Wow. That was really ambitious!
On Wed, Jun 22, 2016 at 7:54 AM, Bob Benson <bob.benson91@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Re: the "geekiest road trip." In 1987 my business partner and I decided
> to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the US Constitution (essentially a
> federal-state compact), by visiting all 50 states in under 200 hours.
>
> The route we took looks quite similar to this roadtrip map, though we
> didn't require going to the state capitals. We also flew to Ketchikan AL
> amd Honolulu during 200 hours. We started and ended in St Louis and
> actually completed the 50-state trip in 192 hours. We drove 10000 miles
> (non stop other than the flights) and averaged 59 mph which included the
> time for gas and food stops - and the occasional shower stop at an RV
> camp. Fortuitously, this was the summer (1987) that the infamous 55 mph
> national speed limit was lifted; it would have been more difficult
> otherwise, and we couldn't have used interstates as much as we did since a
> US highway route would have been shorter..
>
> We replaced the rear-view-mirror with a video camera and recorded the
> entire trip. My partner processed the video to create a 10 to 1 time
> reduction; in effect, we have a 19 hour video of driving thru the US at
> 600 mph.
>
> We also stopped at each state border and took a video of me standing by the
> state welcome sign, where I read aloud the next sentence of the
> constitution. We'd hoped to have a 30 minute or so video flashing thru the
> 50 state signs. We did this up until the PA / NJ border (a very busy
> bridge) and decided it wasn't cool to stop in the middle; we thought this
> might also be the case in, say, NY, CT, etc.
>
> The only expense was gas plus a bit of food - by the third day we weren't
> eating much. I can't remember now whether we succeeded in getting TWA and
> AK airlines to contribute our airfares, which would have been the only
> additional expense.
>
> We've talked about redoing this in 2017 -- probably not, but it's an
> interesting discussion item.
>
> Other than seeing a lot of the US -- sunrises and sunsets were particularly
> special -- the only really interesting event was getting through the
> blockades CA and OR had on I-5. This was the year of the Mediterranean
> fruit fly or perhaps some other pests; the officers asked us whether we
> had fruit in the car -- yes -- where did you get it -- hmm, OR, or maybe
> WA, or maybe AK .. no, we got it in ID, and MO .. but oh, I remember
> getting the apples in ND ... ahh, you get the picture.
>
> Bob
> --
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>
--
Paul Braun WD9GCO
Certified Music Junkie
"Music washes from the soul the dust of everyday life." -- Berthold Auerbach
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