USELESS FACTS AND FIGURES
Duration of trip – 114 days, 8 hours
Distance travelled – 18,137mi., 29,189 km.
Average distance travelled per day – 158 mi., 255 km.
Volume of gas purchased – 6,175 L. (which if you are interested would fill a 1.8m cube and weigh 4,693kg)
Cost of gas purchased – $7,292.24 (ouch)
Cheapest gas – $ .86/L in Tennessee
Most expensive gas – $ 1.66/L Dawson City, Yukon
Fuel consumption – 13.2 mpg, 21.4 L/100km
Cost of gas / km. – $ .25
Number of countries visited – 3
Number of states visited – 21
Number of provinces/territories visited – 9
Number of photographs taken – 5,180
LESSONS LEARNED – in no particular order
No one country has the market cornered on nice people, or assholes for that matter
Buying gas shouldn’t be more difficult than buying a handgun
No one should wear a fanny pack, no one, ever
There are more good beers than bad beers
There are more bad wines than bad beers
Sometimes the road less travelled is that for an excellent reason
Never pass a chance to dump your waste water – you don’t know when the next opportunity will present itself
When in the north never pass a gas station
Never assume that the locals know anything about the world around them more than a mile from their home, no, make that a half mile or as far as they can see, which ever distance is shorter
Take the time to be friendly with people, good things generally happen
A bad day of fishing is still better than a good day in the office
When you are on a twisty, neck wrecking, white knuckle road and suddenly there is a sign saying twisting road ahead – pay attention to it – the road is about to get a lot worse than you ever imagined possible
Not all speed bumps are created equal, or even marked
All fishing regulations are written by committees made up of:
-lawyers
-socially challenged biologists who have not mastered any human communication skills
-people who do not want anyone to fish, ever
-bureaucrats whose jobs and future livelihoods depend upon interpreting the aforementioned regulations
Promotional travel brochures have the accuracy of political platforms and are written by people who already live there and want you to visit, sometimes apparently just to share in their misery but mostly so you will spend your money there. Choose your destinations wisely, life is short.
Prepare well but remember all plans are STC – subject to change. The happy accidents that come from spontaneous decisions are all the sweeter and more memorable
Just because you can dress and grow hair and a beard like on Duck Dynasty doesn’t mean you should. That look is getting very old, very fast and it always was stupid
True friends are rare, hold them close and treat them well
Marry your best friend. Everything is more fun when you share it with your best friend.
To quote Dorothy, “There’s no place like home.”
IN CLOSING
After 114 days of writing to this blog and as the last standing contributor it will be hard to stop. For me, through repetition it has become a habit, a daily mental exercise in finding new ways to describe some amazing things, in words and pictures, to share with those of you who have been kind enough to read it, in part, or God forbid in whole, a way to try and share what was a phenomenal experience for all of us with our friends and family.
Regardless of the quality of the product what started out as an idea for a simple way to keep family and friends informed of our progress became a practice of observing and recording so it could be made as real as possible both for those following from home and for us in the future as we relive the trip. From my perspective my experience was enriched by the exercise of recording it. I know I speak for all of us when I say how much we appreciated knowing that somewhere out there in the ether, our friends and family, were reading and sharing in some manner what we were experiencing – thank you all for that, it brought us comfort.
So long from the BRT, the armadillo is just resting, not dead.
And with that I set down my digital pen…..until the next time.
