Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, Death Valley, San Fransisco and Yosemite!

Sorry for a big delay, we've had no internet access at all until now! The above are some pics of New Orleans and a mighty Flying J! We decided to buy a cheap camera from Wal-Mart in the end.

Well, we had had a few problems with Roger when I last wrote a blog to say the least! After forking out for the muffler to be replaced we tentatively set off for the Grand Canyon - listening for every knock and scrape in case we had further problems!

Luckily, we have not had any major problems thus far. I put major in italics because we have had a few niggling issues that we've attempted to deal with. They are as follows:

1. Console heat - The center console in Roger (where we put our things like camera, map etc...) gets VERY hot on the passenger side - so hot that I accidentally touched it with my foot and burnt it (a proper burn, with blister and all). If we put anything near it, it melts or catches fire. We've had a bag melt to it as well as a towel catching fire. Yes - you might be thinking "why doesn't the case around the engine melt then?" - I'm not 100% sure, but I'd imagine it's a thermosetting polymer which won't melt. We opened it up and noticed that the pipe that comes from the carburetor to the engine manifold has a split (right where the manifold is) which pumps out extremely hot air as well as toxic fumes. We purchased some "Tiger Tape" that is supposed to patch it up, but it's not worked at all. I got underneath Rog to have a look from the bottom and noticed a slightly bigger hole too. Again, the patch up job there hasn't worked either.
2. Tire alignment - The front tires are out of alignment, which is making the "new" tiers on the front wear down faster. We haven't got the money to fix this unfortunately!
3. Transmission - We started developing problems where we would put Roger into "Drive" and he wouldn't do anything. I guessed correctly that this was the transmission, but I didn't realise that Roger would need the transmission fluid. He did, he was empty. We bought some and found the place in the main engine area where we had to put it.
   
4. Rear view mirror - Still broken from about 45 days ago, we've stuck it back up. Let's hope the heat here doesn't make it fall off again!
5. Starting motor - Which broke along route 66. I think it was on it's way out for a long time. We stopped for some "gas" and when we went to leave the engine just went 'mmmmmmmmmmm' as opposed to 'chugachugachugachuga bruuuuuuuuum'. Pleased that I diagnosed the problem, I checked through the parts we bought before we left Buffalo and found what I thought was a new starting motor. I changed the part and Roger started just fine! Similar to our breakdown ages ago in Pennsylvania, we stopped the engine, put it all back together and prepared to set out on our way only to find that he didn't start! Luckily a helpful guy named Tom Chavez just appeared and politely informed me that what I had changed was the solenoid, not the starting motor. He took us to a car-part store down the road and we got a new starting motor. I fitted it and voila, Roger started no problem!
6. Overheating - Not overly surprising that a car of Roger's age has been overheating really. This has happened on two major occasions ...once going through the desert in Nevada and once on the way up the mountains to Yosemite. Both times when we've stopped, water has been spewing out the top of the radiator which - luckily - has some kind of outlet for immense steam (in the form of an open-ended pipe that comes out the top of the radiator and down the side). Both times we've been lucky in the sense that we had plenty of water to help cool him down and re-fill him!

That aside, what have we been upto? Well we made it to the Grand Canyon which was actually pretty amazing. Most people say that visitors just spend about 45 minutes there, but we spent two days camping there! During that time we didn't go far from the van, just to and fro from the rim of the Canyon (on the South side). We stayed at a $12-a-night campground which is one of those "self-registration" ones. On the first night, Sarah and I were playing Monopoly in the van when a car pulled up behind. I stepped out of the van and a guy approached asking if he, his wife and his son could camp on our plot with us as everywhere was rammed. I said that's fine, so they set up their tent.



A little while later he came back up and we decided to build a camp fire and have a chat. He told us loads of cool placed to see, whilst his son made us campfire-baked marshmallows. He also told us about a cool "pie-iron" device which you could buy for making loads of different things in campfires. After a few beers, we decided to go to bed. The next morning we woke to find that they had already packed up and left. I stepped outside and on a rock nearby was a state park map with their details on should we need anything, about 6 tins of various foods, $12 for letting them stay and ... wait for it ... a PIE IRON! We didn't expect anything at all, but at most maybe just $6 for half of the campsite rent! We've yet to send them an email saying thank you, but we will do after we've written this!

The next night we had a similar scenario, with a young guy needing to park his truck next to our van while he, his two friends he'd just met that day and two hitch-hikers camped within the campground (don't ask, it's complicated!). Again, I said sure no problem and that night they joined us around our campfire for a chat and a few beers.

After leaving the Grand Canyon, we headed for Las Vegas which I was very excited about! It's not as remote as I thought it'd be - but when I say that, it was still at least 70 miles from the nearest small town. As we got close, we could see the skyline which was cool. We found a very cheap hotel / casino called the Sahara (which is one of the oldest casinos there, and where the Beatles played their first Las Vegas gig!). At only $30-ish a night it was a steal I thought!



However, despite what some people we've met along the way have said, we don't think Vegas is cheap. At all. We limited ourselves to $50 each in any casino or for anything we wanted in town, and within about 20 minutes of being in the casino, we had lost $60 (but we did get a free drink from the cocktail waitress!). It doesn't take a genius to work out that the huge buildings were funded by 99.9% of people that visit Vegas. I think that the only way to make money in the casinos is to play the poker tables, but to do that you need a bigger budget than ours! My overall impression of Vegas is that it is extremely fun, but in order to have a good time there, you need to have a lot of money that you're willing to burn. I hear that you can get "comp'd" if you spend enough there!

We were excited to go up the Stratosphere and on one of the three rides at the top - our USA book gave us very favorable prices for doing so, but when we got there it would have cost nearly $20 each just to go up to the top, then another $18 each for a go on a ride :(.

From Vegas to Death Valley - the hottest place on earth (on average temperatures) and officially the second hottest place in the world, only losing out to the Sahara Desert by 2 degrees Fahrenheit sometime in the early 20th century! While I'm skeptical about the above claims, both the USA book and information leaflets there state this. After learning the above (and the following) facts, we just had to stay there - in Roger with no air conditioning. Some facts about "Furnace Creek" campground that we stayed at:

• It's 214ft below sea level
• In summer, temperatures often surpass 125 degrees Fahrenheit (52 degrees Celsius)
• It's called "Death Valley" not because people die there all the time (as I had sort-of en-visioned) but because there were once a group of travelers that took a shortcut through the valley where one of the members died. As they got to the other side, one of the travelers stopped, looked back and said "Goodbye, Death Valley". And that's that.

So anyway, off we go, trundling through Death Valley (which you're supposed to pay $20 to enter, but we didn't see anywhere to pay - so we didn't) in the sweltering heat when we finally arrive at Furnace Creek Campground. Not surprisingly, it's empty. There wasn't even another car there! We set up camp and it wasn't long before we decided we had better get some ice from a nearby town if we wanted any change of surviving the day and night.

We get to the town and get a couple of bags of ice, and proceed to put lots in our mini-cooler, which usually just holds water, and the rest went into our main cooler. We get back to the campground and the VERY LAST corner we have to go around (we almost missed the turning) we turned way too hard and the mini cooler fell off the sink and broke on the floor, losing almost an entire bag of ice! Nevertheless we "sucked eggs" and just carried on without getting anymore ice.

During the night, another car did turn up, and they set up camp but by morning they had gone (maybe it was too hot?). We were up by 5:30/6am as the heat when the sun comes up is just too crazy to sleep through. We didn't bother staying another night funnily enough, but proud that we did one night (and half expecting a park ranger to come along and give us a "We survived Death Valley" sticker for Roger) we headed out for Route 1 (the Californian Highway drive between Los Angeles and San Fransisco).


We planned to join route 1 just above Los Angeles because we didn't have enough money to actually do anything there, and it's a bit crummy according to all sources. On the wat to Santa Barbara (just above Los Angeles) we overheated (as explained in the beginning of this blog post). When we stopped, we met an English woman (with her Spanish husband) that had also overheated.

They had been there an hour already, so they didn't stay too long - but more importantly - after they had left an MG pulled up with and English numberplate! Amazed, I went and started talking to this guy. He told us that he's on a would tour road trip, raising money for UNICEF. He's been to loads of places already, including Iran, Pakistan, Australia, Mexico and now USA (many places in between)! See http://bridgetthemidget.co.uk/ for more information! It also turned out that he stayed at the Sahara hotel / casino in Las Vegas when we were there AND he checked in right next to us (he remembers seeing us and I remember seeing his briefcase [and that he had an English accent]).

Aside from him overheating, he was also having problems with his clutch - so we helped him add more fluid to his clutch control. I got to sit inside his car and pump the clutch, whilst Sarah put the pump onto the tire and he (Roy) did the messy bit of attaching it to the cylinder in the engine. He didn't have the correct top for the cylinder, so I provided the awesome idea of using one of our many bottle lids - seeing as we have quite a collection of empty water bottles these days! Amazingly, my idea worked and he got on his way.

We also set off, and it wasn't long before we pulled into the same petrol station as Roy, where we let him use our map to figure out his next route. We were going in roughly the same direction, but it just so happened that about 10 miles after we left the gas station we had Roy following us. When we were on the Interstate, if I went in the middle lane - so did Roy! I think he was using us as a guide which was nice! About 80 miles later, on a small quiet road, I pulled over to switch driving with Sarah, where Roy stopped to make sure we were ok and didn't have any engine problems! After saying that we were fine, he set off and that was the last we saw of him.


We stopped at a campsite about halfway through California to route 1 where we were greeted by the most miserable camp host in the world. The site, however, was amazing. It was just off the road and sort-of in a mini bay, about the size of Elberry Cove. We left early the next day to head for route 1. By the time we got there, we started looking for places to stay (by the way there's no Flying J's along these smaller roads - they're only on Interstates). Getting hungry, we started our drive along route 1 around 3pm.

After driving along most of it, and finding nowhere to stay we were now starving and therefore not really taking in much of the sights - although it did look amazing (if a little foggy!). Eventually we stopped at a town called Seaside where we ate a McDonalds - and let me tell you, it was the best MaccyD's we've ever had! We just got a drive thru as it's cheaper than eating inside (they add a tax for eating in) when I noticed some guy walking around the parking lot asking for money. He approached my window and said "Get a bruvva a burger man?" to which I said "nope, sorry" when he instantly replied "Gotta split?" whilst making the V signal with his hand near his face, still walking kinda past the van probably because he's used to people saying no to him. I said no again and he disappeared. After we finished eating, we popped to the petrol station before heading off in search of somewhere to stay. That beggar guy must have done well because he just pulled up in his car and put a full tank of petrol in!

We set off, by which time it was now dark and we were near San Fransisco where they don't have many campsites, and everything is more expensive. In fact, the whole of California is expensive - petrol, food and accommodation (we picked up a room saver guide incase we decided to stay in a motel, but they're around $50+ for the cheapest of rooms!). Eventually, we found a KOA campsite, which are generally more expensive than a basic campground - but they do have showers and other bonus facilities. As we pulled in, the attendant told us that we couldn't stay because we needed to be "self-contained" with proper facilities inside the van. It's Californian law apparently. She did point us in the direction of another campground in Santa Cruz where we eventually arrived and stayed the night.



We headed to Yosemite the next day, stopping to pick up some supplies such as oil, transmission fluid and Tiger Tape to patch up the engine manifold holes, which was a really nice drive. We overheated on the way up the mountain to the park entrance, but that didn't matter too much as we were able to get some pictures of the surrounding area. After looking for a cheap campground in there (you have to use the campgrounds there, unless you get a backcountry pass due to the bears and lions that live there), we eventually found a $10-a-night one. We headed to it, to be greeted with a 2 mile steep downhill road with holes everywhere. The sign at the top did say that the campground wasn't suitable for trucks, trailers or RVs and it wasn't joking.

We arrived at the basic campground where they have a hole in the ground for a toilet and you have to get your water from the creek and purify it yourselves, but you were allowed to collect wood and burn it (which was a bonus as most campgrounds don't let you - but that's never stopped us). They also have lockers on each campsite where you MUST put all your food in, to stop bears from taking it. We weren't even allowed to keep any food in the van, not even canned goods as bears can smell it. Apparently, bears can smell a dead deer three miles away!

We stayed two nights, which gave us an entire day to go for a hike nearby. We set off with a backpack full of food and some water, and after walking a mile we stopped to take a photo. Batteries dead. We were gutted! Still, we continued over plateaus, through forests and along creeks for about 5 miles where we stopped for some food. Seeing as our water was nearly empty, and we had been walking for about three hours, we decided to head back. As we walked back, we realised we didn't recognise any of the areas we were going through. After a while I began to get snappy because I didn't fancy spending the night lost in the middle of this huge national park with free-roaming lions and bears and no torch! We found a trail through some woods and I saw that there were footprints - so that was a relief. I decided to check out the footprints, looking for my own foot print and low and behold I found one! We had walked through this path, even though we didn't recognise it! About a mile and a half of following the footprints and we were back. Phew!




When we got back, we used the supplies we bought to repair Roger's known problems. We applied the Tiger Tape to the holes in the engine manifold and put the rear-view mirror back up. That night we were both awoken to the sound of what we think were hyenas. It sounded like a weird laugh, followed by a bark or two. Weird. In the morning we set off up that horrible, narrow, winding, busted-up road. Glad to arrive at the top, we headed back to San Fransisco so we could go over the Golden Gate bridge! We didn't stop in San Fransisco mainly because it's like driving through London, but with no where to park at all. We were lucky going over the bridge as there was no toll that day, and we managed to get some photos of Alcatraz too!



We're going to head almost directly to Yellowstone from here (just north of San Fransisco) which will take a couple of days. We'll probably stay there for a day or two, then head almost straight back to Buffalo where we'll sell Roger and head home! Limited internet access over this side of the country, with a lack of Flying J's has meant that we cannot get online as much as we'd like - but don't panic! We're fine, and well!

Speak soon!

Love to everyone as usual! Missing everyone lots!

Ed & Sarah xxx

Lots to say, Very little time!

I have to write this blog post rather fast unfortunately, as we don't have much time before we head west to the Grand Canyon!

From last time, we headed into Kentucky and met up with Sarah's Uncle and his friends. They lived on a nice big cattle farm, which me and Sarah decided to walk around until Sarah nearly died when we ran out of water and we were about 3 miles away from the main house! We stayed in a detached guest house which was really nice! They even had a really playful cat which reminded me of Matt & Becky's cat - Tyler!

We stayed there for a few days before heading south to Nashville where we stayed for 2 days in a budget motel. The first night we went to the main strip in Nashville to see all the country bands and have a few beers. We had a great time, we even had a guy who wouldn't stop telling me that he was "the" Tommy Lee, to which I replied - "You may be called Tommy Lee, but you're not the drummer one". He took offense to this and failed at trying to get me thrown out by whinging to the doorman! As we left the pub, it became apparent that Sarah's bag had been stolen from right under our noses! We didn't lose too much, but we did lose her purse and the camera that had some really good pictures on it!

We logged the theft with the police and nothing has happened - surprise, surprise! The next day we popped to the Jack Daniel's distillery in Lynchburg. The tours are absolutely free and we both found it very interesting indeed! We did buy a bottle of Jack Daniel's, only because you can't buy this particular bottle anywhere else. It's also funny that they're allowed to sell it because it's based in a "dry county" which means no alcohol can be sold there! They have a separate law that states they're allowed to sell commemorative bottles there.

The next day we made a bee-line for New Orelans. We stopped at the welcome center just inside Louisiana where they managed to get us an amazing deal on a hotel right down in the french quarter! We popped out that evening, had a drink called a "Hand Grenade" which they only sell in New Orleans and the recipe is a secret ...apparently.

Bummer - I'm out of time, so I'll finish this blog post later but there's some things I want to quickly add!

We're heading to the Grand Canyon so don't expect to hear from us much during the time we're there! We're already doing 120mile stints without anything in between, including petrol stations! I would just quickly point out that we also broke down twice on our way through Texas. At 1am, Sarah sleeping in the back, the drive shaft center bearing went again. As my mobile is incapable of ringing the AAA for some stupid reason, we went to the motel over the road, got the AAA to drop the van there and we got it repaired the next day (after spending 5 hours in the garage!!!).

We left there and got 50 miles up the road, and the same thing happens. This time the center bearing slipped down the drive shaft, so the drive shaft ended up rubbing against the bracket. We stopped, I jumped out and saw lots of smoke. Massively annoyed wouldn't even begin to describe how I felt. I had sarah hold the drive shaft up with a towel whilst I used our crowbar to smack the bearing back into place. As the screw wasn't there to hold it, we had to turn back and drive slowly. Stopped at the same motel, got the center bearing replaced again the next day by the same garage for free which is where we noticed a MASSIVE gash in the side of the muffler which was blowing extremely hot air directly onto the center bearing. We had to get this fixed and as it was Saturday we had to move fast! Luckily they put us in touch with a garage nearby and they replaced the muffler and some of the tail-pipe section mega fast and we got on the road and 700 miles away to here: Albuqueque, New Mexico!

We're absolutely loving this place, it's JUST like in the movies and we've even driven through some really wild west towns with populations of around 231! We're so glad we carried on in Roger, despite the problems of late!

Hope everyone's ok!

Love to all!

Ed & Sarah

xxxxx

Roger's Fixed (I think) and we're now GMT -6

I did promise more regular posts, and seeing as I have the opportunity now, I'm posting another blog!

We woke around 7:15am (12:15pm GMT) when Susan (Sarah's mum) called the motel room to have a chat. Sarah was pleased to hear from her mum seeing as they've mainly been emailing since we've been away!

We fell back to sleep afterward, but woke around 8:45am remembering that we have a free "continental breakfast" which ends at 9:00! We got dressed quickly, and ran to the lobby to chow down. Now, I'm not going to down-talk the free continental breakfasts, because we need food, and anything free is massive bonus - but this wasn't that great. You were allowed one item per person, so I chose a coffee and Sarah had a bowl of cereal. I'm pretty sure that the cereal had been sat in it's dispenser for about 5 months based on the facts that this motel is in the middle of nowhere, and it was empty. That being said, we did manage to catch a glimpse of Roger over the road in the garage.

If anyone cares, you can see where we stayed on Google Street View, and if you rotate the image, you can see just how close the garage really was! NOTE TO IMPATIENT PEOPLE: Give the map time to fully load, and you'll see the actual place we're at, not just a map, you can move/rotate the image too. We were in the room with the door fourth from the left, on the bottom. You can also see "Alan's Tow Truck" which is the same truck that picked us up. Funny how he took us to the place he BLOODY WORKS AT THE SKANK!

Roger was still hanging up in the air from where they left him yesterday, so we knew he wasn't ready then. We watched TV and packed our stuff up just before the checkout time of 11am, but as the girl over at the garage said "Come over before you check out and see if the van's ready, if not we'll ring the motel and get them to extend your checkout time for you.". So, we popped over there to be told that (and I really wasn't that surprised) "The parts the mechanics ordered were wrong so they're getting different ones in later, it'll be ready around 1pm.". She did ring the motel for us and they said that we can stay in the room until the cleaner comes to do our room - after that we could sit in the lobby.

That was fine with us, so we went back to the motel. 11:01am and the cleaner knocks on the door. I had a feeling that would happen somehow. So we grabbed our bags and relocated to the lobby where we set up the laptop and sat around for nearly 2 hours. When the people running the motel started to eat their lunch in the lobby, we decided to go and get something cheap to eat from the petrol station across the road, with bags.

After chatting once again about the cricket to the Indians (real Indians from India, not native Indians) that run the petrol station, we left with our lunch:

• 1 x packet of salt and vinegar pork scratchings (not that great)
  
• 1 x packet of sour cream crisps (nice)
  
• 1 x bottle of water (it's water...)

and sat on the road outside the garage to eat it. Once done, we went inside and they said it'd be another hour so we just sat tight and eventually all the work was finished! I stood up and settled the bill ...umm hang on wtf? It says $399.86 now? What the hell is going on? The manager told me that the different parts have bumped up the total cost unfortunately, but the work's done now so they can't change it. One thing's for sure, garage's in America are the same as England. Reservedly, I paid for it and we left in a pretty happy mood seeing as we were back on the road. Sarah slept for a few hours whilst I drove 200 miles north, then we swapped and Sarah drove another 200 miles to our current destination - Ramada motel in Clarksville, Tennessee. We found a nice cheap voucher for this place ($33) so we thought seeing as we've barely eaten today, we can afford it.

We arrived, and it's very surprisingly very, very nice. Probably one of the best places we've stayed! This town (although it's dark now) looks much like Asheville in North Carolina. We can see the skyline composed of thick forests growing over mountains. I have to say, as low as we were yesterday, we're much happier now - and America really does have a lot of amazing scenery to offer - something we didn't expect as much as we're seeing.

When we checked in, the (Indian [they must get everywhere]) lady told us that we'd have to pay $40, plus tax, for a double room as the only single room she had left was a smoking room. Now, I do smoke, but smoking rooms really stink and even make me feel ill in the morning. We said that it'd be ok and we'll take the smoking room for the $30 price. That was fine, and we went to our room. It doesn't smell anything half as bad as previous smoking rooms we've checked into! It's also quite spacious, has a fridge-freezer, microwave, ironing board (not that we'll use it), coffee, a sofa, coffee table and even a basic dining table! Most of these things are extras that you pay for!

After receiving a quick phone call from the front desk lady to check that the room was cool with us (to which we replied "Yes! It's lovely!" in a very ecstatic manner) Sarah noticed that we didn't have a coffee maker. We rang the lady back and she said she'd have a look around and call us back in a mojo. A few minutes later she rang back and told us that she has one for us to use if we could go get it from the lobby. I went and got it, which is where I learned that it was actually her coffee maker for her to use tonight, but we could have it AND she also gave us an "Outdoor Adventure Pack" which she said "It's a gift, you can have it" :).

I whisked myself back to the room with coffee maker and gift, eagerly wanting to open it to see what's inside. Sarah put the coffee on and I opened the gift to find:

• A tube of toothpaste
• Some Halls Soothers
• Some Aspirin
  
• A heat pack for your back pains
• Three Tampons
• A health bar snack thing (nuts and raisins)

How kind!

So that's where we're at for the moment. We're 24.4 miles away from Elkton, Kentucky which is where we should hopefully rendezvous with Sarah's uncle. Roger has been making some "popping" noises every time we remove our foot from the accelerator, but it's not the same as the horrific noise of the drive shaft trying to escape. We've also passed through a time zone, so we're now on Central Time, that's GMT -6.

Missing everyone lots!

Lots of love!

A happier, Ed & Sarah :)

Orlando, Florida Keys, and It Was Bound to Happen!!

When I last wrote a blog entry (I will try more often, promise!) we were staying in Orlando with Steve, Kerry, Remy and Jake.

Steve winning again...

Staying with Steve and co was a massive help! The house was lovely and it gave us time to re-assess how much we had left to spend and where we could go after leaving theirs. We went to Celebration on the 4th July to watch the Independence Day fireworks and soak up the atmosphere. It was actually pretty good, and the fireworks were better than Paignton's (purely judging on the finale where you get most of the heart-thumping booms [i'm sure Joe knows what I mean])!

Boom!

During our stay, we popped to the local bar a few times where our friend Jesse gave us all of our drinks for free - wahey! On our last day there, Steve pointed out that we had a leak in the engine which was a weird one because it stained the driveway like oil, but we don't have an oil leak at the time of writing this touch wood ...oh hang on, I can't because it's all covered in tasteful laminate. We're in an Econolodge by the way (and I'll explain why in a short while), not in Roger - he has waaaaaaaay more style than to wrap himself in laminate!

That evening we ate pizza and drank lots of alcohol :-). We sat outside for a short while, where I decided that I had seen an interesting animal off to the side of the pool. I called Sarah over to have a look, at which point I threw her in, but stupidly dragged myself in at the same time! We dried off, and played some pool (I did seven-ball Steve earlier in the week, but I don't want to bring it up too much!). Steve kicked our butts pretty much all night, so we decided to go to bed ready for our departure the next morning.

We said a sad goodbye and left to go and see Jesse. I say sad, not because everyone was crying and feeling blue, but because it made us feel a bit homesick really :(. What was also sad was that we were leaving such a comfy, cosy, perfect-temperature bed!!

We arrived at Jesse's a little while later where we keenly reminded him that he promised us a ride on his motorbike. Sarah was first up, so she donned her helmet and jacket and they set off. About 25mins later she arrived back a little disheveled but ecstatic with the ride, so I quickly got ready and set off. Once you get the leaning part down its great. You just lean into each curve which does feel a bit sketchy as you get so low to the ground, but without doing that, you'd probably die. Oh yeah, we hit a top speed of 147mph on a normal road which was a bit stupid, but still fun! I asked what would happen if the cops caught him, but he said that he'd outrun the cars no problem, which I can believe. It was when he said he could outrun the choppers too that I became skeptical.

Roger, looking on in envy...

Later that day, one of Jesse's friends came over and we had a jame (or is it jamm? [again, probably only Joe will get that!]). I played on the drum kit, while Jesse played bass and his friend played guitar. It was cool to get behind a drum kit again, but it's just not the same as my own kit! A little later Jesse had to pick up his new bass amp from a shop called "The Guitar Center" which was about 30 miles away - just a normal pop to the shops for the average American! We took Roger so that we could fit it in, and I let Jesse drive (Sarah stayed at Jesse's, waiting for his partner, Sabrina, to finish work). Halfway down the interstate I noticed that Jesse was doing about 85mph. A speed we've never done in Roger before. I said he'd better slow down a bit because the red warning line on the speedometer starts at 70mph on Roger, so he did.

We arrived at The Guitar Center which was JUST like the music shop in Wayne's World. After gazing in awe at all of the guitars, my eye caught the drum section. I speed-walked over and saw many kits, mainly the three that were set up behind glass screens for anyone to play. I had to do my Garth (from Wayne's World) impression, so I got on the kit and oh man was it nice to play! I had a little jam on the kit before we had to leave. We picked up Jesse's new amp and plonked it in Roger. I let Jesse drive again, reminding him that we'd best not do 85mph again due to the fact I could smell something burning. Jesse turned the key, Roger tried to start but wouldn't kick in - even after about 8 attempts. We turned the key once to check the engine temp and it was maxed out. Definitely not good! We "popped the hood" and poured some water onto the radiator and sure enough it bubbled. The only thing we could do was let the engine cool and drive it back a little later, which is what we did.

We played Rock Band that evening (again) which I loved (again) and they let us crash on their sofa that night so we could set off the next morning. We woke and ended up staying until around 5pm in hope that we'd catch the now four times delayed shuttle launch. We left for the Florida Keys and sadly we didn't see the actual shuttle launch, despite being about 45mins away from it, due to the cloud cover!

When the I-95 turned into US-1 we decided to stop for the night:

1. Because we were tired
2. Because the engine was getting very hot

Sarah flicked through the motel voucher book that Kerry picked up for us and chose "America's Best Value Inn & Suites" for a reasonable, but not cheapest, $39.95 a night plus Florida tax of course. Some of you can probably see where this is going...

After driving about 10 miles right past the motel, we decided to turn around. Where we decided to turn around, there happened to be a man selling peaches - so Sarah jumped out and got 2. We were so hungry, thirsty and tired that the peach tasted like the best peach I've ever had.

Sweet Georgia Wha..? Stupid windscreen wiper!

Heading back towards the last mainland town before the Keys (Homestead), where the Inn is, we took a few wrong turnings, the engine was blasting out heat onto us, it was about 97°F (36.1°C), we were tired, thirsty etc... and I think I had just had enough. So when I pulled into a "drive-thru bank" car park to turn around for the millionth time and waited for the traffic to pass (because NO-ONE lets you out here, and I'm not exaggerating at all!), Sarah piped up and said "Just pull out" to which I snapped and said "Don't be so stupid, I hate it when people think they can just barge out into traffic, it really gets on my nerves blah blah..." and carried on grunting similar phrases until we finally arrived at "America's Best Value Inn & Suites" where I was finally cured of all annoyances due to the fact that we had some relative comfort and air conditioning! Or so I assumed...

Everything that could be wrong with a motel room was wrong with this motel room apart from the air conditioning which did work surprisingly (after I plugged in the very sketchy-looking plug and set it to max cold). The TV & bracket was hanging out of the wall, the bathtub was absolutely rank and there were fag burns everywhere! The sick on the curtain was a nice touch though, I think it went well with the decor.

LOVELY sick ...not too keen on the palm-tree curtains though.

Spot the problems with this room

I couldn't wait to take a bath here...

It's ok, I normally watch TV at a jaunty angle in bed anyway!

We decided to just stay put on the bed and watch TV that evening. We both woke up in the middle of the night to some girl screaming and crying in a room near ours. Could have been kinky whatever, but it sounded like it wasn't. Nevertheless, we stayed put and hoped that if she needed help she would have shouted "help", then we would have done something, like maybe use the pee-stained telephone to phone for help.

Random island with it's own slip road off the main road

Seven Mile Bridge

We eagerly left the next morning and arrived at Key West, the most southern point of America, where we checked into our amazing hotel which offered a free champagne breakfast! I can't begin to explain how amazing this place is, but it's like Newquay in an extremely tropical setting. Bear in mind that this place is closer to the equator than some parts of the Bahamas! When I say that this place is tropical, I mean that there's literally palm trees, tropical plants and bushes growing out of every possible crevice between houses and in open areas. Key West uses the "gridlock" layout (as do many towns and cities in America) which I actually quite like. While it can lead to causing the town to lack some character, it's much easier to navigate, it looks cool when you just stop and stare down a street and it does sound somewhat good when you say "Oh, it's just four blocks down".

Tower used to look out for shipwrecks around Key West

An actual ship wreck

We went out that night, on a very low budget, but we still had a great time. We met some college guys from another state, and even a crazy guy who looked a bit like a cross between Patrick and Gandalf! We spent the next day looking around the town, lazing on the beach and staring into the clear blue water. We loved it so much we decided to stay another night, but the hostel we were going to stay at was fully booked so we stayed at the same hotel as the night before.


The next morning we filled up Roger's oil and water (because the water seemed worryingly low) and cained it to north Florida where we decided to stay the night, in a motel yet again as it's just way too hot to sleep in a non-air-conditioned van in what we've now realised is a hooker central - the mighty Flying J. We checked in around midnight, and left pretty quick the next morning. Not because it was skanky, but because we're trying to get to Kentucky fast! We refilled the empty water in the radiator, checked the oil etc... and headed out. After a few hundred miles we had to stop because the engine temperature was just way too hot, and we smelt burning.

When we stopped, we moved our cooler which was full of ice and normally holds ice in ice-form for about 2 days, to discover that the cooler had actually melted onto the floor of Roger due to the sheer heat that the van produces. Needless to say the ice inside had melted and our fridge-based goods were once again swimming in water that has been in mixed with a nice concoction of butter, frankfurter juice, perished cheese and carrier bag.

We stopped for about an hour, refilled the water and headed back out. It didn't take long to smell the burning again, but we couldn't see anything smoking so we continued on to Perry, Georgia (it's in the middle of Georgia). After staying in a better, cheaper motel than the one in Homestead (with the sick on the curtains), we once again filled up the water, checked the oil and headed out. 20 miles up the road and we hear this horrible banging sound coming from the middle of Roger, under the floor. I decide to pull off the interstate, and find somewhere to park up. We find a little parking lot and I get Sarah to drive back and forth whilst I look under the engine. What do I see? I see the entire bloody drive shaft bouncing up and down out of it's restraint! Not only that, I see water pi**ing out of the engine and a massive gash along the side of the muffler - part of our "half exhaust" as the rear-pipe section we lost along time ago.

Sarah stops the van and we have a think. We decided that the best course of action would be to ring the triple A (same as AA back home) to get them to have a look at it, and take it from there. So I grab my valuables from the van, my laptop, wallet and our passports and we head out looking for a pay phone. Before we leave the car park, we tell the shop that we need to leave Roger there for a mo whilst we find help, and the guy kindly rang the AAA for us.

About 25mins later an independent tow truck pulls up. This is their AAA service. They outsource all the work to smaller independent companies, rather than having a corporate owned structure like the AA in the UK. While this may seem like a good thing, I think it's rather crap. I'll tell you why...

The guy gets out and I say hello and begin to explain the problem. During my description (bear in mind, the guy hasn't actually said anything yet, bar "hello") I decide to give a demo - so I jump in the van and move it back and forth. The guy looks at me funny and says "line it up here" pointing on the floor, so I line it up and he hooks it up onto his tow truck. This guy didn't even look at the van at all, he wasn't interested in seeing if it could be easily fixed at all, he just wanted to tow us. He said we can go 100 miles in any direction, so I asked to go north as far as possible and to drop us at a cheap motel (which we'd pick out of the voucher book) and work something out from there. We'd probably ring Garry next to see what he recommends. However things worked out differently...

This guy recommended a motel opposite a good, AAA recommended, garage. We agreed and we set off. About 8 minutes later, we arrived at our motel, the Econoline I mentioned at the beginning of this post, in a shabby-looking industrial place called Byron. He said to take it over the road immediately, but I said no, we'll check into the motel and work something out. After finally realising that this is what the AAA is all about here, and that we'd been completely shafted because this guy wanted to take us to HIS garage we sat and had a think. We came to the conclusion that we're in the middle of nowhere, we don't have hardly any cash left and we can't get anywhere - so we should at least get a quote from the garage. We took the van over there, got a quote of $309 for the needed caliper and also the water leakage problem. I decided that we kinda need it, so said ok to it. We let them know that we're in the motel over the road and that they can contact us there (as it was going to be an overnight job due to the fact they needed parts to be ordered in).

We got back to the motel and about 15 minutes later the phone rang. Sarah answered and they upped the charge to around $385 due to some mis-calculation or some complete and utter horeshit. Excuse my french but they know we're completely screwed, have no money, are English and need to get out of here and they're exploiting that to the max.

Fine, we could have said no, but where would have that got us? We'd be stuck in this motel with a van that's about to cause a massive problem on the interstate (either we'll see one of our wheels going past us, or worse, the whole van will lock up and we'll probably crash). So we can stay in this motel until when? Our money completely runs out? I don't know really... but I do feel like we've been taken for a ride and there's not a lot we can do in our vulnerable position at the moment.

I suppose the good news is that the van is getting repaired, and we should be on the road tomorrow. If not, I think I'll explode.

Stay tuned for the next blog post to see if I have exploded or not.

Love to everyone!!!

Ed & Sarah!
xxxxxx

1,180 miles later...

Sorry for the massively overdue blog post - internet access has been very limited up until recently!

I did forget to mention in the last blog post that I actually got the $500 off of Ellen for the work I did on her website!

Tara & Jims
Anyway, from where I left off last time, we were at Tara and Jims - WWOOFing. We continued to work doing jobs around the farm, which included building a fence, driving the tractor and mucking out the horses. Sarah even gave some of the horses a haircut!


Near Efland is a massive lake called Jordan Lake. We went there on one of the days to go swimming and take a break. Everything about the lake was really nice, but it was quite funny to read the "Emergency Evacuation" signs dotted around. I began to read one...

"If you see orange flares or hear warning sirens, evacuate the area immediately".

I pondered what that could mean for a while, when Tara noticed my puzzled look and told us that there's a nuclear power plant on the other side of the lake, and the signs are just incase they have a Chernobyl incident. "That's good to know" I thought to myself, and we continued with our picnic. We had a couple of Newcastle Brown Ales, a bit of a swim and headed back.

Sarah's Birthday
We had the day off for Sarah's birthday, but with little money and no ideas what to do, we decided we'd go to one of the local wineries :). We set off and had to get petrol first, because I thought I'd try and clear some of the rubbish in the engine by filling up with the premium petrol last time. All this did was burn up much quicker than the regular petrol. Along the way, Roger decided the shift down gears himself, making for a real jerky ride with a backing tune of noisy revs. Sarah looked at the petrol gague, and we were almost out.

We arrived at the petrol station just in time, where we had to wait for a free space. We pulled up behind this black car, and Roger just stalled. Phew! We got to the petrol station just as we ran out! So here we are, without petrol, burning up in a hot van waiting for this black car to move. Eventually two guys came out of the petrol station and began to push this black car. It had also broken down!

We rolled into the space next to the pump and filled up. Hoping that the problem was purely to do with the lack of petrol we had, we started the van. He started fine which was a relief, so we continued onto the winery.

We got to taste about 13 wines here which were all produced by this little winery. They were all pretty damn good too, bar the dessert wine. We bought a glass each and went and sat down at their lake to relax.

A few days later, we had a real nice thunderstorm which I'm sure you'll all agree that Clare would have loved. I tried to get some pictures, but I was just too slow :(.

Back to Ellens
At the end of our time there, we contacted Ellen to see if we could pop back there for a week before we started heading South towards Florida. She was more than happy to have us back again, but there was something new this time. She had another WWOOFer there called Yvonne from Melbourne, Australia!

When we arrived at Ellens, she was outside with Yvonne cutting the horses hoofs. Yvonne is a criminal defense lawyer, who works for Legal Aid. She's just on a break from work and has been to the Middle East and now America. We also met Larry again that evening with his son Jason and family friend, Alan. We had a nice massive dinner with burgers, salad, fresh bread etc..., at which we said grace - still seems funny to me :-\.

Larry and Ellen headed to bed, so me, Sarah and Yvonne played Jason and Alan at Pictionary. Commonwealth vs. America. Not meaning to blow our own trumpets, but we kicked their butts. I think they got about 11 spaces around the board by the time we won! Some of these pictures that were being drawn were hilarious. Alan left that night as he had to get back to his place where he was staying.


Work the next day was similar to what we had done before, I was working on the website for Ellen, whilst Sarah worked in the nursery - this time with a new friend Yvonne. Most of Sarah & Yvonne's work was to transplant the Juncus (name of this fancy grass) into new containers.


Canoe / Hint of Line Dancing!!
The next day after work we all decided to go for a canoe up the lake to this half-developed estate that's been abandoned for the moment. When I say "we all" I mean me, Sarah, Yvonne and Jason. We decided to buy some wine for the occasion, and off we paddled. We got to this abandoned estate which had a really weird feel about it. It's all brand new, there's a few new houses, lots of empty plots, lush green patches of grass but there's no one there. It was like a ghost town. We sat and had a chat for a while, before heading back to Ellens as we were supposed to be going (wait for it...) LINE DANCING that evening. Oh dear.

We left Ellen's, with Ellen, in search of this church where they do the line dancing. After finding the church, it's thankfully completely desserted and there was definately no line dancers in sight! A bit saddened by the fact that we couldn't do it, Ellen took us to see the Edenton Sound, and said that they do it on Fridays at some other placed called "Dave's Red Barn".

Thunderstorm
I felt safe for now, I had until Friday to work out a plan to escape the line dancing. Wednesday night came and Ellen stayed at Larry's for the night. We had an awesome thunderstorm that night, so we decided to sit out on the dock with wine, watching the thunderstorm.


We could see it slowly getting closer, which was when Yvonne started saying "Shouldn't we head back up to the house now and watch from there", to which I replied "Well, when it hits that tower over there (points at tower) we should move". Continuing to get closer, it didn't hit the tower but the rain was just about starting, so we headed up to the house to sit on the decking and watch from there. As soon as we got to the house, the heavens opened. Really opened. We've never seen rain like this before. Chatting away and BOOM! goes a crash of thunder hitting about 50 yards away. Whilst that seemed to stun us for a moment there was another BOOM! shortly afterwards, equally as close! Chatting away, the thunder seems to have passed over us, but the rain was still chucking it down. A little tipsy, I piped up with "How much will someone give me to go and do a dance in the rain?". After some fierce negotiating with Yvonne, we agreed on the whopping sum of $2. Sounding great at the time, I ran out into the rain, did a dance and ran back onto the decking. In the 15 seconds I was out there, I was soaked right through. Still I won $2 though!

The next night, we had made plans to go out with Tracy who works on Ellens nursery. We arrived at her house where we met her friend (forgot her name), and as soon as we walked through the door, I noticed a rolled up dollar bill next to some white powder on the table. Without wanting to feel awkward, I decided not to say anything. We had some wine here, had a tour of the house and just before we left for downtown Edenton, Tracy piped up and said to her friend: "Damn! It didn't work, they didn't notice!". Their little setup with the dollar bill and white powder (which turned out to be baking soda) was a joke that was wasted on us.

We ate some lovely food at a place called Seans, and went to another bar for some more drinks. We didn't stay out massively late, judged by the fact none of us had hangovers in the morning. That evening was line dancing, which I hadn't managed to squeeze my way out of!

Walk-Dancing
Ok, so we pull up to "Dave's Red Barn" which was housing the line dancing that evening. We went in and saw a band with more members than Slipknot on stage, and lots of people going about their line dancing on the big dance floor. I'm not too sure how to describe line dancing, but it seems a bit "ritual" in some ways. When a song begins, a few people will stand up and start their line dance (there's a finite number of line dances apparently, all with set moves - it's not like they're just making it up on the spot). Once they have started, people will gather behind them and proceed to copy the "starters" steps.

The song ended and everybody sat down - that's a point, after every song the stage is clear, then the next song will start and most of the same people will get back up. Seems pointless sitting down to me :-\. There was a young girl who had just had a line dance, and sat on a big empty table in front of where we were standing. She said we could sit there, and it didn't take long until I asked if she could show us how to do some line dancing, turns out she teaches it on Mondays.

We waited for a suitable song, and when one came up she said "I'll start this one, follow my steps". With that we (me, Sarah, Yvonne and Ellen) shot up to the empty dance floor. We got into position and copied the girl (forgot her name... in fact, I don't even think we asked her name!). This "dance" was about 10 steps in total, and took about 2 repeats of the entire "procedure" for me to get it. It kinda went like this (starting with both feet together):

• Right Foot Forward (then back to start position)
• Left Foot Forward (then back to start position)
• Right Foot Forward
• Right Foot Right
• Right Foot Back (then back to start position)
• Right Foot Right
• Left Foot Right (behind and to the right of the right foot, so you do a 180 turn)
• Right Foot Left (in front and to the left of the left foot, so you do a mini side-shuffle)
• Left Foot to Starting Position

(REPEAT THIS FOR THE ENTIRE BLOODY SONG)


Yep that's it. You basically walk to a song, and walk in the same way for the entire song. After about 25 loops of this "dance", I looked behind me and no word of a lie, it seemed like a scene from Night of the Living Dead. Hordes of old country folk were copying our dance (like they're supposed to do) but it just seemed completely odd. Many of the people just looked bored, but still wanted to do the walk-dancing as I've just decided to call it. Along with the bored looking walk-dancers you also get serious hardcore walk-dancers that love starting the walk-dances at the beginning of the song. If someone starts a walk-dance before them, they go off and start their own walk-dance in another part of the dance floor with their mini walk-dance clan. To top it all off, "Dave's Red Barn" is a dry building where they don't allow alcohol. We're glad we went line dancing, but I doubt it's something we'll jump at in the future.


The next day (Saturday) we headed downtown Edenton to watch their festival they had on, then we went back to Ellens for another canoe up the river. Sarah and Yvonne decided they'd swim, so I took the one man canoe, wine, towels, clothes, camera, corkscrew, beers, water and the kitchen sink to that deserted place we found the other day. The current was really against Sarah and Yvonne (and me), and it was about a mile away. We eventually arrived, had some beer / wine and headed back. Sarah and Yvonne were knackered so yeah, I took them back in the one man canoe. Almost sinking, and with the feeling that I was paddling in quick-drying concrete I was surprised it only took about 20mins to get back!

Fishing
On Sunday we were taken fishing with Richard who owns the farm just north of Elizabeth City. We dropped one net and headed a bit further out (in his boat) to fish with rods. After about 20-25mins of just nibbles on our lines, Sarah gets a bite! After reeling in, she's actually caught quite a nice catfish!


Myself and Yvonne didn't do too good, I caught a small "croaker" as they call them, Yvonne had the smallest though.

Leaving Ellens



We left Ellen's on the Monday, heading towards Asheville, North Carolina. We decided to help Yvonne out by taking her there, plus we wanted to see it too as it is at the other end of the Blue Ridge Parkway which we've seen before. 6hrs 30mins later we arrive and check into a Motel. We had quick showers and headed downtown Asheville with a couple of travelers each (for those that don't know, they're beers to drink on the way!).


Asheville is really nice, it's quite high in the Appalachian mountains, and has even higher mountains as the backdrop. There were plenty of pubs to choose from here, we even heard about a town called Brevard which we visited the next day.

Brevard is similar to Asheville in the way it looks. However, they had a state park next to it where they had this sliding rock. It only cost $1 to get in :). We didn't spend too long here as we had to get back to Asheville so Yvonne could catch her Greyhound bus to Nashville, Tennessee. Once Yvonne was on her coach, we headed to our Flying J, about 400 miles away.

To Florida
Halfway through the journey, we switched drivers and Sarah decided to get some sleep in the back. 5 minutes later, the lorry's tire in front of me just blew up! I swerved slightly (not much traffic around) and he pulled over. It's so common to see blown tires here because of the varying heats apparently. Tires that cool down and heat up too much are prone to blowing and littering the interstates. I think locals call the blown tires on the side of the road 'Alligators'. We arrive at the Flying J, and get some sleep.

The next day we decided to go straight to Florida to meet up with Steve, Kerry and the kids in Orlando. We finally arrived at the resort, which is a gated community with huge, really nice houses (pics to follow). We got to their house and pulled onto the drive, stinky, sweaty and tired! We were greeted with smiles, hugs and handshakes despite warning of our disgustingness!

They showed us to our room and have let us stay with them which is a massive help seeing as we just had to get two new tires for Roger! Since we've been here we've been swimming in the pool, met some friends at one of the bars here, relaxed lots and have been to a town called "Celebration" where I had fish and chips :D! We're currently planning our route from here to our next destination, but we'll post a full blog update of this place with pictures in the next blog which I hope won't be as long a delay as this blog was!

We hope everyone's ok!

Missing everyone lots!

Love Ed & Sarah xxx


P.S. Here's a final thought for anyone on the road (you get this everywhere!)