Day 12½ thru 15 - 9.10.98 thru 9.13.98

Activities: Bonsai run back to California

Having to get back to work, I took off the afternoon of the 10th for a quick (4 hour) trip to Charlotte, Nc to drop my son off at the airport, and then start a mad dash back to Sandy Eggo, Ca before Monday. I was hoping to make it back late that Saturday...but some mean bitch by the name of Tropical Storm Francis wanted to meet with me first.

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Through South Carolina and into Georgia I was hounded by by these signs and the accompanying marked cruisers and unmarked Crown Vics. (seems they care more about speeders than people shooting guns while on the freeway - note bullet holes)

On the way out of South Carolina, I spotted this seemingly mild mannered Mustang. However, I had it on good authority (remember my Uncle the police officer) that a Mustang exactly like this was confiscated by the Sc police after a bust of a Georgian drug dealer. The drug dealer had  it highly modified and it is now being used by the police as a pursuit vehicle.

This one did appear to have a few options that weren't offered by Ford (radio, extra blue lights)

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I've been in Atlanta before, but skyline is still spectacular and pic worthy.

Shortly after I took these pics, I had to take another stop after running over a muffler.

I found out when I got back that the extent of the damage was a scrape on the lower right bump down to plastic, broken fog light, broken bumper mounts, and two bent right wheels.

Going through Alabama was pretty boring until I got to this little town. For some reason I had this great desire to take a detour and drive in circles at great speeds for awhile

Almost as soon as I crossed into Mississippi, the weather started turning nasty.

I made it through Mississippi and across the Mississippi River into Louisiana where the scenery started turning to mush (literally) and continued on into Texas.

The bottom pic was the sort of visibility I was going through when I could see enough to take a pic of it (or anything). Most of the time, I couldn't see this much. Passing big rigs turned into a leap of faith that the road wouldn't turn while you were passing them at 90 and completely blinded by the rain and wash off of the trucks.

At one point I was almost hit by a house (yes...it almost hit me) while doing 90 on the freeway. The house was on the back of a truck and I was just passing it when it needed to move over into what little room I had for a lane. Without hitting the brakes (as the backend was already lightened from me dropping off the gas) or ending up in the grass median (which was more like the swamps on the outsides of the roadway) I managed to slow enough to keep me from becoming a room addition. But for about 1/2 mile I had the corner of this house sitting over the hood and about 2 feet from the windshield while doing 80 mph.

Out of the 100 of these Viper GTSRs made, I have to run across one when its all wet and mucky. I would have loved to run against this guy when it was dry (not that it would last more than a few seconds....it would still be fun).

With a close drive by Mexico (as close as I want my Z to Mexico)...

Coming out of New Mexico and into Arizona provided some beautiful sunset pics

As the road I took from Dallas to Sandy Eggo was the same as I took to Dallas from Sandy Eggo, I won't bother posting more pics. If you are interested in what it looked like, start with Day 3 then Day 2 and end with Day 1, scrolling backwards from the bottom to the top of each page...you'll get an idea of what it looked like

So after about 6200 miles and three service lights (Just before I left on the trip, I had gone in for Service one at about 7800 miles and had the lights reset), both I and Dieter Z are in need of a little rest and recuperation.