Bloomington--Tahoe--Flagstaff

Looking for Lodie's frisbee

Eliot acts as a counterweight as Ian reaches for frisbee

part of Lake Tahoe

Lodie, preparing for Eliot to throw the frisbee

Rock climbing?

Ian on guitar, Eliot on banjo = awesome

looking over the Subaru at a rest stop in Nevada

Nevada rest stop

adorable Missy and Lodie

outside of Eliot/Ian's house

view as we headed toward the hot springs

Eliot atop a small mountain

hot springs!

Eliot examines the temperature

hot springs--the water trickled into the pools from the rock face

steamy hot springs

hot water line through the rock

leaving hot springs

Lodie looks out as we leave

Missy and I took off from Bloomington, Indiana, on the 7th of January. We drove through Indiana, Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming, Utah and Nevada to get to California. It took us a three days, a quick fix for a busted tire, caffeine, sheer willpower, and a well-maintained interstate to make it to Tahoe, where we stayed and visited with Ian and Eliot. After Tahoe, we drove one final day down California and directly over into Arizona to meet our city of Flagstaff.

Our first day, we drove straight through to Omaha, where we stopped at a hotel just off the interstate. Lara had us over the night before in Bloomington, and for a number of reasons, hardly any sleeping occurred, which made the first day of driving quite challenging. In fact, about four hours into it I proclaimed I could no longer drive, and we pulled into a rest stop where we retrieved our sleeping bags and coats and passed out for an hour sitting mostly upright--surprisingly rejuvenating! We continued on successfully. The hotel in Omaha welcomed us with open arms and we dragged the important things into our room (including the bikes, much to the front desk person's amusement).

Day two was our Nebraskan adventure, and biggest, most stressful driving day. An issue with a tire bead forced us to pull off of I-80 into a random town and get it checked. I wasn't sure what had happened, because there was clearly air in the tire, but it looked like a mauled black pancake on the bottom of the old rim. Missy and I found a local hardware store, where a shy teenager with patchy facial hair took off the ruined tire and replaced it with the spare, all for only $10! He charged $8 for the change and $2 for disposal of the scrap rubber. He was a really decent person. Missy and I continued on, and as we hit Wyoming, dark set over that part of the country and unfortunately we couldn't see much of the landscape, though the twists and turns of the interstate indicated mountains to us. That night we made it to Salt Lake City to stay with hosts we found through couchsurfing.org. The weather was terrible, nearly a whiteout of snow and wind and we almost didn't make it. We pushed through and our hosts stayed up to wait for us after midnight. They were all students at the university there, and in the morning they left to scuba dive/ski/snowboard before 8am and left us with a fresh pot of super weak coffee and instructions to lock the door when we left. We took our time, and left them with gifts of poetry and a bike sign. Our main host, Zak, liked the poem I wrote so much that he called me later to express thanks and to offer their house and tickets to me and Missy for the upcoming Sundance Film Festival. "It's perfect, perfect!" as Zak would say.

Day three was our shortest driving day, Salt Lake to Tahoe. We saw the salt flats just outside of Salt Lake, and drove toward mountains that seemed an eternity away. When we finally reached mountains, old grandpa Subaru struggled a little bit with all the weight in his trunk, but he chugged along like the Little Engine that Could and Missy and I gave him many affectionate pats on the dashboard.

We made it to Tahoe! Ian's older sister and her fiance were there with us the first night. Her fiance, Jesse, had fallen snowboarding and was holed up on the couch watching Lord of the Rings with his broken ankle elevated slightly. Still, they seemed in high spirits. The next days in Tahoe flew by quite quickly. We spent some time in Reno, which felt like one giant glitzy strip mall full of trash and exhaust. However, we did find an amazing hot dog restaurant there. It sounds funny, but it really was awesome--Freeman's Natural Hotdog. We collectively decided it was the Reno/hot dog version of Laughing Planet in Bloomington. We went there the evening after we went to the hot springs, which totally blew my mind. A thin stream of boiling water trickled from the earth source over and down a rock face into a series of pools about three feet deep that became progressively cooler. We couldn't even sit in the first pool because it was too hot, and after about ten minutes in the second pool three of us jumped out and rolled around in the snow. Missy wasn't quite prepared to leave the warmth and romp around in freezing snow. Maybe I am a little bit nuts. Regardless, it was a truly wonderful experience.

The last day in Tahoe, I went with Eliot and his brother Dan to the gym and tried a little rock climbing. That was the first day I realized some of the effects of altitude on the body. While at Hoosier Heights I had been working on 5.11s, at High Altitude Fitness I struggled to send a 5.9. The moves were no more difficult, but the slightest exertion left my heart flipping around in my chest. I felt like I was trying to exercise while incredibly hungover--I felt dehydrated, didn't really sweat, but my cardiovascular system was on overload. Nevertheless, it was fun, and I'm super pumped to get into shape out here in Flagstaff.

Missy and I have now made it to Flagstaff. We have a lofted one bedroom apartment above a garage in a fairly new subdivision full of students. We are subleasing from four undergrads who all seem great. Last night we brought down some beer and hung out with them and some of their friends. With a little persuasion I got everyone to play Scrabble, and it seems I will be challenging one of them again, because he beat me and that is UNACCEPTABLE. We got to know them pretty well, and they gave us advice as far as places to go. One of them is from Wisconsin, and gave us beer from his hometown to try, and another gave us beer from a local brewery here in Flagstaff. It was a red ale, and I don't know how to explain it, but it really tasted red.

Anyway, today will be our second full day in Flagstaff. We explored the city yesterday, and today I am going to run on part of the 50 miles of the urban trails maintained by the city. This seems to be a place I could fall in love with after not too long of a time. People say that Flagstaff is like Bloomington but with mountains, and so far I think that generalization might be true. People are open, kind, and really want to show off the city. It is clear that a lot of money is put into "green" living, as well as maintaining the natural environment. Tomorrow is my first day of work, yikes! I am excited. Tomorrow will also be Missy's first day of job hunting. Luckily, the weather has been remarkably warm, hovering a little over 50 degrees during the day. Perfect for exploration.

Well, off I go!