USA
November 2007 - New York City, Texas, Cleveland
Hello! After a whirlwind tour of Europe + Morocco, we're rolling back through the USA, enjoying our continued unemployment. People often ask us how we can afford to travel so much. Well, we sold our house, we don't have children, we have marketable job skills, and we don't mind spending money, because as they say, you can't take it with you. Plus, we travel with frugality, avoiding fancy hotels and restaurants, et cetera. Life is good!
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January 2008 - Sedona, Arizona
We spent a month in Sedona to house-sit for my mother. This is a stunningly beautiful place, perfect for daily hikes and mountain-bike rides. We also visited Las Vegas, the Grand Canyon, and Bryce Canyon, classic America. This is a great place to visit but not to live. As such, we are about to tour New Zealand, to scout out this beautiful country as a potential new home (we decided against moving to Brazil due to the excessive corruption and crime).
People say that I'm crazy when I predict the American Empire is about to crash, but the writing is on the proverbial wall. All of the economic indicators are negative and getting worse. First of all, Bush's stupid WAR in Iraq is creating bad karma and enormous debt; then there's the evaporating manufacturing sector, governmental dysfunction, corporate dominance (institutionalized greed plus propaganda branded as news), housing and stock bubbles, stupidly expensive health care, and a car culture that is overly thirsty for oil. Something has to give. The current situation is not sustainable. And with all those American guns, this situation could get very ugly. We have heard nothing but good things about New Zealand, so we're on our way!
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Greetings from North America! We are here for exactly one reason: to ship our household stuff to New Zealand. But we had time for one side trip, to visit a stunning Rocky Mountain town called Telluride. Our friend had extra tickets to the Telluride Bluegrass Festival, American culture at its best. Telluride is famous for world-class skiing but it also hosts music and film festivals in the summer. Long ago this was a Wild West town hidden in a remote valley. Thus the name: to Hell you ride! This was my fourth Bluegrass Festival, and I hope it will forever remain small and fantastic. Music festivals do not get any better than this.
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