Lots of pictures with this, please let me know if I over did it. My drive from Tulsa was uneventful. In Oklahoma some of the interstate highways are actually toll-roads, the income gives the State of Oklahoma the funds to ensure that the roads stay in good condition. My trip from Tulsa south was on one of the toll-ways, and thank-goodness, because I had been driving for about 20 minutes when I suddenly thought “oh, what did I do with my tea-pot.” There it sat on the counter, with at least one cup of tea left in it! Needless to say [View Full Entry]

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We spent one horribly hot, sticky night at Red Rock Canyon State Park in Hinton, OK. We didn't get much sleep. Also the bathrooms were filthy. We decided to have breakfast on the road and stopped at the Gavin Family Restaurant in Hinton. I had pancakes and coffee and Dave had a bagel with egg, cheese and ham with coffee and the bill came to $7. We stopped for gas at the shell and got 2 coffees to go and they cost $.54 each. It was a very hazy,hot morning and again not much to see along the road. We stopped [View Full Entry]

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Archaeology Isn't Always Pretty... Success is going from failure to failure without a loss of enthusiam. --Winston Churchill I debated about whether or not I would include this story, but it is a part of the learning experience of being a new field tech. One of the things that always bothered me about the faculty at my University is that they were not willing to talk about their difficulties as well as their successes in their pursuit of this field. My professors were always supportive, but I think it is important for young archaeologists to have mentors who are [View Full Entry]

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Well, we're back now and I thought I'd wrap this blog up with a few interesting statistics about the trip - Over the course of 18 days from June 11th to the 28th we travelled by train (3060 miles) and car (1478 miles) a total distance of 4548 miles through 9 states (Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Nevada, and Utah) occupying an area (904,055 square miles) that is 29% of the area of the 48 contiguous states. We crossed the Atlantic/Pacific continental divide 4 times, utilized 8 different forms of transportation (train, automobile, streetcar, ferry b [View Full Entry]

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Hello, the first pyramid in Cohokia, near St. Louis was massive and lovely, we are in St. Louis, went up in the arch, (it sways a little). We are off to the Ozarks. More updates later. [View Full Entry]

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Blogger: Katie Location: EBF Arkansas Well, I'm back in the passenger seat now for a little while. DJ started to really feel bad after I finished the earlier post and we switched it up. THEN Arkansas decided to suck some more and there was about half an hour of stop and go traffic, and go only meant slight roll. Needless to say, I now have gotten in a lot more practice starting and stopping and I'm feeling a whole lot better about driving a standard. I may now say that I can drive standard. Regardless, it was annoying. And you want [View Full Entry]

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Blogger: Katie Location: Really flat Arkansas. Well, we have now crossed into Arkansas, only one more state to go. Last night in Memphis we wandered around to find something to eat (after seeing a little bit of "Next Best Thing" and "American Inventor"). We settled on this place called Dan McGuiness, which we were expecting to be a dirty Irish pub, but it opened onto a mall with a courtyard of trees and a fountain inside it was very disorienting. The food was delicious. We think Memphis is a good food city, although not sure why no one seems to [View Full Entry]

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Taking Paul's uncle's advice, we stopped at the tourist info center when we got to Arkansas. We picked up a couple of brochures for crystal mining and continued on our way to Memphis. We hadn't planned any stops along the way, but found a place near enough to the highway that we decided to spend a day mining. Here's how it worked: it's a real, active crystal mine that dumps its leavings in a separate area. It's basically mud and dirt that doesn't have any giant crystals in it. They open this area up to the public. Of course you [View Full Entry]

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So tomorrow I leave for St. Louis, and then its off to Milan! I'm running around like crazy, spending money I've saved on ridiculous things like an "International ID Card." Are those really necessary? I've been reading the memoir "Honeymoon With My Brother" to get in the mood for my 6 week adventure! I can't believe I'll be in Europe in less than 2 days. I'm very fortunate. Peace & Love [View Full Entry]

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Six guys and three days and a back to nature adventure. And hanging out with just guys is a very different experience than when girls are around. The nature of the conversation changes, we relax more, etc. For most of the time on the trip, I wore just a hat and a bathing suit... wearing shoes only when necessary. It was a very liberating feeling... kind of like a Huck Finn free-spirit. Most of the others guys wore about the same. Over the three days, we spent a lot of time talking and joking around. It was great to hang out [View Full Entry]

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