Mark's "quit my job now I'm traveling" thread

Thank you for sharing pics

 

Excuse us as we all have no life cause we're interested in something we wish we could do, so we will sit here and watch yours unfol lol.. Thanks for the pics!

 

A wise move, travel while you can..

 

Thanks for the pictures!

 

Thanks for all the kind words guys! Glad you enjoy seeing the trip. Im posting this on FB and a few other places at the same time, so its handy to get it all written down at once.

Day 5: We make a beautiful breakfast and head out to drive to texas, but not before stopping at the alien museum. After some goofy pictures we kept going on into Dallas. After crossing into texas the scenery immediately changed and it became a more beautiful, so i learned new mexico is ugly and even north texas is more pleasant to drive through. We had to stop and take a picture next to an oil derrek.

Driving into dallas at night i decided to sit backwards in the front seat. This was a cool feeling and a great time for more self reflection and thought, all inspired from the fact that i didnt care about what was in front of me, i was trusting what ever happened and could self reflect on the past. sitting backwards driving through a city at night. felt kinda like being on a train.

We tried to find a campground somewhere around dallas, but unknown to us campgrounds close and the gates lock at 10pm. We rolled in at 12:57am to the only camp ground with a gate attendant 24/7. We looked desperate enough the gate guy lets us in to take a spot for the night.

 

Should've made a vlog on YouTube for the trip. That's what all the cool kids are doing.

 

Day

i was taking go pro vids for as much as I could so I'll hopefully mash them together at some point. Doing too much photography and documentation can ruin the trip and take away the importance of why we're on it ha

 

Day 6: THEME PARK DAY. We had a shitty breakfast at ihop because my buddy wanted to go, and headed out to Six Flags over Texas. We get there and there are at least 20 school buses, because apparently all of the high and pre high school schools had a band day and celebrated at Six Flags. So the park was riddled with kids that clogged up all of the lines. Regardless we rode all of the roller coasters and ate none of the crappy theme park food. Had to take a quick stop for dinner at a classic bbq place before continuing back at the park until close. The first thing I see when we walk in is a jug of sweet tea. Of course I got a big ol glass of it, maybe it wasnt that sweet because I was not impressed. We head back to the park to ride more roller coasters until the place closed at 10, this time with no kids so we just walked on all the rides.

Backing up a few hours, after we got done with dinner and were driving back to the park we were trying to figure out a place to stay for the night (every camo ground was booked solid) when it finally hit me....lets just stay in a hostel. We had stayed in hostels on ski trips and always had a blast. So we called up one in dallas and the guy that answered told us there was only one bed left, so we asked if one of us could sleep on the floor, and he assured us would jimmy rig something together.

We left the park, and headed to the hostel to check in and park the truck. After getting our bed settled in we summon an uber and set out to fufill one of my goals of the trip...find a massive country bar and dance to my hearts content. We found this in the form of the red river saloon.

We walked in and this place had 4 bars, a giant stage, 2 giant TVs and a massive 2 step ring around the center bar. Totally massive bar, and I was in heaven. Bryce is not a country person at all, so as soon as we walked in he just says "im going to need a lot of beer for this". We grab a shot and a beer and sit down to get a feel of the place and these girls ask me if i know what im doing because their friend from the east coast wants to learn to dance. Ive done a few lessons but not enough to really teach but i said why not. I try doing some basics and 2 steps and its not going super well...come to find out this girl has like...no right shoulder...where many many moves are triggered from, so that was kind of odd but we endured. I leave Bryce there the rest of the night, go back for another beer every now and then, and proceede to dance with at least 15 people over the course of the night. I was in heaven.

After we leave the saloon at 2:30 we uber back, drunk eat some food and pass out.

 

The thread will remain on hold for another week or so while I go out on another trip sailing around the lower florida keys. Sorry all!

 

Day 7: Travel day to Austin

We take off from dallas and begin the drive to Austin Texas. About 45 minutes outside of Dallas we pass a sign that says "festival" having no idea what kind of festival it was I googled it and low and behold it is a Renaissance fair. Bryce almost said to pass it since we were on a tight schedule, but one of the top things on his bucket list was going to a renaissance fair, so once i told him what kind of festival it was he flipped around at the next exit and we went right back to the 1600s.

We pull into the parking lot and this ren fair was larger than life. This park was permanently set up and many of the structures existed year round. Explaining the detail and involvement of the participants is impossible, so if you have been to one of these fairs you know what i mean...if not give it a try some time. I was amused by the whole thing, bryce was wide eyed like you unleashed a base head in a drug store. We held axes, drank mead, listened to bag pipes and watched the kings procession go through main street.

After getting our fill of the ren fair we continue our drive to Austin. We find another Hostel just outside of downtown with about the weirdest apparent perma-fried host ive ever met, and a rad aussie dude. I had been meaning to buy a pair of cowboy boots for a while but never got around to it in Boise. Inspired by my stellar time in texas and considering the place I was in, no better location to buy a pair of boots than in the Cowboy state itself. So I picked up my first pair of cowboy boots! After settling our stuff in we head out with the hostel guy connor and this indian dude who was staying there as well. After the first bar we realize connor is a detriment to our social interacting due to his lack of tact or social skills. After ditching connor we begin talking to 3 local gals (a 4th joined shortly after) we met at the second bar. They agreed to hang out with us for the eve and show us around famous Dirty 6th St.

Bryce has this little note book he jots reminders and lists in. The girls got a hold of the book and began giggling at the cute things listed in there. I managed to snap a pic of the laughter and subsequent emberrasment on bryce's face after. I think this convinced them we werent shitty people. The night led on and we listened to music and got more drinks. It got late and the girls let us stay at their house. Im not going into details but I woke up the next morning to a missing bryce and one of the gals...and I sat there awkwardly waiting for a response on my slowly dying phone.

 

Day 8: Austin Round 2

I finally get a call from bryce at 10 or so...and am greeted with a shit eating "whats your status maaan" My status is I was abandoned at a girls apartment somewhere in the middle of austin texas to recount the debauchery from the night before with no transportation and a missing homie. It wasn't that bad. Eventually bryce and the other gal come back and we all go to get some torchys tacos for breakfast! After heading back to the hostel we clean up, have weird conversation with conner and got to know the aussie, matt. We heard about his wild university drinking stories and we shared our trip so far and living in the PNW.

Bryce, matt and myself head out to see a bit more of the city that day we head to the city parks, got thai ice cream and looked in some local shops. We exchanged the true live music soul of austin for some club fun the previous night, so we set out this night to see as much live music as possible. We began with craft brew and darts and ended a few drinks down after shutting down almost every live music venue in the city. While outside getting a last bite of pizza and a last beer we met this gal at a bar and some how convinced her to give us a ride back to the hostel so we didn't need to pay for a taxi. We almost scared her off when matt the aussie began arguing intensively with a brittish guy. I couldnt take the hilarity of these two accented guys arguing about stupid stuff so i was just laughing my ass off till the britt got all defensive and started getting in my face too. Thought we were going to have a multi cultural fight on 6th st, but it got more awkward when we realized the gal we met also agreed to give the britt a ride too...he was not about to open that can of worms again so he got another ride. We got back to the hostel safely that night so we could hit the road again in the morning!

 

torchy's tacos .. fuck yeah

 

Loving the stories so far man! Keep em coming!

 

Curent state of affairs

 

Day 9: Off to NOLA!

With a long drive ahead of us we leave Austin the next morning after the night was cut short when the creepy hostel owner came in at 2am and said the gal who gave us a ride back couldnt be there. The drive there was pretty uneventful, we went through Houston and i commented on the large amount of highway interchanges to the Cali native, about all of the spaghetti ass overpasses, and he lost his mind laughing. We passed about 406 Whattaburgers on our drive through the south so finally to break up the monotony we had to try one. It was pretty unimpressive, just a larger than usual generic fast food burger. We enter louisiana and begin driving into New Orleans playing big brass jazz on the pandora channel, getting in the mood as appropriate. Bryce had a couple of friends that were going the opposite way as us, traveling from New York to Cali road trip style and we happened to meet up with them in New Orleans. So we got to crash in their already paid for hotel for free that night, which was nice.

We parked the truck in a covered garage by the hotel that seemed safe, and moved the tools and most of the gear in the cab, only taking what we needed (the truck ended up costing as much to live in NOLA as one of us did at $30 a day). The rainy hotel tower like picture is the view from the room. After changing into respectful clothes we grabbed our buddies to tour Bourbon St.

It was a pretty generic night on Bourbon. I had a 151 hurricane slushy, jambalaya, searched out as much live music as possible, stopped at an absinthe bar that was pirate themed, and finished it up at a really cool hole in the wall local brewary right as a rain storm came through. The Fais Deaux "bar" was really funny. It was literally just an alleyway the guy set up a fold out table and an awning in, and sold cheap beer out of. We spent the night drinking some good beers, catching up with old friends and listening to the storm flood the vomit filled streets and dance off the metal awning.

 

Day 10: NOLA round II

We all rise after a pleasent night cuddling in two twin beds, and head through town to a nice classic Nawlins breakfast at this cool diner run by nothing but southern black people who had that sassy yet inviting and hospitality driven personalities. It was great food at a pretty good price. From there we headed to the WW2 museum, which was massive, and of course the inner history buff came out of us and we enjoyed all of the memorabilia. After spending hours viewing the exhibits Bryce and I had to part ways and find a place to live again. While Bryce viewed the gift shop I began calling the local hostels and found one right on Frenchmen St in the French Quarter, Madame Isabelle's House, that lived up to the pictures and reviews and ended up being very cool and entertaining.

We realized there wouldnt be any parking near the hostel so we stopped at the truck, got the basics and a change of clothes, then began the relatively long walk to the french quarter. On the way we stopped to view the Holy Trinity Catholic church. I sat down at a pew and, being catholic took a moment to reflect and say a long over due prayer. Bryce enjoyed the stained glass and i enjoyed the irony in this stop on holiness among our sin and gluttonous filled road trip. We get to the hostel, check in, and Bryce takes a nap while I make a glass of tea and talk to a British porn star turned art major who was hanging out on the back deck. Also to join us was a trio of Australian students who were traveling. We swapped college stories and they educated Bryce and I on the savage game of Australian football. A blend of rugby and hockey with less pads and more beating the shit out of each other.

We get the low down on popular places to stop for food music and drinks in the French quarter and hit the town. We stopped at a nice restaurant with a live band playing bluegrass. We had nice cocktails and just...relaxed for a bit. On the way to the spotted cat we ran into what I think was one of the coolest sights of the trip, a brass jam band just appeared on a street corner and began rocking out and playing music. There was trumpets, sousaphones, drums, saxes...and people quickly began to fill in around them and dance and enjoy the music. Eventually the crowd grew so big it filled the street and vehicles were bottlenecked and could hardly even pass. Nobody cared, cops didnt stop, they just kept playing and everyone kept dancing.

After that we stop in at the spotted cat, which was an absolutely packed little venue with an awesome jazz band in the corner. This kind of setting repeated it self throughout the night. We stopped in places and got a drink and enjoyed music till moving on to test the next one. Toward the end of the night we stop in at a bar with more space and listen to this band play. After a few songs a group of 20 something gals walk in the previously sparsely populated bar. I asked one of them to dance because I had space. She agreed and turned out to be pretty good! I let her recover for a few songs until another jammin one came back and I looked over at her, she looked at me, I gave a head bob towards where we were dancing, and we both got up and walked over to do it again. Good timing on my part, that was their last song, but as a finale it was loooong. After exhausting each other we talked for a bit, and my bro and I departed the bar to make the trek back to the hostel with a few stops along the way. The night was uneventful at the hostel other than within 10 minutes from tucking in the Aussies returned and one puked his entire insides out twice in the shared room next to ours. Unfazed we passed out pretty quick.

 

great stuff ! keep it up.

 

Day 11: DRIVE DAMNIT DRIVE

Being on a time crunch to get to the Keys and not seeing anything worth stopping for we decided to do the NO,LA drive to Cape Coral FL in one day. We left the hostel after finally meeting a fellow kiwi (new Zealander) for Bryce. Since we hadn't met one yet. I determined the Kiwis have the cutest accents. The drive was relatively uneventful until we saw the USS Alabama on the side of the highway, and bryce's face lit up like a christmas tree, and damn our time table we were stopping.

We toured the gun deck, played in the turret coupolas, climbed to the bridge, dabbed on the fore deck, and then checked out this cool sub they had in the museum as well. That added about 2 to 3 hours to our drive. While going through Louisiana we ran into some wrecks on the freeway, so to kill time we switched on the CB and bryce got his first taste of trucker talked and absolutely lost it laughing at all the shit they said. This tow truck driver was trying to get another trucker to fight him at the next exit. Later on we did our good deed for the day and noticed an empty semi trailer with the door swinging open and hailed him on the radio to let him know. We pulled into our friend Sierra's grandparents house at 3:00am, and proceeded to pass out.









Day 12: Boating and my Mom's past

Sierra's grandparents live on a nice canal in cape coral and have a nice little boat. Amidst the hectic constant travel of our trip we took the better part of the day to just cruise around the bay in the boat, drink beer and float in the pool. At this point i realized i was on the east coast and had access to Yuengling. From this point on i have drank so much Yuengling...and every glass is as good as the first.

As fate would have it my mom's best friend and room mate from college also lives in Cape Coral, like a mile from Sierra's grandparents house. So Bryce and I brought over some beer, BBQ supplies and I caught up with this lady that turned my mom into a party animal all through college and was a part of my life when I was too young to remember. I also met her son who is the same age as me that I apparently played with when I was 5 or so but dont have any memory of. I learned a lot of new stories about my mom when we got her on speaker phone for about 45 min as stories were swapped.

Having the rest of the night to kill we went out with Michael (the son) and armed with some local knowledge tried to go to a few country bars only to find them all closed. We settled for a cool local pool hall and enjoyed some dirt cheap beer and some billiards.

 

Day 13: Miami or Bust!

We head out from Cape Coral and head down to Miami (about a 2.5 hour drive through alligator alley). We pull into a parking garage and began the walk to South Beach! Finally, after the thousands of miles of driving were in South Beach Miami walking in the Atlantic! After a long walk on the beach we aim to fufill one of Bryce's persistent goals from the trip, is a mahi thai on the beach. We walk down the restaurant strip and i start to notice all the restaurants are the same and serve the same food and have the same automatic tip amount and everything. Apparently one guy owns every restaurant down south beach for what seems like a mile. Unsettled by this i try to find one that is not part of this system but its a futile search and settle with the one that had the best drink deals and offered us free tequila shots with the meal. So we had a lunch in South Beach Miami, while enjoying our Long Islands and Mahi Thais and taking our free tequilas.

Over lunch we discussed the plan for the rest of the day. We could stay in a Hostel in Miami and pay a ton of money to go to a generic club...or drive down to Key West and round the trip out at the Southern Most point and stay at my work for the night before bringing Bryce back to the air port. We opted for Key West...which meant another 2 hours of driving. We truck it through Miami and hit the Overseas Highway...HWY 1. I stop and check in at my summer job in Islamorada and ensure my buddy can crash in the dorms for that night and we drive on another 80 miles to Key West for a sunset.

A total of .3 miles after checking in we come across a wreck that has had the highway shut down for a couple hours. It seemed our Key West leg was over before it started. We turned around around and went to finish for the night when we saw the traffic moving, so we wing it and hope the wreck is clean and jump in the line of traffic to head down to MM 0. The sunset happened around 8:05 when we were in Marathon right in front of the 7 Mile Bridge so we took our photo OP there, and pressed on to take Sluggo as far south as it could go.

After the sun sets over the Gulf of Mexico we drive the rest of the way to Key West and i find it to be a striking resemblance to New Orleans, with live music, gar bars, more bars, and restaurants and live music galore. We eat at an irish pub with a rockin band playing some 'Sweet home chicago, and I get corned beaf and cabbage with a Guinness.

We bring Sluggo to the Southern Most point for a photo op and wrap up a drive from Boise Idaho through Texas, down the gulf coast of Florida, and at the Southernmost point of the Continental United States. All with zero tickets, arrests, breakdowns or thefts. What a wild 13 days that was!





Day 14: Bye Bryce

We go back to my work to crash in the dorms at about 2:00 am, and wake up at 5:00am to drive an hour and a half back to Miami International to drop off Bryce for his flight to New York and my first official day of work in the Florida Keys.

 

At this point in my journey, it is May 21st, and I am starting my summer job. I didn't know what to expect, other than I am supposed to be working on big sailboats. Somewhere in the Keys.

This is the View from my dorm:





And this is the stuff I will spend most of my time doing:




I am working on editing a montage type of video from the road trip, followed by a more in depth video of the trip. Its a slow process making the video.




Also at this point, in real time, i have booked my plane ticket to Germany for the 19th of September. Eurotrip 2016 is locked in!! Ill be driving back to Boise starting Sept 1st, stopping in Nashville and Denver for a few days in each!