The Long Road Home

Many of you readers have been wondering if I'm stuck in South Dakota. Luckily no - I was mostly driving all day and sleeping in generic Midwestern hotels beside the highway.

After leaving the granite heads I headed east on the most direct route back to New York, Interstate 80. This highway took me through Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Jersey. It was also the most congested interstate of them all, with millions of semi trucks, bad roads, construction ...

During the last couple days of my trip the weather got really hot in New York, over 100F. In the midwest, there were hurricanes, tsunamis and every other kind of torrential rainstorm. I pulled over for gas in Pennsylvania and a hurricane arrived just as I did, cutting off the power at the gas station and nearly blowing me and my car across the highway.


This was my last day on the road - 575 miles from Ohio to New York. Another storm slowed me down all through New Jersey, after dark. It was the most harrowing and stressful leg of the whole adventure, especially after driving 9 hours.

I finally pulled into my parking garage in Brooklyn Heights at 10pm on Tuesday June 10, 9,225 miles since my departure 31 days earlier.

Check back for final final stats and epilogue in a few days. I will have to find all my receipts for that.

Granite Heads

I expected the drive from Deadwood to Sioux Falls would be 385 miles of pretty much nothing. But after a few miles I started noticing rocks shaped like human heads sticking out of the black hills. I stopped to take a couple of pictures, then got out of there before things got any weirder.

South Dakota also seems to have the most kamikaze insects. Hopefully Sioux Falls has a carwash so I'll be able to see again. And a running trail .. all the fast food is killing me!

Big Sky!

There are lots of cops in big sky country. Don't believe it when everyone tells you you can drive as fast as you want in Montana. I've still avoided a ticket but had one really close call while setting a land-speed record.

Yellowstone is a huge park that would take a few days to see entirely, but in a few hours I saw a few wild things - bison, deer, Old Faithful.

For a cowboy town, Bozeman is sure bereft of cowboy boot stores. There is one place, Carter's, that makes custom boots if you need a presidential seal or Kansas jayhawk. But turnaround time is 4 months and I didn't want to hang around Bozeman that long.

For my next stop, I audibled when I noticed Deadwood is pretty close to Mount Rushmore. I was a big fan of the HBO series so I decided to stay there for a night. The road to South Dakota was bad and rain poured on me the whole time, but this did make for a spectacular rainbow on the side of the road. Actually two:


I did find boots in Billings, which was a relief because I figured I'd need them in Deadwood. As it turned out, Deadwood turned out to be pretty kitchy and there's a casino in every hotel/bar/restaurant. Next up: Mount Rushmore, Crazy Horse, and a big drive across South Dakota.

Blue Moose

Vancouver to Spokane was the most eventful leg of the trip. I drove eastward in Canada a while, through the Canadian rockies before turning south to Washington.

First stop for coffee was in Hope, BC at a place called Blue Moose. I decided to buy a souvenir Blue Moose hat, but the weird thing was that just after getting back on the highway I narrowly avoided smashing my car into a real moose crossing the highway. Maybe he didn't like my new hat.

The highway eventually turned into a wine trail so I stopped off at a couple wineries. One of them makes wine from organic fruits like pears, apples, and plums (no grapes) grown on the premises. Neat idea, so I bought some of their wine. I hope it still seems neat when get home and drink it.

Getting back into the US was a fiasco, as it usually is for me. My credentials couldn't be more suspicious, I guess: no job, driving from Brooklyn to western Canada just for kicks. So they ransacked my car, went through my pockets, and an hour later set me free.

Next is a quick stop in Spokane, then onto Montana for Yellowstone and new cowboy boots.

O! Canada!

Anne and I made the quick drive to Vancouver, only delayed 30 minutes at the border. At the hotel, Anne seemed scared of the resident wooden mountie. Or maybe she wasn't happy with the accommodations?

We spent the afternoon at the Cormacks' house, where they were having a cookout for a million neighbor kids.

Next morning, Anne and I went for a run around Stanley Park. The park is like a peninsula surrounded by water but we still managed to get off-track and had to walk a mile back to the hotel.

After dropping Anne at the airport, Mike agreed to entertain me the rest of the day. First, a tour of his boat the SS Ballymack. I noticed Mike keeps copies of The Joy of Cooking on the boat and at the house. A serious chef.


We took a drive up the mountain (where there is still snow) for a cool panoramic view of Vancouver.

Tomorrow it's back to the USA for me. I wonder if there will be any problems at the border?

Coffeetown USA

The drive from Portland to Seattle was mercifully short (refer to my previous post re: microbrews) so I had time for a little nap upon arrival. Last time I was in Seattle was with Dad and Sam about 20 years ago, and my most vivid memory was the Pike fish market and the weird and disgusting geoduck clams.

This time Anne arrived late Friday night and we went to the Mariners/Tigers game Saturday afternoon. Here she is wearing her Twins hat sitting inside the big novelty glove outside the stadium.


A few cool things happened at the game: one of the Mariners stole home, they closed the roof during the game because of rain, and we almost caught a foul ball or two. We were about 10 feet left of Ichiro's sweet spot.

Hot dog!

Postgame we zipped up the space needle, which is probably less impressive for New Yorkers but earned some blog real estate regardless.

Next stop: Canada. Eh?

Up the Cali Coast

California highway 1 winds slowly up the Pacific coast, right beside the beach and cliffs. Slow-going but pretty cool despite the overcast and chilly weather.

Taking Hwy 1 would require me to spend 2 full days driving to Portland so I arbitrarily picked Crescent City CA for a stopover. It turned out to be a quaint little town on the coast with a lighthouse and everything. In the morning I hiked up to the lighthouse only to find out the museum was closed so I went for a quick run beside the beach.

In the morning I hit the road for Portland. I pointed the GPS toward the Apple store so I could buy a replacement power cord for the laptop (one of my excuses for the lackadaisical blogging). Just a few miles out of Crescent City I stumbled upon a redwood forest where I went for an impromptu hike. The trees were enormous - I planted my camera in the ground so I could get in the shot.


Besides the great big vertical trees that everyone has seen in pictures, there are weird dead trees that have toppled over, trees growing on top of other dead trees, and trees winding around existing trees.

I finally got to Portland and met up with Bryan and Dave. Apparently there's a shortage of delicious microbrewed beer in the Pacific northwest, because we drank them as fast as we could. Thanks guys!

San Francisco

He did it! Sam broke the land speed record in the car (111 mph!). Here's what this historic moment looked like from the passenger seat:

Unfortunately for Sam this record would only hold up for a couple days. See the Key Stats section at right.

San Francisco was a ton of fun as always, catching up with old friends Lenka Drew Maikhanh Brad and Deva. Deva even took a few hours out of his busy workday to give me a 3-hour tennis lesson (or was it the other way around?).

We had a couple hours to do some shopping. I think Sam had his eye on the blue shirt in the window until he realized he was wearing the same shirt.

My last night in town, Deva/Brad/Maikhanh took me to Chinatown for some cheap eats and introduced me to 'The Chinese'. This is some sort of foul liquor that all patrons of the Buddha Bar have to try, like some unpleasant initiation.

I wasn't afraid. Brad was amused.


Next morning was time to get back on the road, solo for the first time since Dallas. I'll take Highway 1 because I hear it's the most picturesque route. Next stop Crescent City then Portland.

I've convinced Anne to fly across the country and meet me in Seattle on Friday. We're going to the Mariners game Saturday afternoon and drink as much coffee as we have time for. She'll come along as far as Vancouver then fly back to NY, and I'll start the return leg of my trip.