For those of you who don’t know, I don’t just wear the stencil hat. I also wear the eco-carny hat. Over the past two years, I’ve been on the road with Jonathan Youtt and the Sustainable Living Roadshow, doing the carny bit with some great themed games up and down the West Coast. Well, the big SLR tour is happening this fall, starting in Denver, going Southeast, and then heading west for a huge LA Halloween ending. I had to joing the circus this year, and had committed about the time the book deal came around. So expect to see posts about the SLR for the rest of the year, now in the new category I made for it: “SLR 2008”
Some final shots of the Stencil Nation June Tour: Fun at Camas Books, with a final ferry shot of Victoria, BC
Woah. Was I in Victoria, BC just four days ago? Looking for stencils and only finding one? Riding bikes down to the touristy downtown area and then being totally exhausted after all the biking on the trip? Looking for a pint at a pub and finding the pubs full up with Canada Day holiday goers? Did Camas really roll out the red carpet for me and Chris, giving us a great event, buying our books, and then letting me hang out the next day doing stencils (thanks for the cans PESTO. I’m glad Vic has a few more stencils now!)? Man, Peter was nothing but nice as our host, telling stories about Reclaim the Streets in the 1990s, pulling out a 1990s stencils, and feeding us/biking us around.
Then Chris and I drove drove drove. We had to take the 7:30 ferry out of Victoria to Port Angeles, WA, USA. And TSA had to sic the dogs on us, go through all our bags, and ask us stupid questions. We left them without our fruit, the only thing they could find that wasn’t kosher at the border. I drove until about 3 am to Salem, OR and then we crashed hard. Got up the next day and Chris drove all the way to SF. Mt. Shasta looked odd in the forest fire smoke haze. SF looked odd as we crossed the Bay Bridge. Completely covered in a brown fog while we were sunny on the bridge.
No rest for the vagabonds. I spent the next day unpacking from that trip and packing for Colorado. Running errands, setting up things for later in July, and then finally taking down the stencil exhibit at Revolution Cafe. Glad that the artists were cool with getting their art back after my CO trip.
Jonathan told me that he’d pick me up July 2 at 9 am. He showed up after 10. We then drove around running errands, finally ending up at the Gamelan X space to pack the van. More errands got done as Tom and Jon packed the van. It all fit! We were going to take a fat tour bus that Julia Butterfly has offered to SLR, but the cost of fuel led us to an extended diesel van. But everything fit! Four carny games, a pile of easy-ups, boxes, cases, bags, etc etc.
Jonathan goofs around beside the very full van; and Northstar near Truckee gave us a tank of B10 blend
The sun started to set and were were still in Oakland. Had to pick up print jobs, buy easy-ups, go grocery shopping, fill the tires with air, and many other things, but finally left the Bay Area and headed towards Reno. Tom took a turn at driving a large vehicle for the first time. Then we all took turns, all the way to Winnemucca, NV, stopping by Northstar Resort (Truckee, CA) to fill up with a B10 diesel mix. Got a hotel super late and all crashed around 4 am with a 9 am wake up.
We had a cereal breakfast (yes, more cereal believers) and then I drove us all to Elko to register the van. The DMV wouldn’t take the paperwork because the van is registered in a different county and needs a smog test. Elko doesn’t smog test! So we hit the freeway and kept heading east. Super hot in the dessert the whole way. We landed into the Salt Flat outside Salt Lake City hot and sweaty. Stopped in SLC to pick up another print job (I figured out how to Bluetooth it from one computer to another and then it got emailed out this morning). Had printing problems so it took an hour to work out. I went for a walk, enjoyed the open creek by the Kinkos, and people watched the crowds that were finding space for a fireworks show.
Self-portrait, hot as hell in the Salt Flats, UT; Shot of the Ruby Mountains outside Salt Lake City; Proud of USA-made bio-diesel; WTF!?? FoxNews on the gas pump’s monitor!
We had no time to watch pretty lights, so headed up the hill towards the mountains to fill up the tank with a B50 diesel blend. (Um, why the hell was FoxNews on the screen at the pump? Seriously, we had to suffer through that crappy news station while the tank was filling!) We’re trying our best to source bio-diesel, and thanks to Nearbio.com, we have a list of places that serve up the many blends of the green stuff. We did have to fill up with straight dino-diesel, but we had no choice. Timing and location is important too: we had to pass up a fill up of B100 via Moab, UT due to needing to get on down the road. Wish we had time to find out what the source of the bio-diesel is too, but things move fast on the open road.
So we hit the road out of SLC just after sunset today and kept booking it East towards Copper Mountain. Jonathan’s goal was to get to Grand Junction, CO and we hit that city around 2 am on July 4. Happy Inter-Dependence Day! God, we’re tired. We wasted time looking for a place to camp (ah, the stars are so clear here in CO) before hitting GJ and finally finding an affordable hotel to crash for a few hours.
Now… well, we’re all at our Zombie Apple machines, catching up on the interweb world. Hello digital peeples! Do you appreciate your freedom and dependence…. from stuff like oil? Black gold…..
Ahhh, so sleepy. More driving tomorrow to Copper Mountain, and then we set up the games. I sleep after that too!