PART I - Santa Clara, CA to Dallas, TX |
Wednesday, 2/20/02 |
The sun was out when I got up and it had rained the night before so the air was crisp and the clouds were white and puffy. My first destination was Oakland to drop off my old car so that it could be shipped to Hawaii. My father followed me in the vehicle that we would be taking across the country, a '94 Nissan extra cab outfitted with an old camper top that he had found the day before at a scrap yard in Moss Landing. The camper top was double walled with two internal lights and an openable sky light and side windows for ventilation - not pretty, but functional and excited me with thoughts of using it for surf tours or a summer trip to Alaska.
As I drove out to the Matson docks in Oakland I saw a freighter under the Golden Gate push towards the sea against an incoming fog. "Hmmm," I thought, "that's appropriate."
After dropping off the old car we drove northward until connecting with the I-80 E. We took the I-80 all the way out to Incline Village on the Nevada side of Tahoe. |
Headin out. |
Thursday, 2/21/02 |
For the first time in over 9 years I snapped on skis. The snow was fresh, the sun was out, and I never waited for a lift. |
The slopes of Mt. Rose. |
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Me... skiing! |
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My dad and his crew. |
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Friday, 2/22/02 |
Went snowboarding, sorry no pics.
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Saturday, 2/23/02 |
Left Incline Village for a destination further into Nevada where we stayed with friends. |
Played tennis in a bubble 8000 ft up at the Ridge Tahoe. |
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View from the Ridge Tahoe over Nevada. |
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Our friend Jim... |
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...and his geese. |
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Sunday, 2/24/02 |
Drove through the high deserts of Nevada and California. Dropped into Death Valley and then settled for the evening in Las Vegas. |
The sign reads:
MONO LAKE
ELEVATION IN 1941
6417 FEET
In 1941 the lake began
to drop due to stream
diversions to Los Angeles. |
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Somewhere in the high deserts of California. |
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Somewhere else in the desert. |
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Somewhere on the road in Death Valley. |
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Somewhere, again below sea level. |
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Monday, 2/25/02 |
Took off from Vegas and stopped in Arizona. |
Hoover Dam outside Vegas. |
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View of the Grand Canyon. |
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Watch tower at the edge of the Canyon. |
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Dinner at a Chinese restaurant in Arizona. |
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Tuesday, 2/26/02 |
Saw the Meteor Crater, Petrified Forest, and the Painted Desert before settling in eastern New Mexico. |
The best preserved meteor crater in the world... or something like that.
It's pretty big. About two pixels on the bottom relates to the size of a person. |
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Yup, this is it. This is the city. |
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Here's what eastern Arizona looked like 350 million years ago. |
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Here's what it looks like now. |
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The windy Painted Desert. |
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Been there, done that. |
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Moon over New Mexico. |
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Wednesday, 2/27/02 |
Drove out of a dry and cold New Mexico through western Texas and into Dallas. |
Texas = big and flat. |
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Texas sky. |
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Texas sunset. |
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Friday, 3/1/02 |
We stayed in the Dallas / Ft. Worth area for a few days. On this day we went to the city. |
Dallas under cover. |
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Dallas pride. |
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Whales in Texas? |
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I'm gonna let you guess where this is. |
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Kickin it in the Art District. |
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The digital floor art. Ca-ray-zeh. |
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Dallas at night. |
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An evening with the Dallas pops orchestra.
They performed pieces from Oscar winning movies
while the accompanying clips played on a massive screen over the stage. |
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Saturday, 3/02/02 |
There was snow and sleet in the morning so, except for the pictures we stayed inside. |
The streets, frozen over. |
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Our friend Doug, a great guy and a high school football coach for 25 years.
He cooked us taco soup, the perfect remedy for a cold day in Texas. |
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Sunday, 3/03/02 |
Did stuff. |
View of Dallas from the Antares Restaurant where we had brunch.
It's a tall structure that looks like Seattle's Space Needle
with a rotating restaurant on top. |
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Dinner at the Rainforest Cafe.
It's like a mini-Disneyland in the mall
complete with plastic foliage and animatronic animals. |
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PART II - Dallas, TX to Gulfport, FL |
Monday, 3/04/02 |
Goodbye Texas. We moved eastward again through Louisiana and Mississippi before stopping in Alabama. |
