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LA to NYC

September 2019 - October 2021
A 767-day adventure by Rosscoe Read more
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  • TravelerLA to NYC
    1
    11
    Day 2

    Another day in LA

    September 19, 2019 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 23 °C

    I reckon there’s more of a Californian contrast here in LA than in any other part of the state.

    For example we caught an Uber ride (thats another story) to Wholefoods Market at El Segundo, a bit more of a up market and hippy dippy area so you find places that sell things like Vegan Leather and Vegan Handbags... no, we have no idea either, any explanations on how they make those would be appreciated. But then on the same shop window is a sign for criminals that the owner’s packing heat.

    What! how does a Vegan shoot someone? These people step around ants, they itch all night because they won’t kill bed bugs, they don’t realise they are part of a world were every living thing is ripping the crap out of everything else just to get a decent meal.... stuff eats stuff even if it doesn’t have to, that’s how this world works.
    But they have their beliefs and you have to respect that so if the shop owner can hold up a gun and simply yell out “bang your dead” well then the world will be a better place.    Read more

  • TravelerLA to NYC
    1
    23111
    Day 4

    Health Food Heaven

    September 21, 2019 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 23 °C

    You know you are in America when you see a huge highway billboard advertising “ Butter Burgers & Frozen Custard” oohhhh yummmmm!
    If this doesn’t get your tastebuds going how about “triple fried pork rinds in potato gravy with spicy double cream dumplings”.
    Looking around the streets it isn’t hard to see who is buying this stuff, a lot of them have a real butter burger waddle going on.
    I think it is an educational thing because when we ask where we can buy fresh fruit and veggies we get answers like “don’t rightly know, knew a fella back in seventy nine got hiz self some of them thar veg-e-tab-les but just where from I couldn’t rightly say”.

    And then again “You want what? veg-e-tab-les? I hearz Macdonald’s iz putting lettuce and tomato on their burgers, now that’s a heap of goodness right there.
    No wonder the corn crops covering over three states and counting is grown for cattle feed and not for human consumption. Like Martians, anything green is alien.

    Speaking of meat and potatoes the tragedy goes on. First they killed Bambi’s mother now look where poor Bambi has ended up, a veal dish in a midwestern truck stop. Now if more truckers ate more fruit and vegetables there would be a lot more Bambies getting around.
    Better still, what we need is for some of those Californian Vegans to get their truck licenses, then instead of all the truck stops being full of six foot six, hairy palmed, mono browed Neanderthals diggings into huge bowls of stodge and picking pieces of Bambi from between their teeth there would be a much better zen feel to the road.

    No maybe not, thinking about this it won’t work, no Vegan is going to do a job that splatters thousands of insects into a windscreen every night.    Read more

  • TravelerLA to NYC
    112
    Day 5

    LA Freeways

    September 22, 2019 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 18 °C

    The story told before about the trip to “Vegan Leather Land” ended up taking one and a half hours to go a distance of eight miles, we ended up doing fifty, no exaggeration.
    We passed where we started from, The Los Angeles Times building and the airport twice. We went east when we should have gone west, north when we should have gone south.
    In the end we had to take over directions, we knew LA better than he did, he didn’t have a clue.
    The poor buggar had a crap car, I had to wrench the door closed then kick it open with both feet.
    His GPS was a hand held phone with a shattered screen and covered in dirt, he rested it on the passenger seat where it fell through some rips in the material a few times.

    I felt sorry for him especially when Uber’s quote was for $8.00 which we expected to pay.
    When the receipt came through we were charged nearly US$100.00.
    Not feeling so sorry for him anymore I contacted Uber to dispute the fare.
    On your Uber account there is a map of all past rides. All of ours ha a fairly simple line from pickup to destination, this one looked like a plate of spaghetti so with the dispute with Uber after they asked if we requested any different directions or stops I said “look at our tracking map and do you think anyone directing a route like that would be sane enough to communicate with you right now... No! they’d be too #**! ing crazy. This seem to work because we got our refund immediately.

    The trip out to Cruise America was the complete opposite. We got a gorgeous Latino girl, the car was spotless and took a fraction of time compared to our spaghetti ride to “Veganville”

    It’s good to be back in the RV and apparently we get special privileges, what ever they are because we are regular renters.
    Finally it was all good but LA wasn’t finished with us yet.... after booking in, stocking up and heading off we hit the LA Freeways which equals eight lanes of traffic going nowhere.

    Stay tuned for the next post because we have passed through 4 states already and yes stuff has been happening!    Read more

  • TravelerLA to NYC
    1
    1111
    Day 6

    Photo Fail

    September 23, 2019 in the United States ⋅ 🌙 19 °C

    This is written somewhere near Omaha, Nebraska after traveling through California, Arizona, Utah and Colorado.
    The reason for no posts of the amazing landscapes we drove through is the camera stuffed up which is better than admitting I stuffed up, I’m saying no more.

    The camera, or I’m working again now so we could have posted plenty of pics of driving through Nebraska but we want you to stay interested in the road trip, it’s been a beauty so far and there is a long way to go but somehow shots of and writing about the endless prairies where one of the highlights of today was seeing a sign saying “BUFFALO AREA” ain’t going to do that.

    I wanted to graffiti “WAS A” on it because not one buffalo was interested in standing by the sign.
    This probably was a good thing because when you see an animal in the wild like that you approach them thinking they want to be your best friend when really they don’t want to have anything to do with you at all.
    This happened coming back from Alaska. Buffalo were like rats up there, damn things everywhere even crapping all over the road.
    You think I’m over reacting? try hitting buffalo turds at 80 mph, they’re like mini mountains and if you hit a squishy one the stuff flies all over the RV and you can’t get rid of the little pieces or the smell for weeks.

    Anyway coming back from Alaska we see a fairly docile buffalo about 100 metres off the road having a rest under a tree and I think he looks pretty friendly so I walk over to say hello and get a photo.
    They moult at the end of winter, which he was doing at the time but apparently this makes them a bit cranky though I thought it might make them a bit tired so they wouldn’t be so agro. This is another thing I’ve been wrong about because I wasn’t that far away when before I realised it he was up on all fours and going for me.
    I ran for the RV sure I could feel it’s breath on the back of my neck only to turn and see it still standing under the tree.    Read more

  • TravelerLA to NYC
    1
    1
    Day 7

    Nebraska & Iowa

    September 24, 2019 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 27 °C

    There’s an old Bob Segar song with words like “on a long lonely highway east of Omaha”, we can see where he got his inspiration from, having just driven that way, then when we finally reached the city itself, all we can say about that is the main highlight was seeing the head office building of PayPal and that was pretty exciting.... come on, who can say they’ve seen that!
    But then we heard their head office is actually in San Jose, California so that was a let down, now we’ve no idea what the imposter PayPal building was all about.

    So then we drove around hoping to find more attractions like possibly Walmart’s almost head office building but without any luck, but then leaving the city and going into Iowa we crossed the Missouri River which is the border for the two states.

    We don’t know why they pretend to have stuff like international headquarters of various corporations or show a block of land with a lame horse and two chooks to keep it company and are claiming that, that is the spot that NASA almost purchased to launched their Apollo 12 space mission to the moon when they have a river like the Missouri running straight through the guts of the place.

    The Missouri River is impressive and it’s stuff like this along with the Grand Canyon, Sequoia Forests and the Great Lakes that really define this place, it gives Americans a good excuse for their ostentatiousness, arrogance and flag waving attitude, their country is spectacular, that’s why we keep coming back, just have to ignore the other side of that, all the damage and destruction, the crumbling parts of the country.

    We’re headed for the Mississippi and this will be a welcome sight because for three days and three states we have driven through nothing but corn fields.
    We’ve heard before of how much corn they grow here but you need to see it, your imagination can’t.

    We past a town called Kellogg probably named after old Mr Kellogg of corn flakes fame.
    You can just imagine years ago old Harvey sitting out on the stoop looking from horizon to horizon, from state to state, thinking s#*! what the hell we gunna do with all this here corn.

    So then Harvey stops whittling, gets outa his rocking chair and heads out into the barn.
    Mrs Kellogg doesn’t see him for three days and keeps yelling out “Harvey what’s y’all doing out in that there barn, y’all come and get some breakfast now ya hear!”
    Another three days go by and she yells out again”. Harvey don’t ya want no breakfast ?“. “no dear” says Harvey “I done make me own and eyes done a heap for y’all too”

    So finally Harvey comes in and they both sit down to a big bowl of Harvey’s concoction, take one mouthful and spit it out.
    “that tastes disgusting, what’re ya gonna do with it now?”
    “guess we’ll just add a ton of sugar, box it all purrdy like and sell it at the local store. The rest is history.

    (This history lesson sponsored by R&R’s “True Facts” It’s head office is in Omaha, Nebraska.)    Read more

  • TravelerLA to NYC
    1
    Day 8

    Mississippi

    September 25, 2019 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 24 °C

    How come when they come from thousands of miles away, we can buy bananas here for 49c a pound when back home, when they come from just down the road we pay $3 or $4 a kilo.
    Add a few more thousand miles to that distance and we were paying only 99c a pound in Alaska so I tell you what, those thieves in Maclean aren’t so mellow yellow with their pricing.

    With a boot full of bananas and a troop of local baboons chasing us down the road we turned off Interstate 80 onto some quieter backroads to get a better look at the Mississippi River.
    What do you say to describe its size? and the part we were at was very narrow across because there was a bridge there, and narrow is the sensible place to build a bridge.

    This was at a town called Muscatine where we drove over the bridge into Illinois then to Lock and Dam 16.
    Just as we got there six massive barges joined together came up the river to go through the lock.
    The Mississippi is like a seaway, this barge had come up from the southern states and was going on to St Paul, Minnesota, a trip of a few thousand miles.

    As the barge approached the lock workers came out to assist getting the barge through.
    They were friendly so as one old guy walked by he said “hello” and “where y’all from” we say Australia so nodding at the RV and trying to be smart he says. “Australia! y’all drive that thing all the way from Australia”. Being a bigger smart arse I said “no don’t be stupid we put it on the plane as excess luggage”
    He cracked up, shook head and walked on.

    Next his mate comes along, friendly as and says hello, how y’all doing and goes about helping to get the barge through.
    The barge had a couple of deckies. One thing they had to do was secure the barge by tying it to the sides because of the force of the water when the lock gates were opened would have swept it back out again.

    We were looking at the river, considering the distances the barges travel and thinking this could be a great lifestyle if you are that type of person so seeing everyone was so friendly I called out to one of the deckhands asking what they were carrying.
    “ concrete” he says. I hope he meant cement or they would be in for a bit of a shock by the time they reach St Paul.
    “good job working on the barges” I say
    “ yeah good job, pays not bad but the place is full of “no goods”
    I crack up because I thought he was saying this like we might rib a mate or fellow worker, in that affectionate Australian way because just near him was another deckie but no he never cracked a smile once and then he was off.
    “yeah the place is full of no goods they’re everywhere... no goods! yeah can’t say nothing to them, not them no goods! You say something to them no goods and there’s trouble, them no goods is trouble”

    This went on and on and as the barge left the lock and continued on he was still going. We couldn’t understand a word of it except the occasional “no goods”.
    One of the lock operators heard all this and as he was finishing up he walked back past us and put his hand to the side of his mouth like he didn’t want anyone else to hear and said “a lot of them are just out of jail”.    Read more

  • TravelerLA to NYC
    1
    1111
    Day 9

    That Blur Is Chicago

    September 26, 2019 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 20 °C

    When you see this much water its weird that it’s not salt, living by the coast it doesn’t feel right to us, even the the seagulls seem confused though they were probably were to start with, how else do they get this far inland to Lake Michigan?
    Really we’ve no idea but we can’t talk either, sitting by the lake with our seagull brains and wouldn’t you know it we’re eating chips, well I am, Rhonda’s throwing them at me and I’m flapping about trying to grab them in the sand.
    There’s little waves rolling in at the moment though in winter the storms can get so bad they can sink the large cargo ships that sail on the Great Lakes. The waves, they say can get as big as the ones on the ocean.
    So many ships have gone down there is a museum and one of the feature wrecks is of the Edmond Fitzgerald also a song by maybe someone like Gordon Lightfoot called The Wreck of the Edmond Fitzgerald. YouTube it, it’s a beauty.
    There are lighthouses, beautiful classic styled ones all around and with the lakes being so large in almost every respect it’s the same as sailing the open ocean.

    Places over here like the Missouri River, the Mississippi River, The Great Lakes etc are on such a large scale that we have passed dozens of other rivers and lakes that anywhere else would be held up as a national attraction (we certainly would and name it imaginatively too, like our Great Barrier Reef, our Great Dividing Range so we could call it our Great Big River or our Great Big Lake) but against these big buggars they seem nameless and get little attention, even the seagulls couldn’t be bothered, if they’ve flown this far they want to stay at the real deal.    Read more

  • TravelerLA to NYC
    1
    1211
    Day 12

    Following the Great Lakes

    September 29, 2019 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 14 °C

    We have a friend who owns a surf shop in California, well actually a few of them so he’s a rich bastard.
    He tells us he’s always glad when he returns from overseas because the US system “works” where other others don’t, especially in third world country.
    These are fighting words because we don’t agree on a lot of levels.
    One of those is: We’ve been following The Great Lakes, two so far, that’s Michigan and Erie and seeing we’ve been on Interstate Highways for most of the way across the country we’ve now chosen to drive the byways that run along the shore line, well almost do.

    America is the land of the free, that’s if you can afford somewhere big enough to run yourself stupid around claiming how free you are, for all others it’s “git offa my land or I’ll shoot ya”
    Public space is limited, communists have public land, here it’s all private including the beaches so for hundreds of miles along the shoreline of the lakes it’s built on with private houses all sporting a “keep off private property” sign. So we’ve just done the Great Lakes Road With Glimpses Drive.

    Note: A post called “Health Food Heaven” has been placed out of sequence. It should be before this one but has been put way back with the LA ones.    Read more

  • TravelerLA to NYC
    11
    Day 13

    New York State

    September 30, 2019 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 18 °C

    Just bought sweet corn from a roadside store. Hell we’re more honest than we thought, five states and counting in the Midwest covered in nothing but corn.
    We must have been over here too long and losing our Australianess, back home we’d pull over, load up the boot and drive on, you know, living off the fat of the land.

    Maybe it’s more caution. The other day we got a little lost and turned around on some guys grass and he went mental, a real mouth frother, he threatened to shoot us.
    I was about to yell out “you Americans are real tough with your guns aren’t you” when Rhonda said “shut up, apologise and get going” which I did, which annoyed me so much that I said I’m going back to chuck wheelies on his lawn. She reckons she doesn’t know who is more mental, me or him.

    I can see things from their side though, we have beautiful beaches to surf and enjoy, out here if all I had to do was look at nothing but hundreds and hundreds of miles of corn and nothing else ever happened I be hoping for some dumb arse tourists to drive on my grass too. That would brighten up my day for sure, get my trigger finger itching, better than shooting at corn cobs all day, corn stays still, tourists run like hell, much better target practice plus a great release from my corn induced insanity.

    The RV would be a real good wheelie chucker too with a great big 350 V8. It goes like buggary down the highway, it could go faster too if the roads were any better. They are so bad that they caused a crack in a vent over the bed. One night the rain dripped in wetting everything. I repaired what I could with bandaids then bought silicone and gaffer tape the next day. Gaffer tape repairs everything, we’ve seen cars here held together with gaffer tape.

    There are three classes in the US. The rich, the middle and then gaffer tape society.
    There’re pretty industrious the gaffer tape folk, the repaired cars are an obvious one but houses get a pretty good treatment with the stuff as well.
    Then it gets a bit sad with personal items like glasses and handbags being repaired but an all time low for me was a guy pulling out a gaffer tape wallet and his dog had a gaffer tape collar and lead.

    We are in New York State now and heading for New York City it seem a little more prosperous here, the gaffer tape isle in the supermarkets is smaller so we are hoping maybe the folk this way resemble what we would normally class as a human being.    Read more

  • TravelerLA to NYC
    11
    Day 13

    At a Roadside Truckstop

    September 30, 2019 in the United States ⋅ 🌙 21 °C

    We’re prepared to pay for our corn but baulk on accommodation so we are being lulled to sleep by the squeal of tyres and the scream of truck engines roaring down the highway.
    You’ve got to balance stuff up so after two peaceful nights at some really good campgrounds, on Lake Erie and then Lake Ontario that have the sound of surf on the shore we’re back to the normal diesel dives we stop at.
    The others places we stayed at we walked along the shore of the lakes, here we think about how we walked along the shore of the lakes and we stay up as late as possible to get as tired as possible so above all the noise we might be able to get some sleep.

    Australians are like fungus, they seem to get into every corner of the world so we are surprised that some people we meet here have never met any of our two headed species before, sorry I’m mixing us all in with Tasmanians.
    This happened with a roadside store owner. After talking to him for a fair while he says. “so you folks from round here” what the....y’all don’t hear accents. “Crikey, is this bloke coming the raw prawn or what” well that how we feel like talking as well as putting on a blue singlet, stubbies and wearing football socks with our Blundstones, I mean we all have to be good ambassadors for our country.

    Thinking back to Lake Erie, we stayed near a town called Geneva On The Lake that seems to attract bikers and old fools who can finally afford a Chevrolet Corvette. They drive around town with the tops down which is a big mistake because it gives their age away and at ninety you don’t look cool, all that new glossy paint and shiny chrome is too much of a contrast and shows up too clearly the toll life has taken on you.

    In Ohio and some other states you don’t have to wear bike helmets and this is for motor bikes not those dinky trike laws we have back home so you see old fools who can finally afford a Harley and young fools who are obviously helping Columbia’s economy along riding huge bikes at high speed not looking at the road but at who’s looking at them.
    Back home we call bike riders organ donors and we are probably luckier because amongst the smorgasbord at least there is a good chance you could salvage a brain an a few eyes but here you’d be limited to a few internal organs and maybe an arm or two if you could find them.

    All these new bikes and cars made the place seem like a millionaires row especially with some of the beautiful lakefront houses so curiously we looked the house prices up on the net thinking they’d be in the millions. We saw places for under $100,000 and brilliant ones from $200,000 to $300,000.
    These lakes are so big they do get surf and there are seagulls there... so just thinking, hhmmm.    Read more

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