Trips, Clips, and Stories

From New Mexico to North Carolina, from Florida to Las Vegas (summer 2015).Over 6k miles in one trip over one month. To Catalina Island - to Oregon(summer 2018)just to name a few.

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See sea duck......see Eagle surprise duck. I think he used me as cover to fly in and grab the duck. Absolute nat geo moment before my eyes!!! I missed the grab shot I was just so shocked by the whole thing. Yachats, OR

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A view from our Airbnb house in Yachats, OR. With a growler of the local ipa of course. Views and beer both simply amazing!

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Notice the people in the top left for reference of the size of the rocks. Pretty amazing.

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June of 2018 Drove from Vegas up north of Eureka, CA to camp for a couple nights before continuing north to Oregon.

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Never got to finish the trip post of Florida down the keys - leaving this space to complete later.

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Asheville, NC

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Nashville, TN to Asheville, NC

Finally headed into The Great Smokey Mountains and The Great State of North Carolina for the first time in my life. My wife visited here as a kid, but this is a first for my boys and I. We are pumped. The elevation gains and drop through the Smokey Mountains really surprised me. We have been all through the Rockies and the Wasatch range around Utah. Those are extremely high in elevation and have a much different feel than this. These Mountains range in elevation from approx 3,000 to 6,500 ft above the sea. So a little lower and more moist. Although it did not rain on us during the drive, which was a first for this trip. A very smooth trip into Asheville to the KOA. Our first time to stay at one. We generally prefer hike in, or stay at state parks for camping. But this place was nice. The tent sites are far away from all the RVs and it was quite while we were there, so it was great. Just on the edge west edge of Asheville we really had the feel and serenity of the woods while being just a few miles from downtown.

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Nashville, Tennessee Ready for a hotel. To La Quinta we will go. We almost always stay at a La Q. They are almost all very clean, and newly updated. There are a few exceptions, but the ratings are pretty accurate on there own website. Also really like them because of the free breakfast that is decent, and most importantly-they take dogs, for free. That is hard to come by, and still be in a clean hotel. So yes, a hotel becomes like heaven for us after our tough two day camping trip. We are definitely not the type of family who love to camp all the time. 2 days is a pretty good amount of time without a shower, a personal restroom and decent bed. The wife and kids especially do not like roughing it for to long. Air mattresses are nice, temporarily only. Sleeping outside is amazing, but to get inside is also great. Had such a great night in our hotel we opted for a ‘zero day’ - as long mile hikers call it. Booked the rooms a second night. We got the boys there own adjoining room so everyone could get a little space. And they were in no hurry to leave. We went to The Opryland hotel, where my mom had talked me as a kid. That place is very impressive, and size, the grandeur, it’s amazing! Also went to a downtown brewery that was really great. I cannot figure out the name, and I feel bad because I waited so long to write about these places. Blackstone Brewing Company, established in 1994.....got it!!! Great food and beer! We would go back. Anyway, Nashville is great….but we were ready to get to North Carolina. After all, that’s what this trip was about.

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All the way to Memphis. This would end up being about the longest single day drive of the whole trip. And it was fairly miserable just as you would expect. But we were in Memphis now, after a horrible few hours of sleep we got in the car. It somehow felt like the trip was really about to begin. The rain had passed, and we were headed for a two night camping stint into Meeman-Shelby Forest State Park. We arrived early all extremely tired, and luckily the ranger let us go pick our site right away. It was like heaven. By 10am we had our tents up and we were all headed for a nap. The cicadas made a huge racket, and there were mosquitos the size of golf balls-but we were out for the morning. The boys made me promise we would not drive that far, or sleep in the car again. I agreed. This was a really neat place - bright green grass, trees everywhere. Just on the edge of Memphis, not expected. This is a very rural area though. Lots of long time families, black and white. But you can feel the history of slavery and segregation that still exists. We stayed in the park most of the time there. But did go to the local gas station/beer stop/grill a couple of times. The Meeman Burger at this place was to die for! Not joking, and I will go back for this burger again, hopefully multiple tim a before I die. I have only had two other burgers that even compared to this one - in my life. Now there could be some contributing factors that weighed into this feeling, such as the fact we had had really no hot food for two days prior. And we’ll, we were hungry. But none the less, amazing burger and fries too! Another reason I bring up this place is because of the locals I talked with while inside. The girl who cooked our food was, I would guess all of 16 and very pregnant. She was nice as could be and I would go so far as to say an amazing chef - yes, chef. Then there was the local who talked with my son and I about everything from mosquitos and the birds that keep them away from his house to local politics and race issues they had had as long as he could remember. He did however tell me how things just seem to work out and everyone somehow keeps the peace - almost always. Once outside my 10 year old son asked me “did you understand the guy you were taking to?” I replied, yes. He said he got 50 percent.

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Conway, AR to Memphis, TN

Smitty’s BBQ - really good downhome type of spot. Been there forever and solid food. Different than what we are used to. Had a chipotle type of dark red sauce, that I became more fond of-the more I ate it. We had spend all day just ahead of this storm, and now it had caught us. Letting the dog run around after dinner and here came the rain and hail. As if this was going to follow us all the way to the Atlantic Ocean. Unbelievable! So off we went into the dark I-40 east with our tarp flapping on the roof trying to pull the car into the air like the wizard of oz, it felt at times. We were on the lead edge of the storm again, and were moving just faster than it was. As 40 dipped south toward Little Rock the weather caught us again, but we pushed on. I was beside myself and probably should have stopped for a room. But to Memphis we got to - in the early hours of the morning. It had to have been after midnight when we arrived, and had no idea where to stop and get some sleep for a few hours. We drove the river walk which was still so busy with people walking there were not even any open public parking spots. So we headed to the east edge of town and found a motel parking lot to catch some zzzz in. Not the best plan, but we were tired.

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Oklahoma-Arkansas State Line

Across the great state of Oklahoma we zoomed. Had a campsite all picked out just into Arkansas on the edge of the Ozarks. All day was rain and storms and darkness. As we approached Arkansas there were tornado warnings filling the radio stations. Camping weather it was not and our trip was quickly becoming a race to stay between serious storms. Definitely not as advertised by dad - you know - smores at the campfire and low stress family good times. I kinda have that Clark Griswold ideal and expectation - until things go slightly incorrectly, then I am the first one to fly off the handle. But admitting is the first step right? So I am working on it. The family was hanging in, and it was still very early into the trip. This would be day 4. Sure enough, just as we approach the OK-AR line and neared Alma, AR to go north to our campsite, there was a tornado touchdown as we continued east on I-40. No camping in the Ozarks. I hear they are beautiful, but not this trip. So we drove, with no set destination now, other than east. Stopped in Conway, AR for our first BBQ of the trip.

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Elk City, Oklahoma and Oklahoma City. Elk City - got a hotel, as the weather was not optimal. We had planned on going through central Texas- though Austin but there was terrible flooding in the region. We opted for a northerly route which ended up being an equally bad choice. Tornadoes everywhere. This comes from someone who is originally from Texas, and used to tornadoes. But I have never gotten closer to one than we did on this trip! Anyway, got into OKC for lunch and ate in the brick town district which has a river walk of sorts. Had pizza and beers at Knucks Wheelhouse and it was damn fine!

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Ruidoso, NM Finally got packed, including all kinds of camping gear strapped to the roof of the car. P oh and two folding tables that we had to return to friends 20 miles from Abq. Headed due south to see Amber’s dad before embarking on our adventure east. Stayed one night in a La Quinta there, then went into the mountains to camp for a night. Set up our two tents and had a peaceful night in the woods.

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2015 Summer trip

Started off packing all of our belongings in a storage pod, actually a pack rat-but it’s the same thing. We knew we were in for an adventure over the next month plus. We had been saving money and planning this for months. My wife and I had quit our jobs, are we’re frantically trying to tie up loose ends and finish packing everything we owned into a huge metal box in our driveway. For example- what do you do with a parakeet, an extra car, and many house plants when you plan to have no home for the summer? These are things you tend to overlook if you have never been in this situation. We had a basic idea of where we were going for the trip…but we had only narrowed it down to a few places as to where we would live once this camping/driving thousands of miles trip was over. We hoped this trip would help us choose where to end up. We wanted to explore North Carolina, as a viable option to live-to raise our boys into adulthood. Our initial thoughts were, the Raleigh/Durham area of NC. Or Las Vegas, NV, or Colorado Springs/Denver area. 3 random options, all more different than you can imagine. At this point we had spent the last ten years in New Mexico, Albuquerque most recently. We love the state, but knew it was time for a change before the kids got any older and more attached to life there.