Atlanta, GA

Home! But only for a little while, because we’re moving to Portland, Maine!

A few statistics from the road trip:

• ·      Distance: about 9000 miles
• ·      Duration: 50 days
• ·      States travelled through: 21
• ·      Cost of gas: $1074
• ·      Cost of accommodations: $1770 (7 nights in hotels made up about 3/4 of this)
• ·      Bugs slaughtered on the car windshield: uncountable numbers
• ·      Bear attacks: 0

The road trip was amazing; we visited some of the most beautiful places in America, from the badlands to the endless green fields of the corn belt.  We saw glaciers, geysers, deep canyons, and tall granite mountains with amazing vistas.  We spent 50 days and nights together, almost completely uninterrupted, and we are still married.

If you have the chance to vacation in the National Parks, do it.  They were the best part of our trip, original and beautiful.

Thank you for following along with us on this journey.  For those of you that this applies to, thank you for hosting us and sharing your homes with us.  Thank you for the advice and insider knowledge, and thank you for watching our cats (Mom and Dad) and home and plants (Saujan and Kristen).

Safe Journeys!

Beckie and Lester

Baton Rouge and New Orleans, LA

After leaving Austin, we had another night staying with friends: Amanda Young, her boyfriend Tom, and their excitable and endlessly playful dog Bruin (named for the New England hockey team).  We took in an LSU game at a local sports bar before driving to New Orleans the next morning.

In one day, we managed to squeeze in beignets at Café du Monde, a tour of the Garden District, shopping on Magazine Street, an afternoon nap away from the heat, a Cajun-themed dinner, and some very nice desserts.

We pretty much stayed away from Bourbon Street, which, even on a Sunday night, smelled bad and was full of shouty, drunk people holding large, neon drinks.

Austin, TX

One of the best parts of Austin is that it came with our own tour guide and vacation planner: Jess Jankowitsch!  Our first night there, Jess drew out a schedule structured around meals and restaurants, which is the best way to plan trips.  The only requirement for our stay in Austin was that Lester would be making the pilgrimage to Franklin Barbecue, the best barbecue in the country according to some folks at Bon Appetite magazine.

Lester made it to Franklin at a quarter after eight in the morning; there were already 15 people in line in front of him.  Franklin doesn’t even open until 11.  After three hours in line, Lester walked away with roughly eight pounds of brisket, pulled pork, ribs, and sausage.  There was also a small container of potato salad as a nod to the vegetable food group.

The line at Franklin Barbecue.

I don’t know if it was the best barbecue in the US, but it was definitely the best Lester and I have ever had.

We did a few touristy activities between the Tex-Mex, ramen, and barbecue.  We tried to swim at Barton Springs, but it was closed for cleaning – it’s such a popular swimming spot that it has to be cleaned once a week with pressure washers even though it’s a natural spring.  We were able to swim at Big Eddy, which is more of a traditional pool that’s fed by river water.

We also saw the view of the city skyline from Mount Bonnell.

And we were entertained (and, in Lester’s case, pooped on) by Jess’ birds.

Roswell, NM and McDonald Observatory, TX

We went to the UFO museum in Roswell, New Mexico, which is a small warehouse with cubicles lined with blow-ups of old newspaper articles.  A couple of things I learned:

1) In 1947, a UFO crashed outside of Roswell, littering a ranch with strange metallic debris and alien corpses.

2) The US government then conducted an extensive coverup, claiming it was a high-altitude surveillance balloon.

3) There are actually people who believe the first two statements.

We wrapped up our space-themed day with a visit to the McDonald Observatory near Fort Davis, Texas.  We booked tickets for the late night star observation activity, however, it was cloudy and rainy.  It is apparently monsoon season in this part of the country, which was surprising because neither Lester or myself thought that there was generally much rain in the southwest.

Grand Canyon and Petrified Forest, AZ

Our first view of the Grand Canyon was a white wall of clouds; the weather had finally turned on us and became rainy and unaccommodating.  Between the weather and what is likely strep throat, we abandoned our plans of hiking in to the canyon and, instead, drove around until the clouds cleared and some decent views emerged.  The canyon is so big that it honestly does not look real when you see it in person - more like a scaled diorama or really good mural.

There is a bright side to our unexpected change in plans, as it allowed us enough time to stop by the Petrified Forest on our way to Texas.

Lester was finally able to see petrified trees and overcome his disappointment from Yellowstone.

Las Vegas, NV

We stayed in Vegas for a day and a half and had very un-Hangover (the movie) experience.  We drank moderately, we gambled and lost money moderately, and we did not stay up especially late.  Camping for the last month and half had not really prepared us to live it up in Vegas.

Our only overindulgences were a nice hotel and too much food at the buffet.  Here's picture of Lester and his very eclectic plate (ravioli, fried chicken, roast beef, and tuna tartar).

We also saw a show and watched the fountains at the Bellagio.

Yosemite National Park, CA

On our way to Yosemite from Redwood, we stopped in Napa Valley and took a couple of wine tours.  We don’t have any pictures; we were too busy drinking and pretending like we knew anything about wine.

Afterwards, we visited with Lester’s Aunt and Uncle in Sunnyvale (refer to the Li family Reunion post for pictures).  This was our first time in a house in five weeks, which meant there was a kitchen and a bathroom and laundry that was not coin operated.  It was wonderful.

We went out for Dim Sum in the morning and I tried chicken feet.  Lester also re-tried chicken feet and still does not care for it.  The food was really good and we both enjoyed the reprieve from camping.

Yosemite is on fire.  If we hadn’t read the news reports, it still would have been obvious well before we reached the park, given the ominous cloud of smoke we saw on the horizon. 

As of now, this fire is the third largest in California’s known history, having burnt almost 250,000 acres.  Even with the devastation, most of the park is still open and the valley is, for the most part, free of smoke.  It is also free of crowds, the fire and smoke having deterred many tourists despite the Labor Day weekend.

On Monday, we hiked to the top of Half Dome.  The climb leading up to the bare granite was not too strenuous and the weather was cool and cloudy.  Once we’d passed the park ranger checking permits all that was left were the steep steps up to the cables and the cables themselves.

You cannot hike up the granite slope of Half Dome, you must pull yourself up using the cables, resting every 8 feet or so on two-by-fours spanning the metal poles.  The stone surface in between the cables is mostly worn smooth by the thousands of people who have previously climbed it.  It was easier coming back down to sit on your heels and slide in between the rest spots than to try to keep your footing.

The cables have a reputation for being frightening, which they’ve earned given that people have lost their footing and fallen to their deaths here before.   Despite this, most people climb without any safety gear.  Lester and I used some of our rock climbing equipment to tie off to the cables so that if we slipped, we wouldn’t go far.

The view from the top was beautiful and only partially obstructed by the smoke in the distance.  Although, I think that the appeal of Half Dome is not so much the view as being able to say that you survived it.

On our way up, we met a man who was hiking Half Dome for the 90^th time, with the goal of reaching 100.  He was very nice and offered us some advice and encouragement about ascending the cables.

Lester planned a three-day, 30-mile backpacking trip South of the valley that brought us out to a succession of small lakes in Yosemite’s backcountry.  This late in the summer, the park is very hot and very dry.  All of the creeks that we passed were dry rock beds or shallow pools of stagnant water and much of the trail is now a fine, dark dust.  Whoever hiked in front would send up clouds of dirt that coated the person behind.

Not wanting to camp dry, we hiked 14 miles the first day out to Royal Arch Lake.  We were tired and dirty, but thankfully the lake was full and we were able rinse enough to feel human again.

On the second day, we passed a couple of hikers coming from the opposite direction who informed us that there was no more water where they had come from.  With only three liters between us, we decided to hike out the remaining 15 miles that day.

Towards the end of our hike, I commented on how tan Lester’s legs were getting.  As it turns out, it was mostly dirt.

Redwood National Park, CA

This is Lester’s summary of Redwood National Park: “We saw big trees.”

For the sake of a more interesting blog post, I’ll elaborate some.  We only spent a day in Redwood, which is reasonable given the number of short nature walks and day hikes.

We picked a few of the popular routes and did the only thing there is to do in Redwood National Park: admire the redwoods.

Here’s a picture of me in front of a large tree:

Here’s a nice picture of Lester sitting on a large tree:

Here’s a not-as-nice picture of Lester getting stuck in a tree:

Here’s a picture of both of us to wrap it all up:

Portland and Crater Lake National Park, OR

We spent a day in Portland that started with brunch at a restaurant called Tasty n Sons, which, at 10am on a weekday, was still very busy.  We had enough time for two touristy activities in the city.  First, we visited Powell’s City of Books, which is a branch of a local bookstore chain that claims to be the biggest independent new and used bookstore in the world.  The store itself is certainly the largest bookstore I’ve ever been in, with entire rooms for each genre.

Later, we walked to the Lan Su Chinese gardens, located next to Portland’s Chinatown, which is a scary, Chinese-less incarnation of Chinatown.  In the place of restaurants and smelly fish markets, there were boarded up buildings and, instead of tourists, there were hobos.

The gardens, however, were really very nice.

 

We drove out to Crater Lake the next day to see the bluest freshwater either of us had ever seen.  The lake was formed when a volcano erupted and collapsed in on itself almost 8000 years ago, forming a basin that collected rainwater and snow melt.

We took the boat out to Crater Lake’s island and hiked to the top of the cinder cone volcano that formed a little after the initial, violent eruption.

On a side note: dear god, there are a lot of hornets in this part of the country.  We eat practically every meal outside and always have the unwelcome company of at least one buzzing, stinging guest.  Lester’s record is now five dead hornets during one meal.

Seattle and Olympic National Park, WT

On our way to Seattle, we had the unfortunate timing to reach a blasting site five minutes after the road was closed, forcing all traffic to a complete stop for the next hour.  It was about dinner time and we now knew that we would be setting up camp in the dark, so we decided to make the best of the situation and cooked dinner on the side of the highway.

When we eventually reached camp later that night, we discovered that it was very small and situated so close to the airport that that you could make out the fine details on the airplanes as they landed and took off.  The showers were coin operated and vacillated wildly between hot and cold without ever settling in the middle.  The pit toilets were something that is best not described, but left to the imagination.

We went to Pike's Place in the morning, which I did not enjoy much more than the painful shower I'd had earlier in the day.  Lester, being more tolerant of crowds, had fun watching people toss around fish while I followed along behind him, letting him part the waves of people too busy taking pictures with their iPhones to watch where they're walking.

The Chihuly Glass and Garden did not have this problem, as people appeared to be more conscious of the fact that they were in a museum full of very breakable art.  As we toured the museum, Lester and I realized that we'd actually seen work from this artist before when we were in Venice five years ago for coursework for WPI.  He'd had large, abstract chandeliers hanging around the palazzos and open spaces in Murano, where he'd studied decades ago.

The next morning, we took the ferry from Seattle to Bainbridge Island to reach Olympic National Park.  We have now officially traveled by land, sea, and air on this trip.

We drove to the Pacific ocean and Mora beach in Olympic, which is as far westward as we are going to reach on this road trip.

After getting a backcountry permit form the park rangers, we hiked out two miles along the beach to spend the night camping in the sand near Hole-in-the-Wall.  The park is very strict about enforcing the use of bear cans (plastic, bear-proof food containers), although the ranger said that this was less for the bears and more for the raccoons.  He warned us not to turn our backs on an unclosed bear can or a raccoon would seize the opportunity and "tackle" it for the chance to steal food from us.

At the start of our hike, the fog that had settled along the beach was so thick and the sun was so bright behind it that the sky and waves appeared like a solid white mass.  On the other side, the driftwood, many of which were really whole trees wider than my arm-span, lay strewn together to form a low wall of sun-bleached, white wood.  Since the beach was made of small, shiny, black pebbles, the whole hike felt like we were walking on the shores of a monochromatic, alien world.

When the sun eventually burned through the fog as we ate dinner on an especially large piece of driftwood, we were finally able to see the ocean and the huge, towering rocks just off of the coast.

We shucked oysters for dinner and rinsed the dishes in the ocean.

Our view of the beach was just as beautiful at night as it was during sunset.

The next morning, at low tide, we explored the tide pools, trying not to step on too many of the tiny baby snails that covered the rocks.  Afterwards, we packed out our soaked and sandy belongings and headed inland to the Hoh rainforest, but not before driving through Forks, WT (we had to as it is on the only highway).  If you are not familiar with the writings of Stephanie Meyer, you should know that this is the setting for the Twilight series.  The sign below is an example of what you can now find in Forks.

The rainforest was not as rainy or damp as we expected it to be, but we did enjoy the Hall of Mosses and several other nature walks.

We've just left Portland, Oregon, so that post should be coming soon.

Glacier National Park, MT

When Lester and I were still in the planning stages of this road trip, we discussed whether or not we should bother going to Glacier.  We wanted to see the glaciers before they all melted forever, but it is pretty far north and out of the way of the direct route between Yellowstone and Seattle.  I cannot emphasize enough how glad we are that we made it a stop on our trip.

Glacier has the best views and the best hikes we’ve seen so far; not just on the trip, but in all of our time in the outdoors.  It beats the views at Yellowstone, the Smokies, the Adirondacks, the White and Green Mountains, and most likely will win out over the Grand Canyon and Yosemite as well.

We only spent two and half days in Glacier, but the park really deserves at least a week.  The backcountry camping is supposed to be especially nice, despite the fact that Glacier has the highest density of bears in the lower 48 (and the most bear attacks).  Since we didn’t have time for backpacking, we spent our time on two separate day-hikes.  The first and one of the most recommended hikes in the country is the Highline trail.  This 12 mile route climbs up in to the mountains, providing amazing panoramas that make it apparent why this region is sometimes called the Alps of North America.  There was even a chalet at one peak where you could stay the night or just buy some Gatorade and Skittles.

The second day we hiked out to the Grinnell Glacier.  We did not take the boat that circumvents the first two miles of the trail, which at $25 a person is really not worth it since those are the only two miles that aren’t uphill.

The glacier is situated near the peak of a mountain, where it melts in to a freezing cold glacial lake that drains in to a large waterfall.  The water is literally ice-cold as it has big chunks of glacier floating in it.  A few crazy people jumped in to the lake; I soaked my feet for a second and Lester poked a finger in.

(one of the lakes at the base of the mountains 

that is fed by the runoff of the melting glaciers)

You can only reach the glacier by crossing the runoff from the lake, well away from the waterfall’s edge.  There are some wobbly rocks that span the flowing water and, with some waterproof shoes and good balance, you can make it to the other side.

Lester instructed me that I had to include the picture of the grizzly bear that we saw (the only bear we’ve seen so far on the trip).  This picture was taken from about 400 yards away, which is the distance I like my bears at.

We are now on our way to Seattle and Olympic National Park.