I bought a Vespa this past July. A GTS 250ie. Red. Dragon Red. I bought a whole bunch of accessories for it as well: GPS, satellite radio, hard case, saddle bags, and so on. I was ready, but ready for what?
With all this stuff, I figured that I now needed to actually go somewhere on it. At first it was going to be a weekend trip to the coast. Then it was a trip up to Seattle to visit my Dad. (I live in Portland, Oregon, BTW.) Somehow, it morphed from that into a month-long tour of the West. Go figure.
So here’s the general plan: Head east from Portland over to Yellowstone; south to Eastern Utah and Arches NP, Monument Valley, Four Corners and such; south some more to Painted Desert, Meteor Crater; Petrified Forest and a corner in Winslow Arizona; still further south to Tombstone along the Mexican border; back west to London Bridge; east along Route 66 (going “backwards”) to Flagstaff; north to the Grand Canyon; north still past Lake Powell and over to Bryce NP and Zion NP in SW Utah; out into the middle of Nevada to Area 51 to see if anything interesting flies over; down to Vegas and Hoover Dam; back west to Death Valley; north to Mammoth Lakes and the back side of Yosemite; through Yosemite then southwest to the California coast near SLO (that’s San Luis Obispo); up Highway 1 to Big Sur, Carmel, Monterey, Santa Cruz, Half Moon Bay and on into San Francisco; then north again up the coast, through the Redwoods; back into Oregon coming north on 101 up to Astoria; then back east to Longview and home again to Portland; That’s the plan anyway. Subject to change.
I figure that it will take about a month to do. I’m planning on leaving in late September and being back some time before Halloween. I had wanted to leave earlier, but various things have delayed me. I’m going to try to post a blog entry every day so that anyone is interested can follow along if they want. I’m going to be taking lots of video and pictures along the way, and I’ll post those to YouTube and Flickr respectively, with links from these blog entries.
See you when I get back.
Hey, Scott —
Have a great time! That sounds like a great trip. Lots of places I haven’t been yet. Drive safely and look out for all the crazies on the road…
Scott, it sounds like you are off on a fabulous adventure. I am looking forward to seeing it all on YouTube. You are an inspiration.
Good luck with it all – have a budget so that you can really enjoy the trip.