One Last Post Before I'm in the USA!

Wow, I am GORGEOUS! Anyway... I just got back from the Fed Ex store with are sweet looking business cards. If you see us on the road, you'll probably get one!

Starting tomorrow, I'll be broadcasting to you live from San Antonio, Texas! I probably won't get any sleep tonight because I am uber excited. Before I go, I wanted to leave you with a list of alcohol I owe certain trip individuals (mostly so I'll remember).

Alexandros- 2 beers (in return for the purchase of Calamari at Jack Asters)
Fletcher- 2 beers (in return for bubble tea and laps at Pladium)
Adrian- 2 beers (for debts I am sure I have incurred over our friendship)
Alexandra- 2 beers (for putting up with my youtube shenanigans when work needs to be done)
Ally- I owe Ally pretty much all my income for helping me get the best job ever. However, we'll say 2 beers just to make things easy to remember.

Talk to you from Texas!

Trip Cards/Collectible

Those close to me know that I've been keeping a pretty strict budget over the past months in order to save for this trip. Due to my crazed saving, I actually have money left over in my pre-trip budget. How best to spend this money you ask? Clothes maybe? No? How about a fancy dinner? Or... why not print off business cards for all trip members to hand out during our travels across the United States?

If you excuse me... I have a date with Kinko's.

UPDATE: Cards are at the printers. I'll pick em up on the way to the airport!

Site Pics Updated

Hey everyone, Alex here!

My flight leaves on Sunday for San Antonio and I couldn't be more excited. All these pictures of sea food and alligators make me supremely sad that I could not join this trip sooner.

Speaking of pictures, I have now updated the picture page with pics from the last couple of days. You will notice that older picture albums will just become links now as to not slow down your lovely computers with 90 albums all slideshowing at once. I have also updated the gator post with pictures and hope to do the same with the old posts over the next couple of days.

Today and tomorrow I shall also be updating the blog with more playlists and CDs, including CDs for California, Seattle and a couple of Canadian Content CDs to keep the CRTC happy.

Thanks for reading and hope you like the updates!

-Alex

here's the low down...

Alright,

I have not posted a lot but I promise to fill you all in on the details that have been left out to the best of my ability. Lets begin with a shoutout to Elroy, the nicest guy in our HOliday Inn Lobby!!!

Last night we had a phenomenal time wandering around the French quarter....

even though this says fletcher posted this... hes now fallen aselep... so its alexandros now! we had a phenominal night. we saw bourbon street in all its glory.

we have established that the tropical isle is our home base here in New Orleans. Our night has been graced with great live music, wonderful service and great new friends.

earlier tonight, we had dinner at the at an oyster bar. As adrian does not typically eat seafood, fletcher and I enjoyed a great deal of oysters, fresh gumbo and turtle soup! I can safely say that we had the most satisfying meal thus far in new orleans.

we can only hope that tomorrow holds more exciting new things to do and experience. The tentative plan is to enjoy a boat tour of the swamps, partake in a traditional Louisiana cooking class and participate in a haunted walking tour of the city.

Thats it for now... more to come! look for the new photos coming soon!!

Alligator Wrestling

Today we went to Insta-Gator, an alligator ranch outside of New Orleans, and the experience was amazing.

On the way there we traversed one of the longest bridges we have ever seen at 38.42 km in length. The bridge crossed Lake Pontchartrain and lead us to the alligator ranch.

When we started the tour we learned a lot about alligators, and more specifically the alligators in Louisiana. We learned, for example, that the alligator ranches and farms in the area are largely responsible for the re-population of alligators in Louisiana. To give you an idea, in the 1960s there were 150,000 gators living in Louisiana. As a result of the repopulation program, there are in excess of 3 million gators in a state of 6 million people. We strongly urge you all to consume as many alligator products as possible.

During this presentation, the guide brought out a small alligator and we all got to pet it and feel its surprisingly soft skin. The hands on demonstrations continued as they then gave us marshmallows to feed the alligators with. They took us into one of the barns and we got to feed the roughly 4 foot long alligators.

Afterward we headed over to a smaller pool where baby alligators were swimming around. They had their mouths taped up and the guide showed us how to pick them up and hold them. This was an amazing experience for all of us and we greatly enjoyed holding the gators, especially as they all had unique personalities. Like Snappy, who had two tape bands on his mouth, because he/she was particularly aggressive. This, coincidentally, was the first alligator i picked up.

After playing with the baby gators, we went back into the barn with the 4 foot alligators and our guide fed the alligators a live mouse. It was quite interesting actually as the mouse swam quite quickly and managed to avoid a few gators before becoming lunch. Then the guide got into one of their pools and caught a gator. Another of the visitors on the tour then taped its mouth shot and we took it outside to take pictures and see one up close.

Videos of both the feeding and the capture will also be forthcoming.

All in all the Gator ranch was and amazing and must-see experience if you're ever in New Orleans.

Link to whole day's album here.

Birthday Wishes!!!

There is a certain friend back home in Toronto who is celebrating her birthday today!! From the crew here in New Orleans, we would like to extend a big NOLA Happy Birthday to Kat!! We wish you all the best!

PS: You have been moo-ed by Fletcher. Adrian sends you an inappropriately placed math joke, and i will eat an alligator in your honor.

The Morning After

Last night we decided to check out Bourbon Street. We went to several bars and tried some local cocktails. I found out that most of the cocktails are secret recipes, so they would not tell us what was in them.

We spent most of our night in a bar called the Tropical Isle, which had some wonderful proprietary mixes. The best part of these is that we got to keep the glasses; one was a grenade with a long neck, and the other a very cool alligator with sunglasses. While at the bar, we played a bar game where we had to throw a small hand grenade into a basket hanging from the ceiling.

I got a few from up close, but my crowning achievement was getting one in from halfway across the bar.

We met some nice people at the bar and the band that was playing was really nice and took our requests for Cat Stevens. Though they sadly did not know "The Night That Patty Murphy Died".

We have two more days in New Orleans, then on the morning of the third day look for us to the east as we will be cutting towards the west from New Orleans to Houston.

Day's pics are located here!

The Creole Culture

Following our epic "breakfast" this morning, we wondered how we could have possibly topped it. Having just come back from our very first creole experience at a nearby oyster bar called Desire, we barely have the capacity or energy to wonder at all.

Our meal consisted of shrimp, catfish, crawfish, calamari, mussels and clams, followed by what the locals call a Po-Boy and some shrimp and crawfish Alfredo.

Earlier we explored more of the city. We followed Bourbon street east from our hotel, frequenting voodoo shops, book stores and various other local places. We made our way past the Louisiana court houses down to the Moon Walk. From here we saw our first glimpse of the mighty Mississippi river littered with steam boats in muddy waters. Thank goodness the oil hasn't traveled up this far.

We at the Hotel Motel Holiday Inn

Hey guys, we had a great sleep at the Holiday Inn here in the French Quarter.

We woke up very well rested this morning and some delicious breakfast at Someplace Else.

Looking forward to seeing much more of the city, and Bourbon Street at night.

We are also looking into renting motorcycles, as I have only my M1, this should be highly interesting.

We'll keep u up to date with our exploits.

Awake now... not really...

Heya
This is R1C3RCKT aka Fletcher joining you on my first blog post. I have just woken up from a much needed and restful sleep. Despite our aspirations to go and explore the city a bit after we settled in to our hotel room, well we settled and just stayed in. After two long days of driving we are finally in Nola! I may sound super excited to be done driving for a few days and I am! but look forward to pictures of my perma-smile while driving the infamous "Tail of the Dragon". I'm not much of a writer nor do I read a lot so I do appreciate you keeping up with us on our adventure. Just want to put it out there again: If people want to meet or join up with us along our route, feel free to drop us a line:) For now, its back to sweet dreams of the countless turns of Route 129.

ps I like cheese.
R1C3RCKT

We're Here!!!!!

We've made it to New Orleans, our hotel is right next to Bourbon Street and this promises to be an exciting adventure.

Stay tuned for more, for now we're crashing.

5 Hour Energy for a 3 Hour Stint

After a brief stop in Meridian Mississippi, we are refuelled and re-energized. Indulging in Kei$a songs (my guilty pleasure), and with Adrian typing as my proxy, we are anxiously awaiting our arrival in New Orleans.

Tomorrow we embark on a new adventure; one with considerably less windshield time.

The exploration of the French Quarter in New Orleans is something I’ve been looking forward to for the majority of my adult life. More recently, however, my attention has been drawn to New Orleans due to the BP oil spill. Having covered this event over the last two t three months at The Court, I’m excited to find myself at the front lines of the spill.

Investigative journalism aside, our tentative plan for when we reach New Orleans is to settle in and hit up a couple of late night cafés, regardless of the fact that we will be arriving into town around 3 am.

Our impasse of sorts is whether to go down to Bourbon Street tonight (a incredibly tempting offer), or wait until tomorrow when we are well rested and can properly soak in the atmosphere. This is of course bypassing the very important and relevant issue of whether we will be in any fit state to leave the hotel room once we have settled in.

For those here who are truly interested, you may be intrigued to find that the next exciting blog post will likely (though not certainly), unveil whether or not we braved the streets of New Orleans this night.

More picture and videos are soon to come.

Coming to you from interstate 59 approximately 235 km outside of New Orleans this is Alex M and the Crew with the latest trip news.

P.S. I like your beard

I HAVE A CELLPHONE

Hey loyal followers, and rando stoppers by,

I got a cell phone today and it has a data plan, amazing I know. This lets us do thigs like post while on the road driving... no need to worry, I am not driving currently.

we are about 472 km and 5 hours outside of New Orleans. Looks like another very long night.

Today was a wonderful driving day. We started it off by taking the Tail of the Dragon. This is a section of Highway 129 that serves as the border between Tennessee and South Carolina. As we described yesterday it has a couple of turns, It was a wonderful drive which we have on video, and will try to upload shortly.

After which we drove through South Carolina heading towards New Orleans, and the view was breathtaking. I was constantly gesticulating to Fletcher and Alex to take pictures of the scenery.

At one point we just had to stop and get out and dunk our feet into the river.

unfortunate at some point on this trip the condenser on the civic broke... oh dear no more A/C... this will be very bad in Nevada....

Currently we are being puzzled by a strange light that is shining periodically down the highway, it's very quick and bright and slightly yellow... but we have no idea what it is... potentially small explosions?

anyway with "only" 5 more hours of driving before we get to our second stop I will sign off

Keep reading for more updates and fun stories

New Challenge Added

The license plate challenge has officially been added to the challenge page! Check it out!

Leg 2 of the Trip

We're up again at some ungodly hour... not 5 am again, but still earlier than preferred in the summer.

Today we are going to hit up Tail of the Dragon, a stretch of highway that is known for it twists and turns. It is the best riding road in America and it sports an astounding 318 turns in 11 miles (or about 18 km).

Aside from this automotive adventure, we will be en route to New Orleans tonight. Yeah baby going to the "Big Easy".

Photos from Day 1 are currently being uploaded, we hope to have both days up by tomorrow.

Keep following our zany exploits fellow internet users.

Knoxville

We've landed in Knoxville only a few minutes ago. After 19 hours on the road we are all very tired but excited to have started on this amazing journey.

We have been taking many pictures and these will be uploaded to the pictures tab of the blog shortly so keep an eye out for that.

Our day started very excitingly as we crossed the border between Windsor and Detroit and were set aside for a car search. We did not have anything illegal, and so all was well but it was the first time we have been searched at the border. I have to say it was moderately efficient.

We have taken up a challenge while driving around the states. We are trying to get pictures of a license plate from each state in the US. We have gotten around 12 or so today. Alaska and Hawaii may be the most elusive, but we remain hopeful.

On the way through Kentucky we were stuck in a beautiful thunder storm that lit up the sky magnificently.

By the time we got to our hotel in Knoxville it was almost the 27th and we were all about ready to crash.

Tomorrow will be a day of sight seeing in Knoxville then we will head to New Orleans for the next leg of our trip and a new adventure.

Be sure to stay tuned for more updates as well as pictures and videos coming soon!

Best,

-The US crew, part 1.

Take-Off

Well ladies and Gentlemen, We're Off

It's 5:00 AM in beautiful Toronto, and we are about to embark on our 35 day trip around the United States.

What is to follow promises to be one of the most exciting adventures we have embarked upon, and we invite you all to share in it by following our blog. Soon the pictures and videos of our trip will start being uploaded as well as regular blog posts by various members of the trip.

We will update the Map page to reflect where we are, so keep checking back because exciting things are afoot.

Adrian "Tangent" Muresan signing out for now.

Vegas Video Predrink Party Playlist

Hey all!

Since Alex is all over this music stuff, and I've requested the task of creating a video playlist for hotel predrinking in vegas, I guess I'll post that too! (I'm also just having fun with the fact that you can embed entire playlists).

**Addendum: I accidentally deleted the entire playlist, so now I'm creating a newer, BETTER one. Find it below :) Work still in progress...

SUPA SEXY DANCE MIX CD

1. Miley Cyrus- Party in the USA
2. Black Eyed Peas- I Gotta Feeling
3. Lady Gaga- Alejandro
4. Adam Lambert- If I Had You
5. Cascada- Evacuate the Dance Floor
6. David Guetta ft. Akon- Sexy Bitch
7. Lady Gaga- Bad Romance
8. Michael Jackson- Thriller
9. Ke$ha- TiK ToK
10, Lady Gaga ft. Beyonce- Telephone
11. La Roux- Bulletproof
12. Black Eyed Peas- Boom Boom Pow
13. Lady Gaga- Poker Face
14. Ke$ha- Your Love is My Drug
15. Flo-Rida ft. T-Pain- Low
16. Lady Gaga- Paparazzi
17. La Roux- Tigerlily
18. Lady Gaga ft. Colby O'Donis- Just Dance
19. David Guetta ft. Fergie & LMFAO- Gettin' Over You
20. DJ Earthworm- United State of Pop 2009 (Blame It on the Pop)


Entire playlist link located here.

Country CD

This CD is comprised of mostly top country songs from the billboard as of July 25th.... but it also has a few favs thrown onto it.

1. Lynyrd Skynyrd- Sweet Home Alabama
2. Alan Jackson & Jimmy Buffett- 5 O'Clock Somewhere
3. Taylor Swift- You Belong With Me
4. Big & Rich- Save A Horse [Ride a Cowboy]
5. Easton Corbin- Roll With It
6. George Strait- River of Love
7. Craig Morgan- This Ain't Nothin'
8. Little White Church- Little Big Town
9. Josh Turner- All Over Me
10. Uncle Kracker- Smile
11. Billy Currington- Pretty Good at Drinkin' Beer
12. Lady Antebellum- Our Kind of Love
13. Lee Brice- Love Like Crazy
14. Jason Aldean- Crazy Town
15. Clay Walker- She Won't Be Lonely Long
16. Keith Urban- I'm In
17. Zac Brown Band- Free
18. Brad Paisley- Water
19. Jerrod Niemann- Lover, Lover
20. Carrie Underwood- Undo It
21. Luke Bryan- Rain is a Good Thing


Playlist of available songs on youtube located here.

Texas CD

The AC/DC song doesn't really have much to do about Texas... but it does mention the state once... However, I believe the rest of this CD makes up for it.


1. AC/DC- Thunderstruck
2. Bobby Fuller Four- I Fought the Law
3. Raveonettes- Somewhere in Texas
4, ZZ Top- Sharp Dressed Man
5. ZZ Top- She's a Heartbreaker (LINK= BEST COVER EVER)
6. Sir Douglas Quintet- She's About A Mover
7. Buddy Holly - That'll Be the Day
8. Willie Nelson- Blue Eyes Crying In The Rain
9. Lyle Lovett- San Antonio Girl
10. Lyle Lovett- Daybreak (Texas Trilogy 1/3)
11. Lyle Lovett- Train Ride (Texas Trilogy 2/3)
12. Lyle Lovett- Bosque County Romance (Texas Trilogy 3/3)
13. Pat Green- Southbound 35
14. Pat Green- Goin' Down in Style
15. Pat Green- West Texas Holiday
16. Pat Green- I Like Texas
17. George Strait- All My Ex's Live in Texas
18. George Strait- Ace in the Hole
19. George Strait- Texas
20. Lyle Lovett- That's Right (You're Not From Texas)


Link to available song online playlist here.

New Orleans CD

Here is the first installment of the soundtrack I made. This probably won't be in any particular order... just whatever I feel like burning next... Enjoy!

1. The Animals- House of the Rising Sun
2. The Rolling Stones- Brown Sugar
3. Creedence Clearwater Revival - Proud Mary
4. Elf- Annie New Orleans
5. Back to the Future OST- Johnny B Goode (Link is to the Chuck Berr Original)
6. Elvis Presley- King Creole
7. Johnny Cash- Big River
8. Louis Armstrong- Basin Street Blues
9. Blind Willie Johnson - Dark Was The Night Cold Was The Ground
10. Big Joe Williams- Baby Please Don't Go
11. Billie Holiday - Love Me Or Leave Me
12. Diana Krall- Bye Bye Blackbird
13. Otis Taylor- Nasty Letter
14. Bruce Springsteen- The Big Muddy
15. Bob Dylan- Blind Willie McTell (link is to a cover... this song is hard to find on the youtubes)
16. Jon Bon Jovi- Queen of New Orleans
17. Elton John- My Father's Gun
18. Toby Keith- New Orleans (no youtube link... or anywhere legal for that matter...)
19. Green Day & U2-The Saints Are Coming


Click here for the entire playlist... minus Toby Keith....

Departure Imminent!

Hello all!

Departure for Adrian, Alexandros and Fletcher is on Monday! Soon this site will be updated constantly with stories, pictures and videos from the road. I will be joining the troop on the 1st of August and going from there!

Until Monday I'll be updating the blog with a special project of mine. I have been charged with the sacred duty of coming up with a soundtrack for the trip. I am in the process of burning CDs for each individual drive between cities, as well as some auxiliary party mixes and other things. I shall post the song lists for each CD (as well as links to a youtube video for each song) shortly after I clean my pool.

I am posting this so you too can feel like you are coming on this epic journey with us... and so that Adrian can download these songs to his mp3 device in order to also listen to them in his vehicle.

More to come!

-Alex

The Challenge Page

The last of the pages is now live! The Challenge page has been added with a more specific procedure.
Access the page here.

Sorry I haven't been on the updates, but life is busy preparing for departure. Soon more than one person will be able to edit the blog. This will greatly increase posts and content.

Thanks and stay tuned!

-Alex

Calendar!

If you haven't read Yvonne's description in The Crew section, it may contain the words "dependent on structure" somewhere in there. What? It doesn't? Well there's something like that, and Yvonne has proved it true by creating a Google Calendar for our trip! The Map tab has now been changed to "The Map & Calendar" page. The calendar will get more specific as we know more of the specifics of where/when we will be places. A huge thank you to Yvonne for the set up!

Secondly, tomorrow morning there will probably be the addition of a "Challenge" tab. This will just outline in more detail what was stated in Ally's description. A link will be added to the bottom of this post.

The Map & Calendar Page

Camera Test #2: Underwater

Here is the final of the camera tests. I will be filming more before the trip, however all other videos will probably be even less trip related. You can find any and all videos I make here. The next blog post will be up sometime before I go to bed. Sorry for the continued delay!

Wednesday Post

Hello all of you beautiful people.

As it turns out, I am rather tired today and shall be going to bed soon. Therefore the first city post will probably hit the blog sometime early tomorrow morning. A new video will also be posted sometime tomorrow. Sorry about the change and please stay tuned for more!

-Alex

The Camera Arrived and NEW DAILY POSTS

My new camera came in the mail today, so Fletcher and I decided to try it out. Hope you like it!

Also- starting tomorrow I will be featuring a city from the trip everyday on the blog. Tomorrow starts with Knoxville, TN. Come on back and check it out!

The Trip and The Map Tabs

The Trip and The Map Tabs have been updated.

Eventually we will post information on when we will be where. This way if you happen to be in the area you can come say hi and be on the internets with us. Please check out what we have so far and I'll post again when more information is available!

The Crew Tab

"The Crew" Tab has been added. Click it or read everything here:

Now that you know the plan, it is time to meet the people.

Alex aka- "The Director"

Handsome, brilliant, talented, and all-around-life-champion are some of the words just used to describe Alex. When not writing trip descriptions and auto-biographical blurbs, Alex studies media and communications. Due to his vast knowledge of the field and his stockpiling of camera equipment, he has volunteered to be the trip's main videographer/photographer

/documenter/visionary. All video taken on the trip will be posted to Alex's youtube account here. All of his videos are extremely funny and cool. All trip-related videos will also be posted within the blog itself and in the Videos tab.

The First Post!

Hello Everyone! The Trip is less than a month away, so I thought I would create this blog. Originally, I was going to design my own website, but hosting and updating would have been a pain... so here is a blogger version that will work well! Let me know what you think about the layout and background and such- I can make changes before the big day!

Today I made a rather impulsive buy of a Kodak Playsport camera. It is a 1080p HD pocket camcorder that is water resistant for up to 10ft! I expect this will help document our journey even better. Here is a picture of the camera and a link to a quality and underwater test.

Alright, well this post is mostly so I can format the fonts and colours and such, but I hope this gets you as excited as I am for our awesome US adventure! See you around!