Ryan & Matt's Excellent Adventure

[.RJ]

Route: San Diego to New Orleans (all on I-10) to Atlanta to CMP to NoVa
Miles: 3286
Gas: 95 gallons
Oil: 0 (none!)
Tickets: 1
Red Bulls: 1

I wrote up a log of sorts while we were travelling, which made this rather easy to post up. So, here goes....

Prep

Since it was going to be quite a bit of a drive, we definately needed some in car entertainment for this adventure. I picked up a power inverter, we had our 2 laptops, DVD's, Matt's iPod, some books and car mags, camera and cell phones we were all set. I packed up some tools, picked up a spare distributor from Advance Auto and we were ready.

Monday

We flew out of dulles at 6pm, had a short 1-beer layover in st louis and arrived into san diego at 10pm with an uneventful trip and got our shuttle to the hotel in downtown san diego. Ahh.... 70 degree weather. Around 10:30 we checked out the car and then headed out to hit up the bars for a few hours even though the whole town was empty - monday night, go figure. I had been out in San Diego for work at the end of last year, it was definately nice to be back.

Tuesday (note: all times are Pacific time... i have no idea where the hell I am, let alone what time zone I'm in during this trip)

Got a fairly late start on the day, ate some brake fast at the hotel and then headed out downtown for a bit while we had some time to kill. We checked out the classic car dealership for a bit - they had some GT40 replicas, some old british stuff and some modern classics as well - 930 slantnose porsche, ferraris, etc. Very neat place. Did some more tourist stuff walking around the gas lamp district downtown, bought some Hard Rock t-shirts and then we met up with the seller to get the car. Unfortunately, this proved to be a colossal pain in the ass.

We first headed to his bank (bank of america), which was a few blocks from the hotel and I figured we'd be out of there in a few minutes to sign over the title. Wrong! I did not know his OCD mother was in charge of this transaction.... There was first a dispute over the price of the car - over the phone he had agreed to $4500, but this was veto'd by his mother at some point and I ended up a couple hundred over that. I figured, whatever, i've come out here and its not going to break the budget so lets just get this thing over with. Wrong! His mother wouldnt take a cashier's check from my bank. So then we find a Navy Federal Credit Union branch, which was 35 minutes away and drive there. So we get there, and I cash the check on the spot and finally after another 10 minutes of fussing and haggling over the title, the mileage on the car, the bill of sale - my head a splode - we get it sorted out and I'm off.

Head back to san diego and do some driving around - drive through downtown, down the coast, and then back around san diego harbor. Damn this place is nice... still 70 deg and sunny, great scenery and really friendly people. I guess when the temp never gets over 78 with 362 days of sunshine a year.... From there we head to Old Town San Diego where many of the original buildings are preserved as museaums and shops. Grabbed some lunch at a real mexican restaurant in Old Town - fantastic food.

At some point during the day, we decided that this trip was not nearly absurd enough already - so, after looking over the map for possible detours along the way we decided that we'd drive non stop to New Orleans and arrive wednesday afternoon, spend the night there and then head on to atlanta on thursday afternoon after a night out on the town and some sight seeing thursday morning. From there we'd head to CMP for the weekend on friday morning.

About 3:30 we finally hit the road out of san diego and start hauling ass. We elected to take the most southern route (I-10) - the scenery through southern california is breathtaking. By 11pm we're a good ways into New Mexico (over 600 miles by now) with a few stops for gas.

3 am... almost 12 hrs in, we're somewhere in the heart of texas with 900 miles covered. w00t!

6:30am... deeper and deeper into Texas.... I had been hauling ass ever since the sun came and got busted by the fuzz for littering and... littering and... speeding! I think I was doing about 95, but he wrote me a citation for 85 in a 75 without any hassle. First time i've had a speeding ticket in over 4 years - oh well, hopefully I wont get points in Va for it.

8:00 am... been in texas for over 6 hours and 500 miles now, and I havent seen chit. Nothing. Some trees.... some other cars. A few rest stops. Thats it. No civilization other than a gas station every 50 miles. This place most definately blows. At least we're not too far from san antonio now.

400 miles of texas to go, 400 miles of texas.... take one down, pass it around 399 miles of texas to go....

11:00 am... Finally got into San Antonio, and decided to take a break from being in the car for 17 hours and 1400 miles straight and stretch out a bit before I lose my sanity... well, whats left of it. Since we were here, we headed downtown to see the Alamo, take some pics and get something to eat. After a nice break for an hour we're back onto I-10 East, 300 miles left before we get out of this state.

4 pm - we're finally into Louisiana after driving for nearly 900 miles in texas.

8 pm - Arrive in New Orleans! We drove around a bit, and after about an hour of getting lost we find a crappy hotel that isnt too expensive thats a short drive down to the french quarter. After getting cleaned up we headed down to Bourbon street for some fun. It wasnt too busy but it was definitely a good time and Matt was completely shitfaced after downing two irresponsibly strong 32oz Hurricanes.

Thursday

After we crawled out of the dump that we stayed in we headed back down to the french quarter to see the city some more. We had some brake fast at cafe du monde - some coffee and the beneits were excellent. Then on through the tourist shops, the french market and back down through bourbon street and the surrounding area before we grabbed some lunch on bourbon street and headed out of New Orleans for Atlanta. Thursday evening we get to my apartment.

Friday

Head off to CMP in the afternoon after sleeping in and then changing the oil in the car

Saturday/Sunday

NASA-VA weekend at CMP, awesome time as always. Around 5pm we pack up and head back to Nova.....

[.RJ]

Some pics from the classic car dealership in San Diego......

















Cruising around San Diego....









WWII memorial - very cool



Old Town San Diego



















Heading out across kalifornia













Canyon Carving y0!



We came prepared



La Migra!



Sunrise in Texas





Cruise speed through Texas



Me, tired, unshaven, sunburnt and pissed off at Texas



Evan's mom set up shop in Texas - who knew!



Texas "rest stop"



Alamo Pics











The last ffing exit in Texas....



Out of the damn state!



Bourbon Street





French Quarter





























The infamous Hotard



This guy was spraying himself with copper paint (?) of some sort.. then yelled at me when we took a picture.... imagine that, he draws attention to himself.

[Myuki]

looked like a fun trip, got some laughs from the pics, too.

[Nis01]

Nice pics, I'd love to make it out to Cali. at some point in my life. Looks like you guys had a great time.

[ScottyB]

good stuff RJ, i'll definitely make a trip like this someday

[.RJ]

Maybe I'll look in Ca for my next car....

[lillitnn92]

Nawleans looks like a nice place. really need to plan a trip there.

[Dragon]

Nawleans looks like a nice place. really need to plan a trip there.

Actually it's dirty as hell. Don't get me wrong I still enjoyed myself the two times I was there, but the city itself is just a cesspool.

[JackoliciousLegs]

mmmmMMM cali... beautiful!

[.RJ]

Interesting comparison between teh crowds on bourbon last year to this year:

[Dragon]

I was wondering who the fuck resurrected this thread. Not a huge difference if you ask me. Especially when you consider we were there much closer to Mardi Gras season last year, and off in the distance past the legs looks like there's a decent crowd.

[.RJ]

It was much more empty this year.... not sure if it was the time of year, both visits were during the week.

[Sijray21]

It was much more empty this year.... not sure if it was the time of year, both visits were during the week.

i bet Katrina, Rita, and Wilma had nothing to do with it

[Dragon]

I am leaning towards time of year. A buddy of mine went down for Mardi Gras who has been previous years and said that while not as packed as previous years it was still very crowded.