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The Road Trip
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No - Not The Movie
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I am a big fan of John Steinbeck - along with John Fowles, John Irving, John LeCarre … you get the drift. But for now let’s focus on Steinbeck. If you have never been to Salinas and paid homage to Mr. Steinbeck at ’The National Steinbeck Center’ … well you are just missing out.
In there you will find the other Rocinante …
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… it was the vehicle Steinbeck used in the early 60s when he travelled through the USA on a Road Trip to reconnect himself back to the American people. The resulting book was ‘Travels With Charley’ - a book my mum loved, told me to read - I did - and from there my love for Steinbeck was born.
Friday night I happened to be in one of my local watering holes and met ‘John’ - another one - and we just talked. Great conversation that covered the world and needless to say we solved most of the world’s problems. Turns out he and his wife had just returned from his own sojourn. One that when I first heard him was a six month tour of South America. I misheard. It was a twenty six months tour of South America.
Days on the road: 816
Miles Driven: 27,132
Countries: 17
Border Crossings: 25
Go on - click through - what a wonderful trip - and when you look at their own ‘Rocinante’ - well you can see how I made the connection.
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But there’s more
I happened to notice one of the first posts on their site recounted their Burning Man experience. Like John and Paula, I too have never been to Burning Man, though I do know quite a few people that have not only been - but been several times - going right back to the early days. Most famous is my friend Robin was was at the very first Burning Man Man on Baker Beach in ‘86. (This was the same Robin who originally woke me up to this place in Sausalito .. click through and scroll down to Wheel Number Two, if you don’t recognize ’The Plant’. What a history… and just like Burning Man ’86, Robin was here aswell.
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And then today, I received a call from Roberto a friend of more than 25 years, though sad to say we hadn’t been in touch for a while - it was great to hear from him. In our one hour ‘out of the blue’ conversation, we found ourselves talking about Burning Man and me being told ‘John - we have to go. We just have to go.’
This is kind of what I get told my other Burning Man veterans .. Brennan and Alex .. I guess I need to go! The universe is speaking. Maybe I should listen, because there are even more wheels turning. Like for example, when I went to Twitter just now to remind myself of the link for the next section of this post - the top tweet in the stream was Brennan’s!
But - back to the plot. This is the link I was looking for … Mark On A Bike, Yup - Mark is travelling the world on a Motorbike. So far this is where he has got to ….
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… and it got me to thinking. I am not a highly spiritual person, but even I am getting the message. That said, I am not a bike rider - unlike my friends Bob and Kevin - who have never met - but I know would enjoy each other … but I am a traveller. Maybe it is time to be ‘On the Road Again’.
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And - despite the Maui connection - I am not so much ‘Willie’ as ‘Canned Heat’.
Be safe my friends.