roads built for them. And they aren't fishing, so they can't even claim to be a protected class of "sportsmen". It was so BS, and they were not staying stationary, just driving up and down the beach like it was a road. And half the occupants didn't look like they could have made the walk from the average beach parking lot to the average beach anyway. Its like a handicap access ramp for people too fat to want to be seen in a bathing suit so they tear up the sand with their truck tires instead. An Abomination in my book.

If a place is special, especially in a natural sense, then it should be enjoyed without engine noises.

And for the record, Skyline Drive was not ever present in the distance during my time in Shenondoah.

It gets better... So one prick drinking a beer with his 50's something friends from the back of his Cherokee suggests to me that I put Max on a leash (his E collar was turned on BTW) because "the beach patrol had just come by and they have a tight leash law here." This guy is driving his truck on the beach and has the audacity to be telling pedestrians (w two young kids in tow) to leash their dogs with a F'ing Bud Light in his hand. What do you say to that? I just kept walking w Max on voice.

So now I'm on the beach getting a sore shoulder from typing to you. Max is finally tired after chasing birds and playing with other dogs (Yay!) on the beach for the last 3 hours.

I might go venture down to another campground for tonight. Its Saturday :) Someone mentioned to me a campground south of here before the ferries that is like the Rainbow Gathering. With Max this tired, that might be perfect for another entertaining night.

Someone is tired...

2010-04-03T16:04:00.001-04:00

Got a licence to hang!

2010-04-02T20:53:00.001-04:00

So I got an 88 on the test (passed).

I'm taking tomorrow off. Its the first day off since last saturday (Sunday I drove, M-F was hang gliding).

I'm staying at the Oregon Inlet Campground on the Cape Hatteras National Seashore. Its about a 1/3rd full and there are no trees separating the sites so you can see people and their cars, tents etc.

So its pretty foggy and everything is going to get wet. Which brings me to "why am I sleeping in a tent tonight"?
A. Its going to be colder than the car
B. Its going to be loud because of the other campers and crashing of the waves.
C. All my stuff might be super moist in the AM and be annoying to dry out.
D. Max is going to rustle and bark more because we are in a tent w no windows and more sounds around us.
E. All this is costing me 20 bucks.

As I type this, the dog in the next site just started barking and now Max is growling.

The only positive that I can see is that I can stay until noon tomorrow before they hit me up for another 20 bucks. I've had like the same 80 dollars in my wallet for the last 2 weeks and it feels like crap handing it over LOL.

I'm going to experiment to see if I can attach a voice recording of max just growling a few seconds ago. It probably won't work, but please try to open it if you can. Thanks!

(As a pick up truck with a camper trailer is pulling in next to me, dammit!)

Quick Update

2010-04-02T09:30:00.001-04:00

So Kitty Hawk and the Outer Banks is going well. I'm not the biggest fan of the towns out here, but the weather has gotten good and the tourist are rolling in for easter weekend, college spring breaks and K-12 spring week off.

Max is doing well, his wound seems to be healing well. He's been running on the beach twice a day and chasing birds everywhere. Otherwise, I've gotten the car to stay below 65 degrees during the days when I've been in class. My only gripe is his tentancy to bark at potential threats while I'm sleeping, way too early. He's gonna blow our cover is what I'm thinking.

I have met a lot of people and had lots of 10 minute conversations. Of course I've only told some of them what I'm really up to. Usually I just say "Taking the week off and checking out [the area's name]."

Hang gliding has been a lot of fun. I'm going to take my last test today and hopefully get my Hang 1 certification. Then I'm going to get to fly more high perforance gliders off the much bigger dune (cliff) later today.
The school has been great and the trainers are all young guys and see me as a peer and not older than them. I also have been mistaken for 24ish by a few people, LOL

Accomodations: So the Hostel turned campground turned out to be not worth the time. Max was going to end up having Peacock for breakfast and I'd be in deep doo doo (see the reviews, LOL). So glad I checked the web after talking to the guy on the phone!

So the first night I got here it was windy and the sun was already setting. Walmart parking lot. The second night was a Nor-Easter. Walmart parking lot. The third night I wanted to tent it, but the national seashore campground doesn't open April 2nd (today, hmmmmm). So I gave the local hospital's visitor lot a try and it worked! Then I tried Travellodge's lot. Worked! Then last night it was Ramada. Not a prob! LOL So the bike and the plates make me fit right in at those sorts of places.

The showers have been a probem. The beach showers have just been turned on but they are colder than the ocean. The YMCA is a possibility but I havent gotten around to aksing them. The hang gliding school staff has been slow to pick up on the hints I've dropped. And then yesterday, my hangliding classmates (three High School girls pretending to be on a College style spring break, with one damn cool mom in tow) invited me by to thier hotel room to shower. It was great! And then we all took Max on the beach for a nice walk.

I have lots more good footage of hang gliding, max on the beach and a fab sunrise from yesterday to share as soon as I have some real computer time. I've been waking up with the sunrise, and going to sleep before 9:30 for days now. My air mattress has paid for itself now (in saved hotel rooms).

BTW, if any of the 20 of you wants to stop getting my email updates, please let me know asap so I can give the precious slot to someone else, LOL

In Kitty Hawk

2010-03-29T12:24:00.000-04:00

Spent the night at Walmart. Rather comfy if you don't mind car shaking levels of wind.

I met a German couple that are doing something very similar to me but they have their German licence plated Mercedes Camper (late 80's, early 90's looking). Bathroom, kitchen , sleeping loft... and two front seats (what a fantasy, LOL). They had their dog with them too and he needs a ramp to get in the side sliding door. They were kind of befuddled when they realized that a young american was basically doing he same thing they were doing. But I don't have to worry about my visa running out like they are. Anyway it was an interesting standoffish encounter with some Germans in a Walmart parking lot in North Carolina at 9 at night.

Woke up before the sun and went to get my sunrise from the atlantic ocean view. Too cloudy.

Jockey Ridge State Park has a great exhibit on sand and dunes and its not all piping-plover-centric like Cape Cod and the Hamptons.

Had my "Ground School" hang gliding training. Ready to fly! Waiting for the deluge to stop.

Now I'm off to find a place to camp, maybe. Walmart's price was hard to argue with.

I hope one of us gets to see the sun today ;)
Mason

Happy Sunday!

2010-03-28T10:22:00.012-04:00

So I'm south of Richmond at my cousins house trying to figure out the outer banks and how long it should take me.

Here is one of the things I'm going to be doing down there for the next five days: Hang Gliding!

I'm leaving right now.

Its looking like rain for monday and tuesday, but finally the 70's and 80's by the middle of the week. 50's on the beach.

And most importantly, Max is walking on all fours again :)

And finally, here is the entire set of seven Shenondaoh videos...

I got a new purse today!

2010-03-27T23:37:00.000-04:00

So I'm on my way to the Outer Banks.

I got to bless the new REI in Glen Allen VA with my presence today. It was mainly for parts but I also got a fanny pack to try out as a daypack/stuff in the front when backpacking. Maybe I'll be converted to a fanny pack wearer as I was won over by what I used to call Dork Poles.

I'm spending the night at my cousin's house south of Richmond. I took a shower and had a great home cooked meal. I found a tick on a part of me that I can't mention in a public blog. It was disturbing, but it wasnt in deep and hadn't had much if anything to drink yet. The farm we were on is infested with the damn things, but it was 28 degrees last night, so I'm pretty suprised to see them out and alive. Max had five on him. All seated and dead from drinking his Frontline tainted blood. I wish I could take Frontline. Apparently there is a Lyme vaccine for dog, but not people. That's pretty stupid if you ask me.

So now I need to find someone to inspect my nethers for a bulls eye mark in two weeks. That should make for a great pick up line in a bar.

I'm pumping videos onto the web as we speak. I'm finally in a home with a good connection and time to kill. It's beautiful.

So, Max... He has had five dead ticks removed today, still has a scabby/open wound on his leg from the cattle/razor wire on the farm fence he tried to run through, and now he also has a stubbed toe or maybe worse. He won't put his back paw down since today around 12pm. So he is taking it very easy and I'm picking him up and down to the car/bed, etc. If he looses another leg, he's going to be dragging himself. It's pretty pathetic state for a guy who can run circles around all of us. I think about what would happen if something really bad happened to him all the time and all I know is that we'd be taking him back to Shenondaoh...

Anyway, thats the word. Let's see if anything is better in the AM.

In the meantime, enjoy some videos :)

So much to share, so little time to upload...

2010-03-26T18:33:00.000-04:00

So I've been beating my head against the wall in Farmville with Wi-Fi connections. The files I have to upload for the videos are all in the hundreds of megabytes and it can take 2-4 hours on a slow connection. It is also possible to upload 99% of th file and then have it fail. This has been the case at McDonalds, Applebee's and a few other no-namers.

I got to hang out at an off campus apartment yesterday with four college students from Longwood College here in Farmville. They hate the school and the town but I'll give you my own reasons... They have filled the twon with thier own Wi-Fi signal, made it a private, certificate enforced sercurity protocol and then only allow students access if they bought thier PC through the univerity. WTF?!? And I though Fordham had been out of touch.

So I'm left to lurk in off campus college dorm parking lots, trying to catch an open signal from a students room. This is rediculous. Enjoy my first in a series of seven videos from Shenondoah...

Its getting cold here, 27 forcasted for tonight. I want to leave asap. I'm tempted to push forward with no clear plan as to my next stop. Maybe the outerbanks, then to GA. Not sure. I've gotta get out of this damn cold :(

Windy night on the farm....

2010-03-26T15:59:00.000-04:00

Maybe I should have lent them some of my tent stakes. They worked for my tent...

Use them???

2010-03-24T22:21:00.000-04:00

So I'm driving around Farmville going mall to mall with my laptop next to me sniffing for a wifi connection with full upload speeds so I can get a video or two up...

Applebees looks like it might be the winner. I figure while I was waiting for the file to upload I should go inside and patronize the place (or at least their bathroom). Which brings me to the photo.

I'm sitting on a lot more toilet seats than most and just wanted to know, what do you think of these? Personally, I've never bothered using one. Then again I always had a place to hold it and go home to.

BTW, the front driver side headlight bulb blew out today. I replaced the other one the night my dad died Jan 30th. as I was rushing to Boston.

Back to Bears.... (Nothing to do with bears, dammit)

2010-03-24T22:12:00.001-04:00

So something I have noticed down here is the question of if I am armed when hiking/camping. When I say no, the reaction is that I'm some sort of crazy (2 people even jokingly called me Daniel Boone).

That being said, an interesting hypothesis came to mind: What if the NRA guys aren't really afraid of defending themselves against bad guys or a dictatorship, maybe they just live in areas that have animals that they are afraid of... The flip side is that city slickers that live in places that have tough gun laws, just come up with and follow evasive strategies like hanging their food in a bear can, having a cooking, sleeping, and food storage triangle of 100 yards each, and wearing a bear bell (or making your dog wear one in my case).

At no time during my prep did I feel I had to bring (or even wanted to bring) a gun. But guys down here seem to think otherwise. Are they chickens or are they right?

(Mom, you aren't allowed to comment cause I already know what you think, thanks!)

Here is a random video for you to enjoy

Woo Hoo! Found My Keys

2010-03-24T14:16:00.001-04:00

So something that I was too embarrassed to discuss has resolved itself. I lost my keys, in the car, when I was at shenondoah... Although I did spend about 1/2 hour outside of the car looking, I knew based on the circumstances, that they were in the car.

On my fourth search in five days, I found them under my seat. WTF!

I had a backup and when I lost them, the car was already unlocked (by me) so I had access to the interior, but then there was the issue of not having keys to the roof box. It was a wacko situation to resolve in the parking lot of the woods, but I came though and actually didn't think about it too much for the remainder of my visit to Shenondoah.

And now I can vacuum the car without worrying about the hose finding them for me.

And if anyone has any ideas on how I can avoid sitting at McDonald's for 3hrs for one video to upload, please let me know!!! Thx

I'm off to enjoy daylight for a bit as I think I might be sitting at McD's again tonight :)

Another cold night...

2010-03-24T11:06:00.002-04:00

So I'm in McDonalds in Farmville using the free wifi. I slept in my backup tent (much bigger and heavier) last night 40 feet from a pond on a farm. It was a great sunset and some of my cousins friends were over helping themsleves to fish in the pond.

The flip side is that I woke up to frost on the tent and my car's thermometer 20 minutes after sunrise said it was 33 degrees... I'm supposed to be in the warm part of Virginia. That was the same conditions I had in the mountains of Shenondoah. And it was crazy windy to add to it.

Max has his first real injury of the trip. Lets just say we now know he didn't grow up on a farm with barb wire fences for stock animals. He tried to run right through it in the dark and tore a four inch piece of skin off of his front leg. I bandaged it for the first two days but it kept getting soaked so I gave in and he's now licking responsibly. That and I'm dousing it with peroxide until we have a real scab. He also had another wierd injury that I'll let you look into for yourself here. Its always eventful down here at Mason's Funny Farm.

So I hope you realize that I intend to update older posts with the photos and videos that go with them, right? I havent been at a good web connection for a few weeks and have tons of material to upload.
I'm sick of poeple talking about bears everywhere I go. I got a full rundown on every bear interaction that has occured over the last 15 years from my cousins friends. I understand that they mean well, but when there have been 3 sightings (not personal sighntings, but just reported sightings) in 6 years in the entire county, its just not worth talking about. It's like people think they are going to give me bad dreams or something. If they only knew my bad dreams in a tent are all made up of falling limbs, waking up to a frozen Max, and getting piss all over my stuff.

I've also noticed that campfires just keep me up late... I have been alseep by 930 the last two nights and my sleep/wake cycle is finally catching up with being outdoors so much. That's good. The flip side is that I have heard (and not confimred) that a clean (no food) fire keeps the animals away because they dont like the smoke. Fine, but what about the ashes 4 hours after the fire is out. That's when it would matter to me...

So far the farm is full of way too much combustable material and its 6-8 inches deep in large spots, so if I had gust take an ember, it would be very hard to see where it went because it would probably dissapear in the 12inch long trampled haygrass that covers most of the area I have explored so far. It also was pretty windy last night, so maybe it will be a day by day thing. In addition to those factors are the smoke and the cough you can have the next day... Not fun :)

I have had a few fun conversation that had great poetic quotations (in a southern accent):
"I told him you have to go sit with your rifle in that grove of cedar trees in the afternoon and you'd get at least one. They ain't gonna let you keep them away from thier salad patch."
Five minutes into talking with a guy "I knew an hour ago that he ain't no Lab. A Black Lab woulda been in that water by now."

I'll start writing them down more often when they happen.

So based on the weather, I'm considering getting moving in two days, to where I'm not sure yet..
Today
Sunny. Highs in the lower 70s. West winds 5 to 10 mph.
Tonight
Mostly clear. Lows around 40. West winds around 5 mph in the evening...becoming light and variable.
Thursday
Partly sunny. Highs in the lower 70s. South winds 10 to 15 mph.
Thursday Night
Mostly cloudy. Showers likely...mainly after midnight. Milder. Lows in the mid 50s. South winds 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 70 percent.
Friday
Rain in the morning...then showers likely in the afternoon. Cooler with highs in the upper 50s. West winds 5 to 10 mph...becoming north 10 to 15 mph with gusts to 25 mph in the afternoon. Chance of rain 80 percent.

Friday Night
Partly cloudy in the evening...then clearing. Much cooler with lows in the lower 30s.
Saturday
Sunny. Highs in the upper 50s.
Saturday Night
Mostly clear. Lows in the lower 30s.
Sunday
Partly sunny. Highs in the lower 60s.
Sunday Night
Mostly cloudy with a 50 percent chance of showers. Not as cool with lows in the mid 40s.
Monday
Cloudy with a chance of showers and thunderstorms. Highs in the lower 60s. Chance of rain 50 percent.
Monday Night
Mostly cloudy. A chance of showers and thunderstorms in the evening. Lows around 40. Chance of rain 50 percent.

And Farmville has a great classic rock station with no country music!

I'm looking for the next place to go. Smokey Mountian National Park is off limits to dogs. I'm going to look into the surrounding national forests and state parks for something with a hut like I was at in Shenondoah.

In Farmville

2010-03-23T08:23:00.001-04:00

Shenondoah was great but kept nudging me to leave yesterday. Maybe it was the thunderclap that sounded next to me (not above), or the peel the paint off your car deluge I just avoided by getting to the car, or the absolutely fabulous weather I had once I got in the car and started driving south on Skyline drive to its southern terminus in Waynesboro VA. Either way, it was clear that it was time to go.

So I got our cousins family farm (circa 1790) last night near twilight so I just walked around for a little and called it an early night in the car.

There is barely cell service on the farm and no wifi to tap, so I'm off to explore farmville on this rainy day.

And as to what actually brought me to pick up my blackberry to send this post??? An observation: If you sleep in your car, the windows will be so fogged up you will never have an escape vehicle you might think you do because you will have to defrost for 10 minutes just to make out your windshield wipers. Maybe I'll crack the windows tomorrow.

So sleeping in your car isn't free... It takes 15minutes of idling gas per night. Do the math and its probably half a bottle of mini-bar anything at a motel! :)

Happy Birthday Tim!!!

2010-03-22T09:10:00.000-04:00

Hey someone is turning older today....

Stuck in the rain

2010-03-22T09:00:00.000-04:00

So I'm not sure how long it will last but its been raining since about 30min after I got into my tent last night. So we are cocooned here until it let's up. WOW, I wish I was about 200yards closer to the privy right now. That, and my food stuffs are all over near the hut on the bearpole. So I will need to get up soo, put on my raingear, and just deal w it.

I wonder what this mean for the two guys that are staying in the shelter tonight... They were going to hike back out to their car about 10miles away today (they did an out and back on a section of the AT). I offered them a ride if it came to that. One of the forecast had small hail in it from a town 10miles away so were making alt plans before we went to bed last night.

So I am off to Farmville after this. I hope to take a shower and cut my fingernails on the way there LOL
And hopefully I can get a day or two of research in at a local library or something in addition to camping and exploring my cousin's land.

Ok, its time to get my gear on :)
Mason

Should I stay or should I go now (you know the song)... FORECAST FOR SHENANDOAH NATIONAL PARK ABOVE 2000 FEET
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE BALTIMORE MD/WASHINGTON DC
601 AM EDT MON MAR 22 2010

.TODAY...CLOUDY. SHOWERS WITH A SLIGHT CHANCE OF THUNDERSTORMS.
HIGHS IN THE UPPER 50S.
.TONIGHT...MOSTLY CLOUDY. LOWS IN THE MID 30S.
.TUESDAY...MOSTLY CLOUDY. A CHANCE OF SHOWERS. HIGHS IN THE MID 40S.
.TUESDAY NIGHT...PARTLY CLOUDY. LOWS IN THE MID 30S.
.WEDNESDAY...PARTLY CLOUDY. HIGHS IN THE MID 50S.
.THURSDAY...PARTLY CLOUDY. LOWS IN THE MID 30S. HIGHS IN THE UPPER
50S.
.FRIDAY...MOSTLY CLOUDY. A CHANCE OF SHOWERS. LOWS IN THE MID 30S.
HIGHS IN THE MID 50S.

2010-03-20T17:29:00.000-04:00

So I have a ton of catch up postings I need to make and a lot of youtube work etc... I found a farm in my family that I'm going to camp at next when I leave Shenondoah in Virginia. It should be much warmer than the the Shenondoah Mountains. We are both doing well after a night alone at the Bearfence Hut. We are now in Luray, VA running errands and fixing some gear and uploading youtube videos form McDonalds Wi-Fi while eating across the Street in Burger King...

Anyway, here is one video for you. I just have to say I have the greatest dog!

Next Stops...

2010-03-18T10:32:00.000-04:00

Shenondoah is great! We went to the tallest peak yesterday on a short 2 mile hike from camp. Regretfully I missed the skinny dipping session that was had by the group that went for the longer 10 mile hike. They showed up after dark so I guess, I'm glad I didn't go the whole way. Aside from my 15 camp mates, I've only seen 2 other people on the trails, and they looked like college girls w backpacks. Or maybe that was just wishful thinking. Hard to say.

You have to understand that its been below 32 for the past two nights with a gentle 7mph breeze in the valley we are in. Aside from one of my best camp fires yet, I have to say, Its been really cold for me. Max is just pissed about it, so I'm back at the car now getting his coat and a can of sardines and wrist braces, cause my carpal is acting up.

So I really need help with some connects on people to visit and things to do between here and Georgia/Florida. My plans in Farmville might not be working out. Anyone know anyone?

Thanks!

A few people decided to join me...

2010-03-17T10:31:00.000-04:00

So camp got interesting last night when 7 college kids from Colgate showed up around 4pm. I had a small fire going and they have been without stoves or fire for three nights already on their spring break outing. They had been out in the weather I had tried to avoid and now they were cold and wet even after a nice day of hiking (Mon). After dark their 8 other friends that are hiking the park from the other direction arrived. So now there are 16 of us at this hut... They are day hiking today and all joining back for another night before they separate and continue on their week long hike.

On a good note, its not a church group! LOL

The puddles that I was stepping in last night had a nice coat of thin ice over them this when I woke up. Max did a great job of trying to hang in there with just his fleece jacket and fleece sleeping mat. I added my sweatshirt to his attire but by about 3 AM he awoke in protest and joined me in my sleeping bag. I was nice and warm for all of the night to my great surprise.

Not sure what I'm doing today yet, but I think I'm going to be back here at the shelter. If I want a campfire, I either need to relocate to another one or stay here.

I'm sure there is plenty of solitude for me down the road so this curveball isn't bothering me... Yet :)

A few thoughts before I loose coverage...

2010-03-16T11:24:00.000-04:00

Thanks youtube, for letting me upload a video that was too long for your guidelines. Can't you tell this to me before I wait 45min for the upload to finish?

Wegmans! Great supermarket experience (so far, I'm not out of the store yet).

So I'm 20 north of the park and I have to say that so far, it seems like the forest and land in the north east is very similar from at least VA to Vermont. This must have been dreadfully confusing to the settlers and explorers who first got here.

I wonder when the look and feel of the woods will change. Obviously a place like California has at least 4 or 5 different types of climates and terrain. Growing up in the north east and vacationing on the seashores of the Northeast, I'm very familiar with the feel of the forests and how they fade out into pines and brush as you get to the shore. Its kind of formulaic, and it seems like its going to be the same down as far as maybe Georgia. Then Florida, I think, has its own version of swamp, highland and coastal beach and the various flavors that result as the blend in certain areas.

That brings me back to my main question. How many climate/types of terrain exist in the US. I don't know the proper word for what I asking (terrain/climate), I really mean vegetative zone or something like that. If someone wants to do some wikipedia searching, I'd love to read the page that really lays this out :)

One last question before I go and repurchase some food that I forgot in Nick's fridge... Aren't those baby slings that go diagonal across the shoulder terrible for the back? Its completely asymmetrical. Well they are popular, but they look like an ergo-nightmare.

I'm turning off my blackberry to save battery.
Bye

Shenondoah here we come :)

2010-03-15T14:41:00.001-04:00

So today is my last day in DC with my friend Nick. We went out to a cool club last night that I have heard of plenty of times called 18th Street Lounge. If I was in the club business, my place would be alot like this.

I'm going to try to have dinner with my step mom tonight and then go to bed really early so I can leave before dawn. There is nothing like driving through senic areas at dawn. A little morning dew and ground fog, its the best! And then when the sun goes down, you are instantly ready to go to sleep.

I just got off the phone with Ranger Debbi who has been helping me plan my trip. I reminded her of who I was and she quickly retracted the former hiking plan she had given me because she said that even the small stream crossings on the Whiteoak and Cedar Run Trails were simply impassable due to the heavy rains and snow melt.

She has given me a back up plan which is at a much higher elevation (better views, but probably colder). So it looks like I'm going to camp at the Rock Spring Hut and try to make a short hike up to the top of Hawksbill Mountain, the parks highest peak :) Here is the map... I'm parking at a non mapped, but acutally signed parking area for the Rock Spring Hut between mile 47 and 48 of Skyline Drive (closer to 48, goes north from the road).

I could't help but think that these Rangers have quite a cool job... I really appreciate thier "Let me help you have a good/safe time" attitude :)

So my food will be ok in the car, I dont need an actual bear box unless I plan on not stringing my food up in a tree. I'm going to go the cheep route. I have to imaging that I'm going to find a used bear box somewhere along the way...

If you find yourself bored and surfing these Shenondoah links, I'd love some ideas on other things to check out while I'm in hte region or other "can't miss" things in the park (preferably along Skyline Drive, so it will be accessable.

oh, and another thing... I figured out why my bike was getting harder and harder to fit on the roof... The damn roof box has shifted/slid over by about 8 inches pass the center of the car on the roof rack crossbars. That said, I need to find something to keep it in place. I'm going to get plumbers hose clamps to put around the cross bar to ask as a sliding stop. I hope it works :) My car is about to aquire its first piece of external hardward that wasn't ment for a car :( Now I'm really gonna start looking hillbilly... "So ya got a hoseclamp assembly for traction and a chome exhasut tip for looks. Dat's still a spiffy ride out in these parts."

Anyway, off to home depot. BTW, I have some marinated pork filets that I have prepared and frozen for camp. I'm looking forward to that :) Thanks Tom!

Alexandria 2

2010-03-13T20:46:00.002-05:00

Ok, so I know I'm a bad blogger. Its hard to keep it up everyday and when you miss a day, it feels like you have twice as much work cut out for you the next day.

So here are some updates:
I've explored Alexandria especially the area called Old Town. It is beautiful and reminds me of the interest that both my father and I have in architecture. My step mother confirmed this after I had this thought. I also went to Jones Point Park just to run Max and came across the Mt. Vernon Trail which follows it's way along the Potomic River to Washington's historic home. I didn't do the walk since it was raining and I had alot to do back at the house.
I've had the chance to speak with alot of folks here. It seems like none of them are acutally from here though. Reminds me of Boston or NYC in the sense that it is relies on imported talent and residents.

I also found a great hole in the wall breakfast spot (another connection to my father) called Jack's Place. Why the hell are these a dying breed?

I also keep seeing bumper stickers that I want to take pictures of. "Kids for Coal" is my current fav.

Kinda great news: I have a car alarm. It is installed and I need to go to another shop because Beast Buy (incorrectly spelled intentionally) does not buy their staff tools and I now need to go and find the Best Buy installer that has taken it upon themselves to buy a $100 programmer for the alarm called a Bit Writer. That said, there are certain functions that I was counting on being active, that are not yet. And while I'm ranting, why can't google's blogger have spell check built in? I got the kid back buy making him give me the whole tour of the car while filming him using my flip. So now I have a my own video tutorial and proof as to how suavely incompitent he was. I hope the guys at the next best buy get a kick out of it because they will be cleaning up his mess.

While we are on the vengful side of things, I have ot tell you about something that tikkled me today. Car number 29 of the local Alexandria cab company was driving reclessly and honking at me to go faster then flew into the oncoming traffic to get ahead of me. The after he got stuck behind someone trying to turn, he ended up behind me again and didnt like that... So long story short, I let the guy get infront of me, got out my phone and call his boss (the number is on the cab, LOL). From a stop light, I expalined the boss the situation, and then was reassured "No problem, I'll call him in to have a chat with him". He turned to the dispatch mic, hailed #29, got a response (the cab driver in front of me had picked up his mic), and then said "Come on over to dispatch. Your day is over". At that point I'm like "Oh crap, I'm right behind the guy. What if he goes postal right here in front of the Masonic Monument. Is this how it all ends???
The cab driver, floored it when the light changed and that was that :)

While we are on car stuff, I was overdue for an oilchange and liked the local flavor of this sign.

Speaking of local flavor, have I mentioned the great videos at http://www.bronxflavor.com/ yet?

I have been in Alexandria doing some trip planning and work on the car. I had a whole session of unpacking the car, setting up my "overnight" bag and I packed my camping backpack for a four day camp (no food or water yet).

I am planning on getting to Shenendoah National Park soon. The weather has really killed this weekend's chances and although it is going to get dryer up there Mon-Wednesday, the low temps will be in the 30's.

TONIGHT...CLOUDY. A CHANCE OF SHOWERS IN THE EVENING...THEN RAIN

LIKELY WITH AREAS OF DRIZZLE AFTER MIDNIGHT. AREAS OF FOG AFTER

MIDNIGHT. LOWS IN THE UPPER 30S.
.SUNDAY...CLOUDY. A CHANCE OF SHOWERS. HIGHS IN THE MID 40S.
.SUNDAY NIGHT...CLOUDY. A CHANCE OF RAIN SHOWERS. LOWS IN THE MID
30S.
MONDAY...CLOUDY. A CHANCE OF RAIN SHOWERS. HIGHS IN THE LOWER 40S.
.TUESDAY...PARTLY CLOUDY. LOWS IN THE LOWER 30S. HIGHS AROUND 50.
.WEDNESDAY...MOSTLY CLEAR. LOWS IN THE LOWER 30S. HIGHS IN THE MID
50S.
THURSDAY...MOSTLY CLEAR. LOWS IN THE LOWER 30S. HIGHS IN THE UPPER
50S.

I have spoken at lenght with a certain ranger at the park via phone and she has helped me pick out a good trip that will hopefully entirly avoid me from having to deal with the 1-4 feet of snow that is covering most of the park.

OPEN THIS MAP BEFORE YOU CONTINUE

She has picked out the Whiteoak Canyon for my hiking and also says that Cedar Run Falls might be accessable. The parking area is White Oak Parking Area and I will probably camp on the Cedar Run Link Trail as it is much lower in elevation and hopefully warmer.

I really wanted to start off my trip with a nice dry camping experience. I'm going to use the car as a backup shelter and hope that the walk between the Cedar Link Trail and the parking area isn't a difficult one. As far as how long to stay, I'm going to bring 4 days of supplies and play it by ear... The weather being one of the larger factors.

I still need to call back and ask qabout food being left in the car (bears don't care about the brand of alarm you just bought) and if I need to have an actual bear box (for food) to hang in a tree or if a garbage bag is good enough. I think this question is specific to where I am camping and therefore want to check back about that.

I have my snoshuz's (see pic left), but no snowshoe's, so I'm going to have to stick to a limit of 8-14 inches of snow before I need to turn around. The falls should be roaring given the snowmelt and the rain the mountains are getitng. This trail apparently has more falls per mile than almost anywhere else on the east coast.

After that, I hope to go to Farmville, VA.
Here is the route between the parking lot (I think that is it) in Shenondoah to the center of Farmville.

View Larger Map

In the meantime, the car is packed up, I've done laundry, cleaned the room I was staying in at my aunt's house, gladly helped her with a ton of chores and am just waiting for my Garmin gps to update its maps. I knew something was fishy with the GPS when it messed up a few things in Boston recently, and then it kept not knowing about the outbreak of no left turn signs that D.C. seems to have recently suffered. After that, I realized, Yo this GPS is about to get me a ticket! So I have endured 5 hours of Garmin downloads and now the actual upgrade process via USB cable. Its excruciating. And that's why I suddenly have time to update the blog :)

And the worst thing about being nickle and dimed by Garmin after you have bought thier system (they want 110 bucks for updated maps), is that Amazon has it for $95. WTF? You gonna nickle and dime me and then overcharge me when I can go around the block and get the same thing from another guy? I enjoy waiitng for the downfall of suck a cocky company. Maps and gps chips wont be propriatary for much longer (if they even are still).

So I have been out of NYC for a week and haven't missed it at all.

Download is done! I'm off to Nick's in DC.

Still in Alexandria

2010-03-13T19:51:00.003-05:00

I wrote this wednesday 3/10/2010: If you can sing the lyrics "Sittin on the deck by the train" to the melody of "Sittin on the dock by the bay" then you'll understand where I am right now mentally :)

Monday and Tuesday's free time have been spent doing a bunch of housekeeping while at my aunts.

I have attempted 2 car projects.
Vacuming out all the leaves and feathers from my cabin airbox was a pain. But my homemade air filters do work. Its another way that the car website/forum I follow (http://www.genvibe.com/) has paid of. The dealer wants 40 bucks per filter, 70 installed. I go to home depot and cut a $17 high end furnace filter down to the same size (acually, I can get 4 car filters out of one furnace filters) and voila! It's easy, but you need to look online for instructions. I recommend that everyone al least be an occasional lurker on your own cars fan site. You will learn so much, save alot of money and enjoy your car alot more. I wouldn't be as comfortable with my car without it, and as you can imagine based on the last two videos (car tour), I am comfortable with and in my car.

The second project was to get rid of (install) these two air horn looking things I bought on sale. Now I know this is controversial with some, but I hate my factory tweet horn. It sounds like I'm joking when I honk it. I don't joke around with cars and I dont want to sound like it either. More importantly though, they are taking up space in the cabin right now and space is at a premium. I had a spot all picked out and bought the hardware to attach them before I left NYC, but on my back yesterday, I found out the hard way that they are not going to fit where I wanted them. Or at least with the harware I have. Its a crazy smal space that is too hard to take a picture of and impossible to describe, so I'll leave it at that. This was a failure becaus eof the amount of work it took taking the car apart, etc. to then find out it was pointless. So they are going to have to endure the ride a little longer with my tweet. Aftermarket horns are awsome, as long as you are willing to replace them every 2 years. LOL

It's looking like my next destination is going to be Shenondoah National Park. I'm not sure why, but everyone says its a "Don't Miss", so that's that. I'm going. The problem is that I enjoyed the weather so much here in the DC area, I now am facing rain for the next three to four days and that sucks. I'm realistic of course, but I just feel like I have so much ahead of me right now, that I can't afford or just don't want to have a crappy first camping side trip. The last time I struck a tent in the rain it was with my good friend Tim in the Finger Lakes National Forest. It was afterdark when we arrived, raining and our map sucked, but there wasn't room to sleep in the car for both of us and we both agreed to hit the trail and find a place to camp. Having told that story, I just have to say, that I know for myself, I want to avoid rain htis first outing (especially day 1 and 2).

After that, my sister is reccomending the outer/shore areas of North Carolina and South Carolina. I'm considering the outerbanks. Nothing is decided yet and the more and quicker I get feedback from all of you, the more likely I am to visit it.

I also want to visit the ancestral land I mentioned before in Farmville, VA. I've been there before, but I wouldnt mind exporing it with Max for a few days. That could have been a good first camping trip but it is way south of Shenondoah so to save fuel and time, I should stick with the natural southerbound order I've been trying to follow.

I also has a nice namesake project...
Who can tell the difference in the before and after photos below?

LJ's to shorts?!?

2010-03-09T13:33:00.001-05:00

Certain parts of my dads death really go to show that modern humans still really don't know what's going on with their bodies as much as we try. This occurs to me because I'm mystified by why I can't leave the house between October 15th and March/April without some sort of 2nd layer on my legs. What's up with that?

So I'm in Virginia, its the second sunny 60+ degree day and i still have my long johns on (for safety??? LOL). I don't know what that's about, but I'm still comfortable.

That gets me to the crazy part... I'm quite possibly going to go straight from long johns to shorts this year. WTF! I think that's hysterical.

Anyway, I just walked to the post office to send my DNA sample to the National Geographic Genographic Project. If you know my sister, my mom, my dad or myself, you know that we already have a lot of family history documented about "where we come from". So my sister is taking it to the next level and we are sending our DNA's to Nat. Geo. and they are going to tell us what ancient tribes we are related to. Ill be sure to post the results :)

The problem is that Google Maps gave me the closest USPS facility. Its a repair yard for the trucks and the mailboxes. LOL better luck next time. I knew I should have brought my bike instead of walking. I now might just get it off the car and ride over there to try my new bike gps mount :))

Great Falls

2010-03-07T23:54:00.000-05:00

So Max has been getting some good exercise. The family friend (Jeanne) whose house I stayed at in Tacoma Park had a huge fenced in backyard for such an urban home. There was also a school with a field 3 blocks away that we walked to Saturday night. Then today we were at the ball field you see in the car tour movie (previous post) for about a half hour waiting to meet up with a friend from High School. She has a female doberman and a small female mastiff. We drove to Great Falls and took a nice three hour hike to the Potomic River. The river was running really fast given that DC is about 10 days from its highest ever recorded snowfall and it was 60 degress today.
So this was my first National Park experience with Max. He was off the leash half the time in the woods, and always on the leash in the developed areas and near the river/tow path where there were a lot of people. The one obstacle to having the dog is that there were no dogs allowed on the bridge that spans the best gorge we saw. So i had to get my fill from the sidelines.

So now im in Alexandria at my aunt's place (Kris). She has a furnished one bedroom apt in her house that is vacant, so Max and I are spending at least one night here. I'm going to visit my step mother, my just turned 21 cousin who shares my birthday, a college friend and even see my mother who is coming down from Boston on Wednesday before I leave the DC area.

Where to next? Any suggestions between here and Georgia?

And why can't blogger have spellcheck if gmail can? Not that I always use the spellcheck in gmail...

Car Setup

2010-03-07T23:37:00.000-05:00

Takoma Park, MD

2010-03-07T10:06:00.001-05:00

So I drove down to the Washington DC area on Friday and had my dad's memorial service yesterday.

I'm staying with a family friend Jeanne in her very nice house in Takoma Park MD. It looks a lot like the nicer residential neighborhoods in Cambridge or Brookline MA (near where I grew up in Boston).

They have a reputation for being a very progressive and liberal town. Ex. They have an official city council sanctioned committee called the Nuclear Free Takoma Park Committee. I don't like the idea of nuclear material going by my house either, but a committee??? It seems like they don't have any bigger problems to deal with given the idealic suburb they seem to be. Now that I have referred to them as a suburb, I should point out that they are right on the Red Line DC Metro, so its very well connected.

The stores seem to also have an earthy bend to them... Gourmet food stores, a wine and cheese bar called "The Culture Shop" (yes, I get the pun), and a lot of gift stores with crystals, artistic women's scarfs, artsy mobiles, etc, etc. Its not exactly what I wake up wanting to shop for on a regular basis.

That makes me think... If I had to lay out the perfect main street to live around the corner from, what would it have in it... A bike shop, a auto repair guy (at the end of the block, of course), a food co-op, a liquor store, maybe a gym, and a subway station close by.

In that sense, I don't think that Takoma Park would actually be a looser in the race for Mason's residence. Oh, you didn't know that was happening? Its campaign season baby!

So I'm done with my oatmeal and I'm going to drive to where my sister is staying so I can give her my suit to bring back to NYC, so I can be garment bag free for the rest of the trip. I have a fantasy that I'll get a great interview somewhere, won't have the suit, and will have to apologize and show up in jeans and a sweater, explain why and still get hired... Most people I have spoken with LOVE the idea of my trip, so I assume (or should I say hope) I could get a pass on the suit. There are plenty pictures out there of me in a suit for a potential employer to know that I'm for real :)

So I'm off to go and enjoy a 60 degree day for a hike with a woman that I knew in High School. I just might have to strip off these long johns I've been wearing since Halloween :). (BTW, thank you REI for another winter of warm legs)

All the best!
Mason

Just a quick note...

2010-03-05T13:30:00.001-05:00

I'm not sure I'm going to miss this place, LOL

This is a photo I took from my front door a few days ago when the garbage chute in my building had a small fire. It was quite a site for Max and I to come out to...

The 2nd pic is from a year ago when Max was rescued from my smoke filled apt while I was at work downtown. You can see that it wasn't a fun day for him :(

The 3rd pic is the Broadway facade of the building and the destroyed, and since rebuilt, dollar store.

I can't find the pics... I'll update this post later.

Almost ready....

2010-03-04T11:03:00.001-05:00

So I'm waiting to get my hair cut. I took the subway to midtown this morning and have some last minute business to take care of down here.

I've been packing and organizing to death for the last week or so. I have 6 bins still plus 2 smaller boxes and countless other containers. Judgment day is tomorrow AM when I actually try to get all of this in the car and leave my self a place to lay down. We'll see, but I still think it is possible :)

I've attached a few recent pics below:
I found my bins at Home Depot for 7.00 each. So I saved a bundle but the grey color at HD is more my style.

Max in the snow with his pack on.

I also just got a bike leash attachment for my bike at thedogoutdoors.com. Cool site to check out if you like dogs. It should be meeting me in DC.

Speaking of snow...

p>
Now that my apt is organized and clean, I know where everything is.
Here is a quick tour:

I've been cooking more as a cost saver and to get my feet a little more wet for the trip.
(Edit, my blackberry has my pictures all disorganized, so I'll get back to that photo.

And here is the haircut.

I got the instructions too. #2 around the bottom, #3 a little higher, and #4 on the top with some clean up a the scissors.

So I'm going to DC Friday. My cousins Bday party (he's also the 5th) is that night at a club in DC. I'm going to try to make it. My dads memorial service is Saturday. Then Sunday I'm going to hang out with a high school friend in MD. Then Monday I'm going to try to get my step mom to take a hike with me after we drop off my grandmother at the airport. Then Monday onward I'm going to check out the DC area (been to the mall way to many times) and stay with a college friend that moved down there.

I'm still debating the car alarm purchase. 500 buck installed at Best Buy. 2 way pager remote with auto start and the ability to have the car autostart based on internal temperature. That right there could buy me hours of out of the car time with Max hanging in the shade with his auto A/C kicking in when it hits the temperature points that I could set. Wow! But it is 500 bucks. Then again think of how much (in $'s) stuff I have in the car... Is this a no brainer?

Anyway, my hair has been done for 10 minutes now. I should go!

Garmin Nuvi 660 mounted on my bike

2010-02-22T01:24:00.000-05:00

Check this out. I have one improvement to make to it but otherwise I think its surprisingly very secure.
(Posted via blackberry)

Gonna get organized :)

2010-02-17T17:21:00.002-05:00

So my friend Tim uses these to stay organized... Now I will too. So I found 21 of these with the logos and serial numbers buffed off. They usually have "property of" imprints, but these are luckily missing them. Now I need to shower with them to clean them all up and hopefully start putting them to use tomorrow. Based on preliminary measurements, I think I could fit them side by side in the cargo box on the car.

I also got some interest from a guy coming to work at the hospital near my place from England. I'm going to break down and make signs to post in the nearby student buildings soon.

I also finished an easy but very important car project. Now I won't knock myself unconscious on the side of the road on my own hatch door, LOL

Happy Valentines Day! (where I have been and upto over last 50 days)

2010-02-14T13:10:00.001-05:00

So I owe everyone and myself a post...

The cup half full perspective is that I'm one phone call and check away from leaving on my trip. I need to find a sublettor and then I can go. So what if I have some packing and a storage unit to rent and fill? That will all be done on addrenaline at the last minute, I'm sure.
That being said, tomorrow was my expected/hoped for departure date...

I have my apt on craigslist, pearlshark and listed w the Columbia dept of housing.

Everyone has little critiques about my ad, but I'm going to muscle through with what I have. Here are a few examples: "too much money, too many pictures (4), too much info, I should empty my place first and/or unfurnish it".

I have a laptop that I'm bringing. Anyone have suggestions on some programs or laptop things I should bring? I have a new battery already and the car can charge the machine. Please don't suggest a "netbook" unless you're buying :)

My car is 99% ready. I have little side projects that I want to do, and a few I have just finished...
Tom of Groton helped me put on a florescent light fixture on the surface of my tailgate door (the hatch). It has its own switch and I can now see outside of the car when I have the hatch open. This is great for dressing, adjusting, looking for ticks, packing/unpacking etc.

The cargo box is on the car. The bike fits right next to it. There is no wind noise below 50mph, and a slight wishile comes up and peaks at about 65mph. I need to be on a smooth road or have the radio and fan off to notice it. The wind conditions outside definitly change the dynamics of having the box on top. If you aren't aware and cognizant of the box and the wind your first gust will feel like the car has been captured by a kite. Wheel feels more like a rudder with the pushes and the pulls. I'm making more of it than it really is, but it has taken some getting used to...

So with city driving and some "keep warm" idling included, I averaged 27mpg on my last tank coming back from Boston to NYC. That is exceptional and I'm almost skeptical that I miscalculated. If I can pull that off consistently, I will feel pretty good about my carbon footprint (when you combine that it is a "already built car" (aka used), I'm ridding myself of 12kwh's of monthly electricity usage, bringing the bike for local touring and sleeping outdoors... Am I forgetting anything?). I'm sure flying to SanFran for the weekend would be worst than my whole driving extravaganza. If someone wants to calculate it, my map is in one of my first posts.

So I got to test out the cargo box on a unexpected trip to Boston in early Feb. My father has passed away unexpectedly and I had to run off to Boston (a week too late to see him alive), and help organize the funeral. My dad thought my trip was genuinely cool and was the one person that was not skeptical when he heard about it. I say "heard about it" because I didn't tell him directly, and this is because I thought he was going to be much more skeptical. (I think my sister told him, and I'm happy she did.) He also was going to be one of the first stops on my roadtrip and since I didn't know exactly when it was going to start I didn't want him to be expecting me at a a certain date. It was silly as are lots of my rationales about family things. Its really my worst department. Don't trust my advice about family stuff.

My dad had a list of people he wanted me to visit on my trip. I hope my stepmother can find it or recreate it. Its amazing how you don't appreciate what you have when you have it until its gone...
On that note, I'm really glad that I went to Cape Verde with him in 2008.

So as for future posts, I'll post 'em when I feel like it, but its really hard trying to blog the process of waiting for a sublettor.

Or I could just post cool pages I come across like this.