Day 16?…I dont know…The aliens here in Roswell took me up into their space ship during my slumber and controlled my dreams…Im not sure how long they had me in their slimy grasps….It could be October for all I know…those little buggers…

We drove 13 hours straight yesterday from Avon, CO to Roswell, NM…windows down the whole time…we had the top down for almost all of it too…it was probably one of the most amazing drives so far…

After saying our goodbyes to Jack, Brigdon, and Bob…we headed out…

We stopped at Wendy’s for a quick lunch….I remember when Wendy’s was $5.15 for a #6 plain with a Dr. Pepper…its now like $9.45 after tax and rape…ugh

So onward we went…

You experience all sorts of land formations along 285 South out of colorado…we drove through little roads that barely one car fit…we climbed mountains and descended down…It was pretty amazing..the weather was in the 60’s and the sun was out…

The mountains were amazing…One of the best parts was the White River National Forrest…the mountains cascaded around..jagged rocks descended to a decent size river that the road followed along…it felt like we were driving through a mini grand canyon…..when we got out of the mountains, we left the zig zagging roads behind and had to settle for flat straight roads for awhile…it was pretty nice actually, because on each side of us it was raining and on our little patch of road it was perfectly sunny the whole way…

so as the sunny, cool top down driving turned to dark, colder top up driving, we began to close in on Santa Fe, NM

We ate dinner there at the Cowgirl? or something and kept on our way to Roswell…

The next few hours were spent drinking red bulls…we finally arrived in Roswell at about 2am….whew….

Our goal is Austin, TX today….Come on Ol’ Heepy..you can do it!

Peace, Love, and Soul….

- Dennis

Colorado:

Land of 10,000 Time Shares… (there is actually a story behind this)

Ha…

…….

“we are getting off exit 171..now where do we go?” - me

“I dunno” - Jack

…….

Ok…so we last left you in the Dakotas have a 5 star stay in Ol’ heepy..we drove south to Mt. Rushmore to pay our respects to the righteous 4…

See…we woke up with the sun and that actually ended up being the best thing to happen to us…it caused us to get to Mt Rushmore before it got to crowded…it also helped us stay in front of the storms we’d later encounter in wyoming..

After Mt Rushmore, we got breakfast and headed back on the open road…instead of going through Nebraska, we decided to head west to Wyoming and take the south to Colorado…

The weather was perfect (for the time being) so we put the top back…we found ourself on a road with no one else on it..Robert looked at me and said this is your chance to car surf…so I did..I stood up on my seat and was struck with 50mph wind..ha..it was awesome..

So we get to Wyoming and admire the blue skies / western movie landscape..we saw tumble weeds, dust tornadoes, and a lot of nothingness…ha

The clouds darkened and I said maybe we should consider putting the top back up…we finally pulled over and quickly put the top back…then…literally 35 seconds later, the skies opened up and it started pouring!

Rain turned into gobstopper size hail…it sounded like my car was being shot with paintballs…it was coming in horizontally!…the trucker in front of us pulled off on the shoulder to wait out the hail…Robert, in a moment of brilliance, parked ol’ heepy next to the semi…we used the semi as a shield!! Genius!!

The hail subsided and our adventure continued…we arrived at the fringe of Denver at 4:50pm…aka…traffic…my superior navigating skills (ha!) took us off the interstate, around the heart of Denver, and back on the interstate with no traffic..

We arrived in Avon, CO finally…it completed a two day trek from Duluth, MN…whew

We were greeted by our good friends Jack and Brigdon at there apt.

First thing first, we had to shower…after ridding our bodies of Dakota fever, we had to eat….taco night! After a couple brews and many more tacos we headed back for some rest…

Wednesday rolled around and we decided to go hiking in Beaver Creek…

After taking the 10 minute chair lift to the top, we began our hike to Beaver Lake…half way there we began to hear thunder…normal people woulda turned back…well…we are not normal..

We hike the rest of the way with echoed of thunder teasing us…we finally arrived at the lake…then…

Hail

This is the second time in 24 hours I’ve been in hail…really? We tried hiding under a tree…didn’t really work

When the hail turned to sleet we began to feel the whopping 48 degrees taking it’s tole on us…I had to put my camera bag in a walmart plastic bag and carry it like a baby the whole way back…

After the longest, wettest, coldest hike back, we arrived at the chair lifts…

The chair lifts decided to take the afternoon off apparently…great..

Now we had to hike down the whole slope with wet shoes and even damper moral…

After busting my ACE a handful of times, we finally made it off that godforsaken mountain…

We rested the remainder of the day…we needed rest…for Wednesday night in Vail, CO would be one for the record books..

Long story short, we found ourselves in a condo/duplex/time share…but…you know what they say…what happens in Vail, stays in Vegas…

Thursday was spent in recovery…Robert, Bob (jack and brigdon’s roommate), and I walk to the river behind the apt complex…we had to wash our sins away…ha!

Thursday was simple…we just hung around and did nothing…we ate sushi that night and watched Tv…Colorado at it’s finest

Today is Friday…this is our last night here…friday night in Avon….should be a good one…

We head south tomm….the 60 degree weather will come to an end..what a shame

Until then,

I’m Dennis Akers and that’s the way it was…

Due to the verbal nature of this next post…

….Viewer discretion is advised….

If a cop pulled us over and asked “do you know how fast you were going?” , Robert said he would go..”obviously not fast enough, we’re still in this god forsaken state.”

Shit…

Seriously…if you want to get way from reality and lose yourself…come to South Dakota…about the only thing you could find here would be “yourself”, and if you failed at that…well…you’re SOL because you suck apparently…

Wow….you have a better chance of catching the West Nile virus here than you do in Florida…I’ve never seen so many mosquitos in my life…they attacked us once we stepped out of the car because we were on only living thing that has been there in 5 years..

We were forced to sleep in the car last night..we felt like Mary and Joseph when there was “no room in the inn”….at about 3:30-4am Tampa time, we had already been searching for a hotel for 2 hours…we came across one finally and surprisingly there was no vacancy…this made sense because they held a monopoly on the whole north western area of South Dakota..it was actually kind of funny..we saw “Buffalo” SD on the map and it looked to be a bigger city…this was our last hope to find a place…13 hours of driving was taking it’s toll…we approached the city and the sign said..

“Buffalo Population 320”

Fml

To put the Dakotas in perspective…North Dakota’s capital didn’t have a 3G network for our phones…CAPITAL….I was going to post a blog last night via Morris Code, but ma and pa turned off the power of that section of South Dakota…

I really describe the awesome feeling of watching the sun rise on a new day here…the coming sun represented a beacon of light…it was a symbol of what was to come….aka…getting the hell out of this state…

I’m not sure what I just typed…and I’m not reading back over it…all I know is that today we see Mt. Rushmore and head to Vail, CO…

Xoxo,

• Dennis

Ps…I Love You

North Dakota sky

Day 12

I’ll have a Vodka Sota…

So….

Robert and I are on our way to Fargo, North Dakota from Duluth, MN and felt it was time to reflect…

Sorry we took so long to update…the land of 10,000 lakes had barely a drop of Internet…

We left you last Thursday in Wisconsin after the night spent in the petting zoo…it is now tuesday and we are traveling across the great state of Minnesota…we spent Thursday night-Sunday morning in Coon Rapids, MN with some of my friends from studying abroad in Italy…

Thursday night we went “uptown” to a bar called “The Cafeteria”…it had a pretty cool deck on the roof that we hung out on…the weather was perfect, and the group we hung out with was great…

Friday Robert and I did some exploring..after finding everything Coon Rapids had to offer in about 15 minutes we stopped at target for a DVD..ha

Rookie of the Year / The Sandlot combo pack…greatness

See…My friend from Italy, Shleeee, had not seen the Sandlot and, therefore, was not a true American..this was unacceptable..

she watched the movie long, and she watched it good…Ashley T-rico walked a little taller that day…

We hung around Friday night and rested our traveled bodies…

Saturday, Robert and I were verbally assaulted at the corner of 123rd and Lilly at 6:45pm…it was a warm day…sun was finally out…Robert and I decided to walk to a close restaurant…when we reached the corner that would later be referred as Y.G.F’s corner, we encountered a “human being” in his 1995 Chevy “A-hole”…he was at a stop sign across the road about to take a right…he saw us and promptly “got us good”…he stated “Y’all gay…(no response from us)..FAGGOTS!” and drove off…..

See…the fact that we had our matching Road Trip shirts on didn’t help…but come on…can’t two friends skip along the road hand in hand anymore? Ha! Jk…but we found that whole situation hilarious and kept quoting him all night…”y’all gay…faggots”…words Shakespeare himself couldn’t have eloquently rebuttaled as well as the Redneck Chevy Man…

That night we went out for a night on the town in Minneapolis…once again, the weather felt amazing…it was neat seeing the nightlife in a city like that…we went to “Drink” and “Sneaky Peats”…what was also a great sight to see was everyone running out of the way of the light rail…putting a light rail straight through the middle of the bar district may have been a mistake…ha…

Sunday we recovered and made our way to Duluth, Canada…hahaha

We received a lovely tour…

“We went to Gordy’s High hat for burgers in Cloquet, MN ***(diners, drive ins, and dives was there) then drove to Canal Park in Duluth to see the tall ships, the Aerial lift bridge (which is one of the things Duluth is most widely known for)…we walked up the boardwalk to the Rose Garden and Lief Erickson park and stopped to get malts at the Portland Malt Shop. THEN, we drove up the skyline to Engar Tower to see the Duluth lights. BLAM. that’s it.”- Ashley

Couldn’t of said it better myself

After a quick walk around, we began our walk back…following the shore of lake superior, we came across a group of skinny dippers…now, skinny dipping doesn’t bother me….but when it’s in the middle of the day and next to a popular boardwalk…come on…

There were three people and one of which was standing Knees deep with the backside towards us….

I believe my comment went something like this “uhh…those two guys are staring at that dudes crotch…WTF”………

“Dennis, the one standing up is a girl”…..Ah!! Bleh!!

Anywho…we hung out and drove to this tower that overlooked the city…we watched the as the sun went down and the city lit up…it was pretty cool…”the Duluth lights”

That night all my friends from the Duluth area came out for a campfire…we had a little “Italy reunion” of sorts…we swapped stories of our time in Florence…Robert and I had the chance to try one of Ashley’s “famous smores”…they were amazing to say the least….slowly the party died down…finally it began to rain…a lot…

After spooning the night away with the house hold Great Dane in the basement, we said our goodbyes and thanks you’s…

On the road again…

Until Colorado,

-Dennis & Dennis

***things I added to shleee’s portion

Day 12

I’ll have a Vodka Sota…

So….

Robert and I are on our way to Fargo, North Dakota from Duluth, MN and felt it was time to reflect…

Sorry we took so long to update…the land of 10,000 lakes had barely a drop of Internet…

We left you last Thursday in Wisconsin after the night spent in the petting zoo…it is now tuesday and we are traveling across the great state of Minnesota…we spent Thursday night-Sunday morning in Coon Rapids, MN with some of my friends from studying abroad in Italy…

Thursday night we went “uptown” to a bar called “The Cafeteria”…it had a pretty cool deck on the roof that we hung out on…the weather was perfect, and the group we hung out with was great…

Friday Robert and I did some exploring..after finding everything Coon Rapids had to offer in about 15 minutes we stopped at target for a DVD..ha

Rookie of the Year / The Sandlot combo pack…greatness

See…My friend from Italy, Shleeee, had not seen the Sandlot and, therefore, was not a true American..this was unacceptable..

she watched the movie long, and she watched it good…Ashley T-rico walked a little taller that day…

We hung around Friday night and rested our traveled bodies…

Saturday, Robert and I were verbally assaulted at the corner of 123rd and Lilly at 6:45pm…it was a warm day…sun was finally out…Robert and I decided to walk to a close restaurant…when we reached the corner that would later be referred as Y.G.F’s corner, we encountered a “human being” in his 1995 Chevy “A-hole”…he was at a stop sign across the road about to take a right…he saw us and promptly “got us good”…he stated “Y’all gay…(no response from us)..FAGGOTS!” and drove off…..

See…the fact that we had our matching Road Trip shirts on didn’t help…but come on…can’t two friends skip along the road hand in hand anymore? Ha! Jk…but we found that whole situation hilarious and kept quoting him all night…”y’all gay…faggots”…words Shakespeare himself couldn’t have eloquently rebuttaled as well as the Redneck Chevy Man…

That night we went out for a night on the town in Minneapolis…once again, the weather felt amazing…it was neat seeing the nightlife in a city like that…we went to “Drink” and “Sneaky Peats”…what was also a great sight to see was everyone running out of the way of the light rail…putting a light rail straight through the middle of the bar district may have been a mistake…ha…

Sunday we recovered and made our way to Duluth, Canada…hahaha

We received a lovely tour…

“We went to Gordy’s High hat for burgers in Cloquet, MN ***(diners, drive ins, and dives was there) then drove to Canal Park in Duluth to see the tall ships, the Aerial lift bridge (which is one of the things Duluth is most widely known for)…we walked up the boardwalk to the Rose Garden and Lief Erickson park and stopped to get malts at the Portland Malt Shop. THEN, we drove up the skyline to Engar Tower to see the Duluth lights. BLAM. that’s it.”- Ashley

Couldn’t of said it better myself

After a quick walk around, we began our walk back…following the shore of lake superior, we came across a group of skinny dippers…now, skinny dipping doesn’t bother me….but when it’s in the middle of the day and next to a popular boardwalk…come on…

There were three people and one of which was standing Knees deep with the backside towards us….

I believe my comment went something like this “uhh…those two guys are staring at that dudes crotch…WTF”………

“Dennis, the one standing up is a girl”…..Ah!! Bleh!!

Anywho…we hung out and drove to this tower that overlooked the city…we watched the as the sun went down and the city lit up…it was pretty cool…”the Duluth lights”

That night all my friends from the Duluth area came out for a campfire…we had a little “Italy reunion” of sorts…we swapped stories of our time in Florence…Robert and I had the chance to try one of Ashley’s “famous smores”…they were amazing to say the least….slowly the party died down…finally it began to rain…a lot…

After spooning the night away with the house hold Great Dane in the basement, we said our goodbyes and thanks you’s…

On the road again…

Until Colorado,

-Dennis & Dennis

***things I added to shleee’s portion

Day 7…

It is currently 10:05am and we are at a best western in Illinois….I am telling you this because a mere 24 hours ago we woke up in a “Worst Middle Eastern” hotel that wouldn’t have even passed for a .5 star hotel…

The hotel: We arrived in Michigan City, Indiana at around 1am and needed a place to rest out dreary heads…we came across a sign that said “Rooms $32.95 and up”….and by that I think they meant rupees because we rang the bell for the office and a family of 17 came out to check us in…first question was “how much for one night?” (a question that is not normally legal unless spoken to a hotel employee)..the red eyed employee responds “55 for two or 45 for a one bed”…ummm…I Priceline the deal and make a bid…I only have $40 cash on me…no one outbidded me, so we got the room…before signing anything Robert made a keen observation…during my battle for low prices I didn’t realize that the office we were in was about 95 degrees and fluttering with exotic moths…he ask…”uuhhh…do the rooms have AC?”…after a confident “yes” we were on our way…a boy shows us to our executive suite for the night…he is adamant about us not smoking in this room and once the door opened we knew why……

Have you ever had a hamster or been to a oversized petting zoo? Well….if you answered yes to both, put the smells together and add curry……it was so bad that we didn’t want to bring our bags in because it would contaminate our belongings…to add to the ambiance, the bathroom made you feel right at home…the yellow water was just so inviting to be peed in and the yellow towels made the Martha stewart spring collection look like petty walmart brand…the shower had a head on it that was unique…it had three different settings..”Four streams of water” (default setting), “One stream that rips off layers of unwanted skin”(one click to the right), and “Swollen Prostate.”(two clicks to the right)

After leaving Slumdog Millionaire, we headed towards the windy city…

We kept the “using back roads” spirit alive…after missing a turn towards the interstate, we found a unusual sight….See, before this turn was missed, there were individuals trying to sell water and popcorn at the light….and now I know why…we probably needed popcorn because we were about to drive into the movie set of “Boyz in da Hood”…and let me tell ya, it’s a heart pounding thriller that became a 4D experience after ice was flung at my car…two thumbs WAY up and a Oscar on the way…

After returning to reality, we found ourselves on the fringe of the windy city….we took Jefferson St. to Michigan St. And parked…we walked down Michigan…we saw the Bean (big chrome bean shaped sculpture)..that was neat and followed shortly by a live orchestra playing in the amphitheater…where else in the world can you have a lunch break and listen to something like that!? It was pretty amazing…we ate at “China” something or another on Michigan street…after that, we said our goodbyes and headed towards Milwaukee, Wisconsin…

Milwaukee:

We got in contact with my old roommate from Italy, Monte Eady, and met up with him for a beer or two…instead of taking the interstate around the city, we drove straight through it..it’s actually a beautiful city..it was about 4pm and we had the windows down just cruising though the heart of the city…it felt like October in Tampa..after finding his house, we went to a local bar to catch up on things…we hung out for about two hours and left…Special thanks to Monte for meeting up with us and showing us some cool things..

We head out and drove toward Minnesota, our halfway mark on this trip…it reached the 50’s on our drive north…hopefully we will get some camping in…

Later today we will be meeting up with my friends from Studying abroad in Italy and stay for a few days..we will be in just north of Minneapolis…

Until then,

-Dennis

Last night we stopped in Nashville and ate dinner at a place called Cabana, with our friend Brigdon’s younger brother Bennett and his fiancé Jenny. It was two for one pizza and draft and both were delicious. After dinner we drove on through a tornado laden storm on our quest for a shower for Dennis. We crossed into Kentucky and about an our later arrived at our destination for the night, Cave City, KY.

This morning we got up and found a few maps of cave locations and of the Kentucky Bourbon Trail at the visitors center.

Spent over an hour in a cave called Diamond Caverns learning absolutely nothing from a tour guide who, though he was very nice, no one could understand a damn word he said. I had no clue the Kentucky cave association hired people that didn’t meet the job requirements of a Publix grocery bagger. Once the laughter subsided some pretty good pictures were taken, and I even had the camera rolling when one of the other tour guides either out of malicious humor directed at our poor handicapped leader, or possibly just made a mistake and turned the lights off in our part of the caverns. Forcing Hellen Keller to walk blindly feeling the walls for the light switch.

We are now driving through yet another torrential downpour on the way to the Makers Mark and Heaven Hill Distilleries.

We can’t seem to find the Mississippi sticker to ad to our state sticker collection you see in the picture. Hopefully we can ad that before we go back through.

Until next time

-Robert

Day 5

We spent Thursday night - Sunday morning at the Neshoba County Fair. The fair has been going for 121 years and draws people from all over the country…

The fair is hard to explain to people have not been…

First of all, it’s full of these cabins that are only functional for the week or so that surround the fair. The cabins are owned by families and are usually kept for a long time. For example, The Miller family has owned the cabin we stayed in since the 50’s or 60’s.

The Miller family meets at the fair every year.

What goes on at the fair?

Well…a lot of playing cards and food..ha..we sat on the back porch and played Spades for hours. The food is always great. Scrambled eggs and bacon in the morning, sandwiches for lunch, and a variety of food for dinner. Robert and I had our fair share of beer and corn dogs. (Lindsey’s Lemonade has the best lemonade and “hot dogs on a stick”)

On Saturday we all went and watched the “mule pull” on the horse track…it’s the recession’s version of a tractor pull I guess…ha

This was my second year at the fair and i have still never won a game of Spades…

Saturday night they had a big concert on the horse track..it was this rock band..the guy had long hair like a singer from the 80’s and sounded like Sebastian Bach…BUT…he did play (the movie Grease) the Grease Mega Mix live..haha..thought that was great

We left Sunday at around 11 and began our journey to Iuka, MS…

We made stops at Shuqualak, Starkville, West Point, Aberdeen, And Dennis.

I really could have done without the Shuqualak portion of the trip…ha…we drove to wear Robert hunts and went to change out memory cards / batteries for his game cameras…about 15 ticks and 107 degrees later…we left that place…(it’s the second day after that and we are still getting ticks in the car…fml…I think I hate ticks more than the creatures from The Hills Have Eyes…)

Got a Happy Meal in West Point, MS…yup

Stopped in Aberdeen to use the Internet (I had to pay a bill) and Robert showered…I decided to shower at the River cabin in Iuka…(we’ll get to that later……..)

We got stuck in really bad thunder storm right before we got off of 45 towards the Natchez Trail…

The Natchez Trail was a great drive..I was navigating and saw that “Dennis, MS” was right off the path where we were headed….soo….we had to make a stop…

After proclaiming god’s name at Dennis’s Methodist Church, we finished our drive to Iuka…

This is where the fun began….this cabin was the setting for every scary dream I have ever had…

I could feel some zombies looking at me when I went out in the dark to get my bag from the car…they were just preparing to get me…flanking me in the brush..attack formation…there was a well next to the house that made the one from “The Ring” look like the well little Jimmy fell in from Lassie..( aka…It was spookier..)

All that being said, we settled in and worked on our plans for the next few days…

Oh, and that shower I was going to take….never happened because we couldn’t figure out how to get the water running…sooooo, today we are heading to distilleries and breweries in Tennessee…of course stopping in the lovely dry county that Lynchburg (Jack Daniels) is in…ha

That is all for now…

OW! Another damn tick!!

Ugh..ha

-Dennis

I think we took a wrong turn…..