For those of you just tuning in, the TAT stands for Trans America Trail, a 5000 mile dirt route across the United States. From Tennessee, we'll follow the trail all the way to the Pacific Ocean along the Oregon Coast. Follow us here as we document our adventure over the next six weeks. More info on the trail at www.transamtrail.com

Saturday, July 30, 2011

Even Better in HD!

Turn up the Resolution to 720 and then watch it Full Screen!

Arkansas

This state is prettier than I expected, we are gonna try to get to the Tennessee border tonight if the storms ahead permit...

So hot. Too hot.

Its so hot. We had to stop at a lake in here in Oklahoma to bathe/wash clothes. The lake is aptly named fire lake and the water is red, due to either it's clay bottom or it's proximity to hell, we aren't sure. Here's a great pic of Josh in his 'swimwear'...

Friday, July 29, 2011

Oh, the folks we meet

Just had an awesome girl take a break from graffiti for a minute to snap this pic, and it made me think that we need to include the folks we meet along the way in the blog more. So paint can girl, if you are reading this drop us a hello in the comments!

This guy, shameless!!

So fun. The smell and sight of canned paint everywhere.

Coming to a monitor near you... in three days

maybe four, or five... whenever we can find TN.

The sun?!

You would think I was in Portland OR with how surprised I am to see
the sun. Very well pleased to be out of that rain! Poor Josh suffered
greatly through those miles.

Night 1

We were about 100 miles outside of Albuquerque NM when nightfall found us. We were about to throw up the tent behind a closed gas station when Luke remembered that he knew someone with connections in Albuquerque that we could contact. That proved to be a great decision as we were fortunate enough to meet Liza and Derek and take advantage of the wonderful tent pad that was the front yard under a starry sky. Thanks so much to both of you! I left the rainfly off seeing as how the sky was clear an there isn't much for dew out here. The temperature was perfect for sleeping outside, but I ended up being wrong about the rain staying away. I had to get up and throw on the rainfly, but the rain proved to be light. We headed east first thing in the morning, but the rain has caught up to us here near Santa Rosa NM. We are in a truck stop and taking the opportunity to charge some batteries and update journals and blogs. Luke is currently cutting a little movie with some footage from the GoPro cams so you might get to see that up here soon, assuming we can find some decent Internet here...

This trip just went international!

Here we are at a gas station in the Navajo Nation yesterday afternoon...

Thursday, July 28, 2011

It's clearing up!

Well, it's pretty...

Guarantee you this, we were not expecting this weather!!
Wishing I had an iPhone four so y'all could see these tumultuous skies!!

And we embark...

The first leg of the trip is from Phoenix to Jelico TN. I was just out in the parking lot loading up the gear on the bike and the neighbor boy, who is around 7 years old, came by to say hi. He helped me switch my sprocket a couple weeks ago and was asking where we were going. I told him, and could tell that he didn't understand and hadn't heard of any of the places I mentioned. When I uttered "one and a half months" he began to understand. Kinda hit me at the same time how wild this is.

Dear internets,

I heard you liked teh kitteh, here are two little kettehs for you nao.
I give you, SammyPants and Bellie.

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

How does this thing work?! Testing the GoPro HD

Back when I had hair, Josh and I tested out the Cameras!

Last of the pack'n'maps

Vids of us ramblin' scramblin' and gambling up and down the spiral
staircase this night before we leave.
Testing video posting from mah fone.

Roll Charting in action

Luke is still working. Relentless work ethic in this guy.

T'was the eve of our departure...

And we are definitely stirring around here. Our gear is sprawled out everywhere as we make our final preparations to embark hopefully tomorrow morning. Luke is putting the finishing touches on the roll charts and I am wasting time at a pretty good clip here doing this. We hope to be able to update this page with pics and videos as we travel, that is of course as cell phone signal and available internets allow...