Day 4 Photos

A little out of order, but here's what happened between Columbia, MO and Charleston, WV.

Ozarkland. We didn't go in, but it was the most interesting thing to take a photo of while filling up with gas. That and I didn't think that the Ozarks actually came that far north.

The Arch. I was surprised that the park is actually called "Jefferson National Expansion Museum." The brand "arch" and "gateway" aren't anywhere in the name. Go figure. Anyways, this thing is really cool, especially as you read about the history of the design (1947) and construction (not until 1960). Saarinen didn't know how to build it, and by the time they figured it out he had passed away.



Not much going on in southern Indiana, so we made a 7 mile side trip to Santa Claus, IN. They've got this and a huge wooden roller coaster. And farmland.

The profile of the Kentucky State Capitol from a hill way up above the heart of Frankfort. The Capitol building is nice, but the governor's mansion is off the hook.

4,238

Fairfax Station, VA

And... we're done. Or, a week ago today, we were done. There was something refreshing about waking up to a "short" drive of only 350 miles or so, but it was also sad to be heading into familiar territory. Once I crossed into Virginia there wasn't a stretch of road in front of me that I hadn't driven at least once before. That was true for the first time since I drove south of Salem, OR.


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We tried to end the trip the way we started: looking for a giant hole in the ground. Turns out there is something called the Grand Canyon of the South in Virginia, but sadly it was way further south than we were going. After reading a terrible review of basically all of the BBQ places in Charlottesville we decided to make a break from smoky pork products and go after more traditional country food. Lunch was at the Southern Kitchen (surprisingly, no website) which probably has the best imitation of my Grandmother's food ever. The tea was similar, the green beans were very similar, the potato salad was very similar... the fried chicken was a little different, but not by much.

After lunch we drove to Middletown, VA, home of Route 11 potato chips. It's a surprisingly small little building where they make small batch potato chips. They are unafraid to use the word "chip" as a verb, and are very proud about their deals with Cracker Barrel and someone else (can't remember). The best part about the "tour" was getting a hot chip, which is a surprisingly pleasant treat.

With that we hopped on I-66 and made the familiar 50 mile trek home. The trip was over. We could stand up and walk around and not get back in a car. Fantastic.

To close, pictures from Day 4:

The WVa state capitol:

Home Sweet Home!

Charleston, WV

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Details to come tomorrow. Highlights:

• Stopped to see the Gateway Arch in a frigid St. Louis. Pretty cool stuff, especially from an engineering perspective.
• Didn't find a Starbucks to start the morning, which was a big disappointment.
• Took a side trip to Santa Claus, IN.
  
• Saw another State Capitol (Frankfort, KY)
• Ended up in our last State Capitol (Charleston, WV)

Day 3 route

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Day 3 Photos

Trying again with Day 3 pictures:

East of Amarillo is, supposedly, the largest cross in the Western Hemisphere. I don't have any way to validate the claim, but it does look pretty big compared to the power poles nearby.

The Oklahoma State Capitol building. That's definitely an oil rig in the foreground. The building is quite impressive.

The inside of the Capitol Dome. The dome wasn't built until 1999, and the names of the donors are inscribed on the marble inside. Like SBC and Halliburton.

An Oklahoma rest area.

Some Kansas grassland. I can't begin to capture the emptiness... Kansas wasn't nearly as flat as advertised, but it was as grassy and empty as advertised.

The Kansas State Capitol in Topeka. We didn't get to go in. There isn't a lot going on in Topeka.

Columbia, MO

We ended up in Columbia, MO today. Original plan was to stop in Kansas City, but we decided to grab our BBQ and then drive another 120 miles down the road before pulling in for the night. It was our first 4 state day, our first day over 700 miles, and our first day without a giant hole in the ground. The highlights, this time in bullet form:

• BBQ stop 1: Lunch at Earl's Rib Palace. The food was good: my ribs were really good, and the sides were great. Dad's pulled pork was also good, but he hated the slaw. Their "sweet tea" also lacked... sugar. The food would have left us with a B/B+ rating, but the history of Earl puts it to an A++. Turns out that Earl was Elvis' personal chef and confidant, and was quite proud that Elvis put on 50 pounds while under his tutelage.
• BBQ stop 2: The original Arthur Bryant's in Kansas City. Frankly, pretty mediocre. Was a little sketchy to walk into, and the ambience was such that it should have been a grade A joint. Turns out the ribs were only okay. The sauces, however, left me very confused. The "hot and spicy" sauce was pretty good, while the mild sauce tasted like Old Bay seasoning in a vinegar and tomato solution. Not very good.
  
• The Oklahoma State Capitol is almost worth a trip to Oklahoma City. It's really a gorgeous building, and the actual House Chamber is really stunning (we didn't hit the Senate side, but I assume it was the same). Plus, you can pretty much walk in and go anywhere you want in the building.
  
• Kansas is not as flat as advertised, but impressively empty, even when compared to wildly empty places like Northern Arizona and New Mexico. Its state capitol is way less impressive than Oklahoma's.
  

Photos coming later when my internet connection doesn't suck.

Amarillo

Day 2 found us driving between Flagstaff and Amarillo (660 miles, with side trips); with the exception of Albuquerque there is stunningly little in between. The high desert of Arizona slowly melds into the slightly less high mountains of western New Mexico, which themselves slowly meld into the high, flat plains of Eastern New Mexico and the Texas Panhandle. To be frank, it's stunningly boring. Here are some pictures and stories:

Just outside of Flagstaff* is Meteor Crater. It's an enormous hole in the ground, which as you probably surmised was created by a meteor tens of thousands of years ago. The picture below doesn't really give you a great sense of scale, but you see some stuff at the bottom of the crater? That's a 6 foot tall fence, which is about the same height as my dad. Meteor Crater turned out to be the second and last stop on the "Giant Hole in the Ground" part of the tour.


This is a picture looking back towards Flagstaff taken from the rim of the crater. Yeah, that's 35 miles away. Flagstaff sits about 7000 feet above sea level, and I think the higher of the two peaks here is 11,000. We crested the road between them around 8046 feet on Monday night. In general I think this is my best picture in terms of capturing the enormity of the West.


This is "70s man", just standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona. If that doesn't ring a bell, think about the Eagles song "Take it Easy". One and the same. Just to the left is historic Route 66, which is arguably the most disappointing part of the trip so far. There's nothing else to note about Winslow.

We ended up eating lunch at Mr. Powdrell's in Albuquerque. My dad got the pork ribs while I got the beef ribs, figuring we were in a beefy part of the country. Not to foreshadow, but I think this trip will permanently settle the beef vs. pork ribs debate across the entire country. My meal wasn't bad: I liked the sauce, but the meat wasn't fantastic. The ribs were also fatty and stringy. On the other hand, my dad's ribs were really good: very smoky meat, nice balance of meat and fat... very good. The downside is that they were coated in a sauce that would have been better on the side. Overall a B grade for Mr. Powdrell's (ambiance was nice, except we were the only ones in the place at 1:30 pm).

Sticking with the food story line, my last tale from Day 2 deals with The Big Texan. Calling it a restaurant kind of undersells everything it has to offer: restaurant, shooting gallery, motel, stable, trading post... it really earns the name "Steak Ranch." The food was actually pretty bad, but the ambience was A+++. There were cowboys walking around singing. Tons of taxidermy. And, it has a stage where you can sit and try to eat a 72oz steak in 60 minutes. Succeed and you eat free. Fail, and you pay $72 for the steak. Our waitress says that roughly one person tries each day, and only 1 in 10 succeed. Sadly no on tried while we were there.

Day 3 takes us from Amarillo to Columbia, MO via Oklahoma City, Wichita, Topeka, and Kansas City.


* The distance that is associated with "just" can vary, but in the Southwest I think the minimum unit of "just" is 50 miles.

Flagstaff

We made it to Flagstaff today. Picked up my dad a little before 10:00 and immediately hit the road. 105 to the 605 to the 10 to the 15 to the 40 to Williams, AZ. In Williams we took a left turn and went to see the Grand Canyon. All I can say about the Grand Canyon is WOW. I'm not sure how many things in life live up to their hype, but this is one of them. Other than that, not a lot of news to report. It still amazes me how little there is in the West... it was easy to drive 60 miles today without seeing an exit from the highway, and often those exits lead to roads that didn't seem to go anywhere worth going to.

Two photos from today:


This was taken at speed somewhere on I-40 between Ludlow, CA and the California/Arizona borderd. But really it could have been taken anywhere on I-40, which has looked like this for the past 400 miles.



This, obviously, is the Grand Canyon. We got there just a few minutes before sunset, so the colors were very impressive. It was (un) surprisingly cold (you can see some of the snow on the ground). I'm not that talented a writer, so I won't try to put the GC into words. If you haven't been, it's on my highly recommended list.

Road Trip: Seattle - LA - DC

I've made the last couple of posts from my hotel in Redding, CA. I did about 620 miles today, including some "sightseeing" in Salem, OR (a pretty lame state Capitol building). The trip went really smoothly until I hit Weed, CA, when I-5 goes back up into the mountains. It snowed on me for the last 70 miles, and snow/dark/unfamiliar roads is pretty much the trifect of super-stressful driving. But I'm here. Sadly I can't post any of pictures because of my lame hotel internet access.

That said, here's what I can tell about Redding:

• There's a really cool bridge*
• The "city center" has nothing open after 8:00
• Well, it has some things open: a couple of cheap and seedy motels, and a couple of bars that looked way to tough for me.
  
• The "Hill Top" area has every chain business imaginable. It's like they just said "Screw downtown, we're just going to build an entirely new city center about two miles on the other side of the interstate.
• If it weren't night and raining I bet it would be very pretty.
  

On to LA (West Hollywood, to be specific) in the morning.


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