A rough night

From dodging giant tumbleweed to drafting 18-wheelers through snow and ice, we have been driving through it all. It has been absolutely insane. In Nevada we started seeing snow, but it wasn't until New Mexico at 2:30 AM that it actually started snowing outside. Soon the snow started piling on the road, and we did not have chains or anything to help get us through. But the road was pretty straight so we managed to follow behind a convoy of trucks that warmed the road enough for us to drive. I have no idea how we did not wreck, but we pulled through the all-nighter in fine shape. Ines is a little sick, and everyone is tired, but no one is seriously injured--that's a success in my book. And we saw a beautiful sunset. We're now in Texas, driving S on the 287 to Dallas...

The Grand Canyon

If there is anything that this trip has reinforced for me, it is that Todd and I have an exceptional ability to find ordinary people willing to be extraordinarily nice. Aside from the amazing people that let us stay with them, we somehow get discounts almost everywhere. And I don't know we pull it off. Just from our journey, there was the restaurant in Beverly Hills, the waiter at the Chinese food restaurant let Todd share our buffet, the winery that sold us a bottle of wine at a 30% off, and today the Grand Canyon we got to see for free--it usually costs $25. These things weren't pre-arranged, they did not exist before we got there. Take the Grand Canyon--we just pull up to the booth after driving something like 2 hours from the interstate. Todd tells the woman that we are just driving through, but she insists on the $25 charge. Todd gets a little upset, and he just responds, "why?!" And when she starts going in to details about what the money is used for, I lean over and say with plainness and certainty, "We're broke. We have no money." I think it probably looked that way, too, with the car covered in a layer of dust and dirt, the inside trashed, and Ines passed out in the back. She almost did not hesitate before she winked at us and asked us if we were visiting someone inside.... A few nods later, we were in and hey we got to see the Grand Canyon. How cool. Enjoy the pictures.

How did we end up here?

We're not sure if we have quite enough money to get home. My American Express card cut me off. There is a French girl sleeping in the backseat.

Things definitely got crazier over the last five days. I know I have not posted on the blog, but I have been writing entries in my notebook that I will upload over the next few hours and days and put them in chronological order, so check pack frequently and review the old posts.

Trust me you'll want to hear the stories. We're on a marathon drive through Nevada, Arizona, and New Mexico.
We just saw the Hoover Dam and we're approaching the Grand Canyon. Vegas was a blast. Like I said, keep in touch.

The Vegas Climbing Scene

Our first and only full day in Vegas--Thursday Jan 8--found us in Red Rock Canyon, hiking around. Todd and I were really excited after we saw how beautiful the rock was to climb. It was chilly outside, sunny, and the rock was cold. We started messing around on some easy routes before we got hung up on two really hard boulder problems. Both of us were eventually dangling 15 feet off the rocky ground that was certain death. All this in the nice clothes we were wearing for breakfast. I started with my Puma slippers and socks + a long sleeve Polo button-up+long khaki pants, and I finished minus one sock, shirtless, and with dirty pants.

Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas!

We woke up somewhat early in San fran, checked out of the hostel, and loaded up the car for Vegas. The drive was a little rough with three in the car now, but it got o so much better when we actually got to Vegas. If you haven't actually seen Vegas, it's an impressive city to approach--the lights spread out in neat-looking little rows for as far as you can see and the nuclear-glowing strip at the center of it all. We had called up Todd's old friend, Billy, on the way and we ended up meeting him at his parents' house. We were all really hungry so we checked out this nice brewery-restaurant and had copious amounts of beer. Billy brought some coupons which we used for the food and then after for some on-site gambling in the restaurant. Ines is only 20, but she has been able to avoid all barriers so far by relying people's bad math skills, a little persuasion (1988 was the year she was born, but if you start on your first finger it's easy to confuse a bartender), and a French-language passport/ID. This time was no different, and it was great that we did because we actually went up $10 in something like 5 minutes. Beautiful--you gotta love Vegas.

+1

We ran into a French girl today, her name is Ines. She stayed at the hostel with us. She speaks English well, but she is traveling alone now after her friends left her in San Francisco. She goes to school in Virginia, and we offered to take her to New Orleans with us. She took us up on the offer, so now we are a 3-company.

Chillin in San Fran

New Danish friends!

We're in San Francisco!

We made it to San Francisco tonight, and we reserved 2 $18 beds at a hostel in the middle of the city. It's a great place--pretty clean, centrally located, good bathrooms and showers, etc. And all the people are really cool and friendly. And they are from every corner of the earth--Russia, Denmark, Austria, Germany, Mexico, Japan, etc. We're going to explore the Sunday night scene in a few minutes.

Crazy CA driver

Some a**hole was messing with us on the interstate, he kept trying to get in our lane and bump us off the road. But Todd didn't budge and we managed to screw him over. And over. haha. Then we took pictures of him making an obscene gesture at us. OMG. Now you can have the last laugh ))

Progress Report

We're in Santa Barbara, on our way to San Fransisco. I'll be updating all the way there. Law school applications are going well. I've made good progress on essays and everything. See you later.

Special thanks to this guy, who gave us great directions and information and actually read and commented on the blog while he was waiting at the bus stop after talking to us.