- The runway is so small that the plane literally has to do a 180 at the end to get back to the terminal.
- You can walk home from the airport (when does that ever happen?).
- The pizza place closes early because they’re out of pizza fixin’s (and out of draught beer) – turns out the supply barge only comes once a week.
- The people are so friendly that the owner of the grocery store offers to give you a ride back to the marina with all of your groceries.
- Free lessons in dock surfing abound.
- You get back to your boat after 9 months of it waiting out an Alaskan winter and it’s in REALLY good shape (and still floating!)
S/V Hello World's Travel Log
You Know You’re in Wrangell When…
(I’m stealing this great blog format from my good friends Mike and Anne, who are just finishing their 500 day round-the-world honeymoon)
Cross country trip - week 2
Jason needed someone to take pictures on his cross country trip, so he invited me along for the second half (actually, I wasn't interested in riding through Oklahoma on a bike, so I joined him for the fun part).
I flew into Albuquerque and we headed west the very next morning. We both, independently have a hangup about not taking highways on cross country trips - first of all it would make said trips much too short, second of all, you see lots more interesting things on back roads. The Tuba City's of the world just don't live on interstates...
That said, we bombed west on an interstate through the rest of New Mexico until we got to Arizona - it turns out there just aren't any back roads to where we wanted to go - horrors!
We had a great first day and made it to Lee's Ferry, AZ - consequently where we put in for our rafting trip 4 years ago!
We stayed in the cutest little inn...
that had a bathroom so small that they had to make room any way they could.
From there we rode on to Zion...
which I can now cross off my bucketlist - riding a bike through there was as spectacular as I'd imagined.
We decided after this grueling 100-mile day, that we couldn't pass Zion by without hiking, so we plunked down for a night and hit the trails.
We were awed by the hats...
and the asses falling out of shorts.
From Utah, we headed to Nevada, where we took the Extraterrestrial Highway (yes, that's really the name), and immediately saw our first alien!
We decided to bypass Rachel, NV - it just looked a little too sketchy for us.
We attempted to dodge the cows (note the lack of fence - a little scary when you're not surrounded by the cage of a car!).
We had big plans to stay in a place called Tonopah, NV for the night, but it was about the most depressed looking town we've ever ridden through, but our decision was made easier by the only hotel option with a vacancy.
Seriously, so sketchy.
So we decided to go to Mammoth Lakes, CA instead.
We had an AWESOME (albeit cold) ride through Yosemite...
and headed through the western foothills of the Sierras...
until we got to Napa to stay with friends in their 2 story, yurt shaped house next-door to a vineyard.
We headed to the coast...
up highway 1, possibly the best road of the entire trip!
Off to Northern CA, where the cows have a better view than most people.
And the local crazies sit atop thrones of possessions...
outside their favorite stores.
We headed into Oregon, with the best shoreline around, and stayed with our good friend Brenda.
And when we got to Washington, knew we were home when we found our first hipster hitchhikers (sadly, there was no room for them on the bike)...
and then we finally made it home!
I flew into Albuquerque and we headed west the very next morning. We both, independently have a hangup about not taking highways on cross country trips - first of all it would make said trips much too short, second of all, you see lots more interesting things on back roads. The Tuba City's of the world just don't live on interstates...
That said, we bombed west on an interstate through the rest of New Mexico until we got to Arizona - it turns out there just aren't any back roads to where we wanted to go - horrors!
We had a great first day and made it to Lee's Ferry, AZ - consequently where we put in for our rafting trip 4 years ago!
We stayed in the cutest little inn...
that had a bathroom so small that they had to make room any way they could.
From there we rode on to Zion...
which I can now cross off my bucketlist - riding a bike through there was as spectacular as I'd imagined.
We decided after this grueling 100-mile day, that we couldn't pass Zion by without hiking, so we plunked down for a night and hit the trails.
We were awed by the hats...
and the asses falling out of shorts.
From Utah, we headed to Nevada, where we took the Extraterrestrial Highway (yes, that's really the name), and immediately saw our first alien!
We decided to bypass Rachel, NV - it just looked a little too sketchy for us.
We attempted to dodge the cows (note the lack of fence - a little scary when you're not surrounded by the cage of a car!).
We had big plans to stay in a place called Tonopah, NV for the night, but it was about the most depressed looking town we've ever ridden through, but our decision was made easier by the only hotel option with a vacancy.
Seriously, so sketchy.
So we decided to go to Mammoth Lakes, CA instead.
We had an AWESOME (albeit cold) ride through Yosemite...
and headed through the western foothills of the Sierras...
until we got to Napa to stay with friends in their 2 story, yurt shaped house next-door to a vineyard.
We headed to the coast...
up highway 1, possibly the best road of the entire trip!
Off to Northern CA, where the cows have a better view than most people.
And the local crazies sit atop thrones of possessions...
outside their favorite stores.
We headed into Oregon, with the best shoreline around, and stayed with our good friend Brenda.
And when we got to Washington, knew we were home when we found our first hipster hitchhikers (sadly, there was no room for them on the bike)...
and then we finally made it home!
Cross country - week 1
I forgot just how much I loved riding and traveling on our motorcycle. We shipped the bike out to Charlotte, NC this winter in part to ride some areas in North and South Carolina but mostly, my hidden agenda was to setup a cross-country ride back to Seattle at the end of our time in Charlotte, NC.
One of my immediate targets for this ride was the Tail of the Dragon. The Dragon is short section of U.S. 129 running through the Smokey Mountains of eastern Tennessee that packs 318 curves into a spectacular 11 miles of riding. At one point half-way through I found myself laughing hysterically in my helmet at just how much fun this road was to ride.
Packing up the bike in Charlotte, NC.
The Tree of Shame. When you eat shit on the Dragon, pieces of your bike get hung on the tree of shame. I was determined to not decorate the Tree of Shame.
I spent a day riding through eastern Tennessee and wished I had more time. It's a beautiful area full of rolling hills and some really nice back roads. Unfortunately, I was on a schedule to meet up with good friends in Arkansas so I had to cut my time short.
Falls Creek Falls State Park in TN.
After a few days with friends in Little Rock, I was looking straight down the barrel of Oklahoma and north Texas. The weather forecast was scattered thunderstorms. I was riding through eastern Oklahoma when the sky started to darken and I started to get nervous. I found a gas station and pulled in under their awning right around the time the sky opened up. Thunder, lightening and torrential rain kept me cowering under the gas station roof for an hour before it let up. Another 30 miles down the road and the Oklahoma weather repeated the performance. This time it never let up. I wasn't relishing the idea of sleeping at a Shell station so I decided to make a run for Oklahoma City. This was probably a mistake. While riding through the lovely hamlet of Donkey Crotch, OK one particularly lightening bolt touched down close enough to convince me that being on a motorcycle in this weather was not a great idea. I pulled into the nearest pay-by-the-hour motel, paid for a full night, locked the door, and tried to decide which of three channels on the TV I was going to watch.
Turns out that same weather system that chased me indoors in Oklahoma was spinning off tornadoes in north Texas. After getting up the next morning, I decided I'd had enough of the heartland. I packed up the bike, got out on to the freeway and dropped the bike into GTFO gear and didn't stop until I got to northern New Mexico.
Here's a photo of the only beautiful thing I could find in the Texas Panhandle.
Christy, being the smarter of the two us was not terribly keen on riding through Oklahoma and Texas, decided she would work an extra week and fly out to Albuquerque, NM to meet me. Since I blew through Oklahoma and Texas faster than I thought I would I had an extra day to kill. So I headed up to Durango, CO and spent a couple days in the San Juan mountain range in southern Colorado.
On Hwy 550 to Silverton, CO.
After a couple days of hooligan riding up the San Juan Skyway and drinking really good beer in Durango, I ran down to Albequerque to pick up Christy and start on the two-up portion of the ride.
One of my immediate targets for this ride was the Tail of the Dragon. The Dragon is short section of U.S. 129 running through the Smokey Mountains of eastern Tennessee that packs 318 curves into a spectacular 11 miles of riding. At one point half-way through I found myself laughing hysterically in my helmet at just how much fun this road was to ride.
Packing up the bike in Charlotte, NC.
The Tree of Shame. When you eat shit on the Dragon, pieces of your bike get hung on the tree of shame. I was determined to not decorate the Tree of Shame.
I spent a day riding through eastern Tennessee and wished I had more time. It's a beautiful area full of rolling hills and some really nice back roads. Unfortunately, I was on a schedule to meet up with good friends in Arkansas so I had to cut my time short.
Falls Creek Falls State Park in TN.
After a few days with friends in Little Rock, I was looking straight down the barrel of Oklahoma and north Texas. The weather forecast was scattered thunderstorms. I was riding through eastern Oklahoma when the sky started to darken and I started to get nervous. I found a gas station and pulled in under their awning right around the time the sky opened up. Thunder, lightening and torrential rain kept me cowering under the gas station roof for an hour before it let up. Another 30 miles down the road and the Oklahoma weather repeated the performance. This time it never let up. I wasn't relishing the idea of sleeping at a Shell station so I decided to make a run for Oklahoma City. This was probably a mistake. While riding through the lovely hamlet of Donkey Crotch, OK one particularly lightening bolt touched down close enough to convince me that being on a motorcycle in this weather was not a great idea. I pulled into the nearest pay-by-the-hour motel, paid for a full night, locked the door, and tried to decide which of three channels on the TV I was going to watch.
Turns out that same weather system that chased me indoors in Oklahoma was spinning off tornadoes in north Texas. After getting up the next morning, I decided I'd had enough of the heartland. I packed up the bike, got out on to the freeway and dropped the bike into GTFO gear and didn't stop until I got to northern New Mexico.
Here's a photo of the only beautiful thing I could find in the Texas Panhandle.
Christy, being the smarter of the two us was not terribly keen on riding through Oklahoma and Texas, decided she would work an extra week and fly out to Albuquerque, NM to meet me. Since I blew through Oklahoma and Texas faster than I thought I would I had an extra day to kill. So I headed up to Durango, CO and spent a couple days in the San Juan mountain range in southern Colorado.
On Hwy 550 to Silverton, CO.
After a couple days of hooligan riding up the San Juan Skyway and drinking really good beer in Durango, I ran down to Albequerque to pick up Christy and start on the two-up portion of the ride.
35.228554°N 80.832329°W
Cruising Comparison: Bikes vs Boats
When I thought about “cruising” a few months ago, the only thing that really came to mind was cruising on boats. Of course, we’ve lived on Hello World for over four years now, so I suppose that’s natural. It turns out there is a whole class of people who conjure up visions of motorcycles when they hear the word “cruising”. We were fortunate enough to join that group, if for a short time, while riding Jason’s bike back to Seattle from Charlotte. It was on that ride that it occurred to me that cruising on a sailboat is surprisingly similar to cruising on a motorcycle.
Boaters always have something in common. Sailors have even more. Oh and you meet a sailor that has the same boat that you do? Excitement ensues! It turns out, bikes are the same way – nearly ever biker waves to other bikers on the road – it’s just a friendly community. You stop at gas stations, you chat, you talk about gear and where people are going and which roads are the most curvy. We had beer, dinner and even invited to Switzerland with complete strangers.
Those bikers love to talk the biker-lingo (fortunately it’s not as extensive as sailor lingo):
Because we were riding 2-up, it meant Jason was always in my way – so it felt exactly like home. There was not the regular salon shuffle we have down below since I tried to move as little as possible, but still, I was not homesick.
When above decks, as many of you know, Jason has a nickname of “Safety Pup” – he is certainly the more safety conscious of the two of us (for which my mother is extremely happy). We have rules about when we tether in and how many backup lines he ties on me before I go up the mast. On the bike, Jason continues the Safety Pup tradition and suits me up in only the best gear, which explains our awesome partial face tans (which are eerily similar to Alaska sailing tans).
And as all safety pups of the world know (and fortunately most of the rest of us), some heeling on a sailboat is good, but too much is not-so-fun. Certainly this is true of motorcycles as well. This brings us to the differences in cruising vehicles:
Overall, I was surprised by the similarities, but upon further reflection, I suppose it comes as no surprise that we love cruising no matter what the form. Either way, we have plenty of spare time to write up really random blog posts. :)
Boaters always have something in common. Sailors have even more. Oh and you meet a sailor that has the same boat that you do? Excitement ensues! It turns out, bikes are the same way – nearly ever biker waves to other bikers on the road – it’s just a friendly community. You stop at gas stations, you chat, you talk about gear and where people are going and which roads are the most curvy. We had beer, dinner and even invited to Switzerland with complete strangers.
Those bikers love to talk the biker-lingo (fortunately it’s not as extensive as sailor lingo):
- Salad bowl: silly half helmets that Harley riders wear so they don't get pulled over for not wearing a helmet
- Ape hangers: really tall handlebars
- Squid: the guy riding a sport bike down the freeway at a 100mph doing a wheelie, not a term of affection
- Cage: car
- 2-up: two people are riding on one bike.
Because we were riding 2-up, it meant Jason was always in my way – so it felt exactly like home. There was not the regular salon shuffle we have down below since I tried to move as little as possible, but still, I was not homesick.
When above decks, as many of you know, Jason has a nickname of “Safety Pup” – he is certainly the more safety conscious of the two of us (for which my mother is extremely happy). We have rules about when we tether in and how many backup lines he ties on me before I go up the mast. On the bike, Jason continues the Safety Pup tradition and suits me up in only the best gear, which explains our awesome partial face tans (which are eerily similar to Alaska sailing tans).
And as all safety pups of the world know (and fortunately most of the rest of us), some heeling on a sailboat is good, but too much is not-so-fun. Certainly this is true of motorcycles as well. This brings us to the differences in cruising vehicles:
- Motorcycles are not self-righting (which is really a bummer when you do heel too much)
- Typical cruising speed on a motorcycle is about 10 times that of our sailboat (yet it took us 54 weeks to sail the 4,697 miles we just covered in 2 weeks on the bike. Hmmmm...)
- It turns out maintenance on a motorcycle is much easier and certainly less frequent (we went through 3 clogged heads, 1 bowsprit repair and a waterpump replacement in that 4,697 miles vs 1 pint of oil on the bike)
- It’s not nearly as comfortable to sleep on the bike as it is the boat (yet I still manage)
Overall, I was surprised by the similarities, but upon further reflection, I suppose it comes as no surprise that we love cruising no matter what the form. Either way, we have plenty of spare time to write up really random blog posts. :)
wrapping up our time in charlotte
We moved to Charlotte in September of last year to take a contract job and squirrel away some cash for the next journey. Well... spring is here and so is that journey. My last day of work was yesterday. With a surprising amount of reluctance, I said goodbye to my Charlotte co-workers. Tonight will be a last gathering with the friends we've made here in Charlotte. Tomorrow - I hop on the motorcycle we had shipped out here to ride back to Seattle. Christy will work an extra week (someone has to pay for all this!) and then fly out to Albuquerque to meet me on the bike and ride with me through the last few western states.
Our last week in Charlotte, the weather finally turned nice. We spent an evening with Nate and Neville sitting on the grass watching live music at the U.S. National Whitewater Center.
Two of my favorite people.
Our last Food Truck Friday. We waited in line for an hour for a grilled cheese sandwich. Best damn grilled cheese sandwich evar.
We really loved our time in Charlotte. Our jobs introduced us to some incredible people that we're going to really miss.
Now? The fun starts.
Our last week in Charlotte, the weather finally turned nice. We spent an evening with Nate and Neville sitting on the grass watching live music at the U.S. National Whitewater Center.
Two of my favorite people.
Our last Food Truck Friday. We waited in line for an hour for a grilled cheese sandwich. Best damn grilled cheese sandwich evar.
We really loved our time in Charlotte. Our jobs introduced us to some incredible people that we're going to really miss.
Now? The fun starts.
35.22547°N 80.83668°W
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