A Man, A Jeep, No Real Plan

Amazing Stories and Adventures

Scavenger Hunt

Days 21, 22, and 23: The Stumble Home

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The journey home was a long one… I left Pheonix at 4:30 in the morning on day 21. I was a man on a mission. The mission was simple, drive 920 miles from Pheonix, AZ to Fort Collins, CO.

The trip took me through Santa Fe. That was a bit rough. I didn’t even have time to stop in and wave. You see, I have spent a few seasons working at the opera there, and I still have a lot of friends in the area. It was my intention to make an appearance as part of this adventure. However like so many things involving me and Santa Fe, it just wasn’t meant to be. Honestly if my track record for visiting is any indicator, it’s probably for the best. Still sad to be so close to so many I hold dear, but unable to swing by, but things will be as they are meant to be.

As I traveled further north I started to smell smoke. I bet you think It was Jeff. Shame on you.

My drive took me close enough to a few of the large fires that the smoke blocked out the sun. It was surreal to see the glow in the distance, the pinks and purples peaking through the clouds, and the realization that almost everyone else was smart enough to find a route that was further away from the fires. The wimps!

Well, around 9:30pm I arrived in Fort Collins, CO and got to visit with Keenan and Sarah. Keenan is literally my oldest friend. He grew up about a half mile through the woods from me and we bonded from an early age over video games, blowing things up, and a mutual understanding that there were no other playmates within walking distance. Haha. He has been my best friend, a roommate, and on more than one occasion the recipient of a drunken freaked out phone call. Sarah is the woman who tolerates us and I honestly have no clue why…

Well these two have been engaged forever. And by forever I mean I think in the amount of time they have been engaged I got engaged, married, and divorced. Everyone has given up on them ever actually doing it.

Well I think the fires I drove through were my preview to hell freezing over. They have set a date. October something 2019… They told me the day, but until I receive that save the date etched in stone I am not going to remember it.

The other news is that they asked if I would officiate their ceremony. After some negotiations on how much input I get and weather or not I have to wear pants to the ceremony, I graciously accepted. So internet, prepare to ordain me. I wonder if I pay a little extra can get a tittle? Like Arch Bishop DeLong? Would it be weird if I insisted on making people call me “your excellency” at the wedding? Don’t worry, I’ll let them kiss my ring. Haha

But seriously Keenan and Sarah, I am honored and I promise to only embarrass myself.

Day 22 was fairly uneventful as far as travels go. I drove a half hour to I-70 and then drove East for 8.5 hours to Amanda and Jakes in Kansas City. The only notable thing is that my water bottle tasted a bit off towards the end of the day. I thought nothing of it, but… we’ll get to that later.

So I arrived at Amanda and Jakes and their dog Cooper lost his mind. I’m talking jumping, rebounding off a wall, licking my face, into a back flip kinda excited. I am his favorite human. I think Amanda is a bit jealous.

Speaking of Amanda, she is kinda preggars at the moment. So we are not going to make any jokes about anything…

But I have already started thinking of all the memes that I am going to make out of this photo…

At any rate it was a lovely evening of hanging out and watching Firefly and shooting the shit with these two. Odds are the next time I see them I will have a tiny human who will no doubt have her mothers sass demanding my attention.

Day 23 should have been an easy one. Only 6 hours of driving home, 5 of which on I-70… well you remember how my water tasted a little off. I am going to say that was the issue. Because any other explanation would mean Amanda gave me food poisoning and I am pretty sure even implying that’s a possibility would be a serious infraction.

So, about 50 miles into my drive I started to experience, shall we say gastrointestinal distress. I made it to a truck stop and the took care of business, or so I thought. 4 miles down the road, the urge returned. Pulled off on the next exit and once again took care of business. After waiting a good long while to make sure it was safe to return to driving, I hit the road again. About 10 miles down the road I suddenly felt nauseous, and then I felt more than nauseous. I cut Jeff across 3 lanes of traffic while going 85mph. I slammed on my brakes the moment I hit that shoulder. I put Jeff in park the moment he was sort of stopped, flipped on the hazard lights, and made a B-line to the guardrail on the side of the road. That is were I went all exorcist. I have done a great many things on the side of highways over the years, but this is the first time I have violently vomited. I don’t recommend it.

I traveled the next 100 miles an exit at a time. Day 23 was going to be the last day on this adventure no matter what. Once I started feeling better I started skipping a few exits, until finally I was back to being a functional human being.

At 6:49 PM I pulled into my driveway and officially ended this adventure. 7,626 miles of driving over 16 states, 11 National parks visited, 13 friends visited, $4,126 worth of repairs to Jeff, 342 gallons of gas, $255 worth of gambling profits, 1 case of serious food poisoning, 1 new tattoo, and more stories than I can even currently comprehend.

That my friends was one hell of an adventure. Road Trip 2018 is over, but my journeys are far from over. I am currently sitting in my new home, or rather the gutted shell that will soon be known as “The DeLong Home For Adults Who Can’t Even”. I am flying to FL to start a new job that is a serious step foreword career wise in a little over a week. I also am not about to start adulting full time any time soon.

So, thank you for joining me on this round, but remember, life is an adventure and only you can embrace it.

“I hope you see things that startle you. I hope you feel things you never felt before. I hope you meet people with a different points of view. I hope you live a life you’re proud of. If you find that you’re not, I hope you have the strength to start all over again.”

-Eric Roth

Points scored on stumble:

– 2 points for visiting with friends

– 2 point for accruing another 1000 miles twice

Total score for this trip: 42

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Day 19: Adult Supervision Wouldn’t Have Hurt

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Despite only have 2 hours of sleep I checked out of the Golden Nugget around 7am and dropped Jeff at the mechanic by 7:30.

I then immediately grabbed an Uber back to the nugget and got some breakfast. As I was sitting there I got a phone call from my friend Zach, he didn’t have a lot of time, but he swung by, we chatted for a few minutes and he offered to give me a ride anywhere in Vegas I want.

So I did what any sleep deprived individual who is avoiding adult responsibilities would do. I went to a casino and spent most of my day hopping up and down the strip loosing an embarrassing amount of money (spoiler for day 20, I get it back plus some).

Once Jeff had his front bearings replaced I picked him up and then checked into The Luxor. About the time I got settled in Zach sent me a text and asked if I wanted to grab some coffee and catch up properly.

We went to this local coffee shop he loves and spent a decent chunk of time catching up. Since we last saw each other he has gotten married, he now has 2 step daughters, AND a baby on the way. I wish I could have met the woman who domesticated the man who I used to literally travel the world with. That being said there was something about him that I never saw in my 2ish years of touring with him. He was smiling, and I don’t mean just as he chuckled at our jokes. He mentioned that he had had some offers to return to the touring world, gigs that the Zach I knew would have killed for, but he is genuinely happy sitting in one place and doing the family thing. It’s great to see an old friend not only doing well, but proving there is life after touring!

Speaking of old friends, I couldn’t help myself… I went to Blue Man and I used all of my inside knowledge of the show to hide in plain sight, get the blue dudes to take a selfie with my phone (wasn’t one of the performers I know), I got them them to repeat part of Tequila on the PVCs by yelling tequila at the right time and of course I tested if the lighting guy was paying attention and I clapped when the desk lamp was on the table to get him to turn it on and off. It was a blast, and the blue man I toured with never made me.

That is until I showed up to the meet and greet for a selfie. Haha

Post show Ethan and I met up at one of the bars in the casino for “a beverage”. That was around 11ish. By 11:15 we had introduced ourselves to a pair of ladies. Alice is from Sweden and Theresa is from Austria. They are in the states as part of an ESL emersion program for adults. The 4 of us sat at that bar until around 5:30 in the morning discussing everything from different American accents, to drug issues in Sweden. We also spent a lot of time figuring out that Theresa basically lives on a mountain in the middle of nowhere.

I crawled into my bed at 6:05 and set the alarm for 9am. The drive to Pheonix is gonna require caffeine in the morning, but today’s adventures were some of the best to date. In fact I think I’m counting this as my wild card score for the trip!

Daily Score: 7

– 1 point for visiting with Zach

– 1 point for visiting with Ethan

– 5 points for such a crazy “wild card” day

Total score to date: 36

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Day 16: El Capitain

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This guy has been my constant companion in this empty campground. He’s a bit skittish, but I did manage to have a complete conversation about how empty the campground is this morning.

We also discussed the mosquito issue… it’s bad…

Of course I had my breakfast of champions before heading out for my day of adventures in Yosemite.

My first destination was Taft Point. The hike there was a very leisurely stroll through the woods.

That is El Capitain. It is the holy grail in the rock climbing world and a few years back a guy by the name of Alex Honnold became the biggest badass of any athlete, in any sport, when he solo free climbed it. To date he is the only person to attempt to climb what was considered impossible to climbs even with gear 25 years ago… without any gear. I, like most climbers have an obsession with El Capitain, so expect to see a lot more photos of this bad boy.

Oh also that selfie is on the scavenger hunt… points were scored on the day. Haha

My next destination was to summit Sentinel Dome. I may have accidentally taken the scenic route up there… but look at this pictures I got while on an “unofficial” trail.

The summit was beautiful! 360 degree panoramic view of Yosemite. There also was a very cooperative raven who was willing to work with me for a photo shoot.

That’s the view of Sentinel Dome as I stumbled down the mountain where I hitchhiked back to the jeep… oh wait hitchhiking is on the list. Score for more points!

I spent my evening alone in camp with a bottle of local wine contemplating a lot of things that I haven’t announce on here… till now.

After Yosemite I am going to start my journey home. This trip has and will continue to be amazing. However I have been offered and accepted a full time position (like with real health insurance and a 401k) with Feld Entertainment as a Production Stage Manager. It is their equivalent to a non-working Head Carp. I’ll be flying to Florida in mid July to begin that adventure.

That timeline forces me to move up my other big news. I have bought a new home and I was going to slowly remodel and move, but it looks like I need to go home and get moved so I can have my condo ready to be a rental before I leave.

There also may or may not be a girl back home who I need to spend some time with before I leave again. I’ll bet each and everyone of you 20 bucks she just read that, “squeed”, and then turned 3 shades of red at work.

At any rate, this adventure isn’t over yet, and I am sure to have a ton more in the future, but I won’t be getting my 100 points, or spending a full 30 days on this trip. But life is the adventure and I plan on enjoying it.

Daily Score: 5

– 3 points for selfie with El Capitain

– 2 points for hitchhiking back to jeep

Total score to date: 28

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Day 14: Alcatraz and Pride

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Toots is this majestic creature. What she lacks in grace she makes up for in excitement and her short term memory makes a burn out from the 70’s look good. She is what I woke up to this morning, or rather she was the first one to greet me when I emerged from my room at Rachel’s.

Once all of the proper morning shenanigans had been completed with Toots. Rachel and I set out on our day long adventure.

The first stop was the Sea Lions down by pier 39. All but one of them were just sitting in the sun enjoying themselves. The one trouble maker was 3 times the size of the rest and he was making his presence known as he howled and tried to pick fights with the rest of the group. Well the rest of the group minus the one sea lion that was his size and asleep, he left that one alone.

The ride from shore to Alcatraz was a short but beautiful one.

The Island it’s self is overflowing with history. Everyone knows it as the escape proof prison, but a lot of people don’t realize that it went through several distinct phases.

First it was actually a fortress. It was the first permanent fort west of the Mississippi. It was built to maintain control of the Bay, because who ever controlled San Francisco Bay controlled the West.

It then was used as a military prison in the late 19th century and in the 30s became the infamous civilian prison we all know.

They like to boast that no one every successfully escaped from it, but several individuals were assumed dead when no signs of them were discovered. The assumption is that they drowned in the Bay due to the cold water and serious currents. That being said every year there is a triathlon where the first leg is swimming from the island to shore… so it is very possible that these men did in fact escape and the prison system just decided to claim they were dead rather than admit individuals has successfully escaped The Rock.

The next phase for the rock is known as the occupation. In the late 60’s Native Americans moved onto the abandoned island and demanded that it be declared Indian land. They occupied it for 18 months as a form of protest and their graffiti is all over the place. They eventually were removed by US Marshals, but their occupation drew attention to their plight and native lands began being returned else where in the country.

The final and current chapter is the US Park Service. The island is now a national park and the land, buildings, and abundant bird populations the all federally protected.

The next thing on our agenda was riding an iconic street car. It is a rough ride, but totally worth it. Just the way the whole thing is operated by 2 levers and how going up and down the hills seems like a roller coaster. It’s a ton of fun!

The trolly just happened to dump us right in the middle of the San Francisco Pride Parade. These are my people. I am not a member of the community, but I tend to always find myself most at home in their bars and at their festivities. I think it’s because I too strive to not hide myself and to celebrate the fact that I am just a little different. I also am like catnip for drag queens and am comfortable enough with my own sexuality that I’ll flirt right back.

After we had made our appearance at the parade we hopped on a train to our next destination. I want you guys to seriously look at those two photos I got on the train. Look at the faces. Imagine the energy in the room. Some people were celebrating with their friends, some were celebrating with their children, others were horrified to be on this train. It was a beautiful representation of american society in my opinion. I also am in love with these photos.

Our final stop for the day was a place called Dandelion. They make gourmet chocolates right there were you can see them. Rachel and I spent some time sitting and drinking hot chocolate while watching the chocolatiers do there thing.

I spent my evening enjoying having reliable secure internet for the first time in 2 weeks. Toots kept forgetting I was in the house and getting excited every time she came around a corner and found me.

On that not I am off to bed folks, tomorrow I have to deal with some stuff for the new job before leaving the city, but I will be off to Yosemite for a few days.

I also want to take this chance to thank all of you for reading. Keeping this blog has been a blast, unfortunately this adventure may be coming to an end sooner than expected, damn adult responsibilities, so if you are enjoying it, please share it with your friends. I am for sure not going home this week, but possibly next week, and I would love to have as large of a following as possible. You see this trip is mostly self funded. However if I have a decent sized following then it will be possible to get some funding for the next adventure. Cause let’s be honest, we all know I am going to keep periodically refusing to adult.

Daily Scavenger Hunt score: 1

– 1 point for getting a photo in Alcatraz

Total score to date: 23

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Day 12: Trees and New Friends

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I woke up in a rest stop somewhere in Oregon this morning around 4 am. I did my daily social media dump and decided I was going to drive the 200 miles to Redwood National Forest before having my morning tea and oatmeal… I made it 40 miles to the next rest stop, pulled over and went back to sleep…

I woke up the second time around 7 and was determined to make it to Redwood… I made it 46 miles to the next rest stop and fell asleep again…

I finally arose for good around 9 and off I went.

My first stop was a visitors center right outside the forest. I walked in and was greeted by a ranger who immediately asked about the kilt. Haha! We chatted and I told him about my adventures and asked him about camping in the area. He told me that lol of the reserved sites were spoken for, but he laid out a day full of adventures and gave me a list of national, state, and county campsites outside of the park along the way to San Francisco to try as I progressed. The theory being that the further away from the park the more luck I’d have.

The first stop on the adventure was a gravel road through the old growth. It was everything that I wanted it to be… Mainly looking like the 2nd moon orbiting Endor from Star Wars. Massive trees, ferns the size of Jeff, and an anticipation that I was being watched by small furry creatures.

Along the road I stopped at a tail head that took me to The Boy Scout Tree. It is a massive tree with a trunk that is 23 feet wide, names for its popularity with the scouts back in their early days of the program. That being said the trail is a beautiful showcase of old growth redwoods. Any Star Wars fan is going to have a hard time not imaging Ewoks and speeder bikes as you hike this beautiful trail.

Post hike I hopped in Jeff and headed to the recommended scenic overlook. Each place I visit on this trip seems to top the previous one in beauty. I don’t remember what river this is running into the ocean, but the bike club that was there and I enjoyed swapping stories as we sat up there eating our respective snacks. I didn’t catch any of their names, but apparently they are riding from Portland to San Francisco for Pride tomorrow… yes that’s right folks, I am going to be in San Francisco for pride…

After making some friends (who actually googled “a man, a Jeep, no” and google sent them to this page), Jeff and I began our hunt for a campground. The first 3 were full. The 4th one had some vacancies, but it was on the beach and there wasn’t a single tree in the entire campground. So I moved on to the last one on the list…

Upon arrival I immediately found my home for the night. So I parked Jeff and walked back to the registration board. The fee was 10 dollars, and I only had 7 in singles and then several twenties… As I was pondering how the hell I was going to solve this problem A family pulled in and they had a similar problem. I made my first friends for the night. We registered as a group in 2 sites, I put my 20 in and they Venmo’ed me 10 dollars.

We parted ways and I set up my camp, but I knew I would be talking to them more later. I decided to start the water for dinner and while it boiled I cleaned out a weeks worth of trash from Jeff’s floorboard. I also restocked my snack crate from the cargo pod on top of the jeep.

Dinner tonight was a Mountain House spaghetti with meat sauce. I burned my mouth because it was hot and way too good to wait for.

Up next I decided to walk down to the nearby creek. As I approached I could smell someone smoking the good stuff. Upon arrival I found 5 college kids in their underwear swimming in this pool. They invited me to join, I politely declined the pot but welcomed the swim. We swam and shot the shit for a while. According to the consensus on Facebook this does not count as skinny dipping, so no points, but it was fun regardless.

As the shadows grew and night approached we parted ways and I headed back to the campground.

Upon return to my site I discovered that my trusty boot had a blow out… crap… there is no way that I can get a replacement before I hit Yosemite this week, so it’s going to be gaff tape and prayer this week. Hopefully I can get a friend in Vegas to let me drop shop a new pair there and I’ll pick it up next weekend.

At any rate, I secured my site for the night and then headed over to the site that the family was staying at. I spent a few hours talking with the family and trading stories as their two children played. The father is in the CBD oil business and as dark truly approached he asked if he could get a photo of me with the product if he tagged me on Instagram with it. So expect that to pop up in the near future (if it hasn’t already). It really was a great evening. Hell its been a great day, and now I am leaning against a Redwood getting that checked off the list tonight. Tomorrow I’ll be headed to San Fran for a few days and then who knows!

Daily Scavenger Hunt score: 4

– 1 point for accruing another 1000 Miles

– 3 points for sleeping against a readwood

Total score to date: 21

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