Here I Go Again On My Own

The road trip was, in short, amazing.

I left Tacoma at 11:15am on Monday morning after finishing my appointments and hit the road. The drive from Tacoma through Oregon was brutal until I finally got my first coffee of the day around 3 or 4pm, at which point I got really, really hyper and happy and turned up the music really loud. It was a great time.
Coming down out of the mountains that border Oregon and California was the first high point of the trip. The sun was beginning to set, and the air was warm and golden. A storm was rolling in from the west over Mount Shasta and the sky turned a beautiful orange as large, hot raindrops began to pepper the windshield. I kept the sunroof and the windows open, allowing the rain into the car and feeling the warm night air rush by.
I made it to Redding, CA around 8:30pm and stopped at a motel for the night (distance covered on day one: 610 miles). Next morning (Tuesday), I was up at 5:30 and on the road with an extra-hot Starbucks latte and a bagel by 6:45. The sunrise was incredible.

The next 500 miles of freeway looked like this:

Long. Straight. Relatively boring. About this time I started getting tired of the CDs I'd brought. I also got coffee 3 more times on this stretch.

Then came Los Angeles. I reached the city limits of L.A. at 1:30pm on Tuesday and made my way through the insanity that is the L.A. traffic network system. Let it be known that I will NEVER move to Los Angeles. The air is filthy (it's constantly cloudy due to the ugly brown smog that never leaves the sky), it's crowded, and the people drive like idiots. Three hours later, I was finally clear of San Bernardino and Palm Springs, and the freeway opened up into a beautiful desert landscape with softly rolling hills that the freeway weaved over and around. I was able to set the cruise control at a comfortable 75mph and just cruise through the left lane as everyone slower than me moved to the right.

I crossed the Arizona border with much elation and turned up the music again. The sun began to set and I reached the city limits of Phoenix just as it had dipped below the horizon. I turned off the A/C, opened the windows and sunroof, and cruised through the streets, enjoying the humid, warm air. It was hotter than hot, but the air felt sooooo good. It's just as humid (if not more) than it was in Germany, but for some reason in Phoenix it just feels great at night. Distance covered, day two: 900 miles. Total drive time, day two: 13 hours. Time from begin to finish: 22.5 hours.

Next morning, i was up and rarin' to get to campus by 9am . . .