the Malaysian Cowboy

Today’s Flickr Gallery | July 31st: Amarillo to Oklahoma City

The drive to Oklahoma City was as straightforward as things go: head east on I-40 and eventually I’d exit off to get to the hotel.

The first stop off the highway wasn’t terribly exciting, but it did give me another chance to get shots of a dirt road. And me in a cowboy hat, of course. Of note, about 25 miles into the trip I hit the 4,000 mile milestone.

For the moment, the skies were clear with nary a cloud in sight, making for some nice contrast between the fields and the wonderfully blue sky.

A few miles later I spotted more empty roads, and realized I hadn’t really tried out taking shots from the top of an overpass. So I pulled off, parked a little ways away, and made the trip across the overpass to see what kind of shots I could get. They weren’t awesome, but they were at least another angle that I’ve driven up and around over the course of this trip, so why not document them, eh? Looking back, I would like to get some shots in the dead of night, as The long exposure shots with the car headlights and taillights always make for beautiful shots…but I’m always fearful that I’ll get hit or something, what ith all those cars and a lot more darkness than there is light. So anyway, I still have to do that at some point in my life. Click here to read more »

The Flickr Galleries: Day 1 | Day 2 || Denver: July 28th & 29th

After a good night’s rest and a late breakfast, our first stop was Casa Bonita, a wonderful dining experience similar to a Rainforest Café, only better. Now I must tell you that Julia and her mom went to great lengths to inform me that the food there was pretty bad, and, really, we were going for the experience over anything else. Obviously, being familiar with the numerous Tex-Mex dining options in Houston and Texas, while I can’t say I’m a connoisseur of good Tex-Mex, I can certainly tell good food from the bad stuff.

As it turns out, the food wasn’t really as bad as I’d expected (in fact, the nachos were pretty good, if not rather filling), and the rest of the experience was really cool (check out the video clip for a better idea)!

Having watched a few of the cliff diving shows and a pirate duel, we finished our meal and explored Black Bart’s hideout, which took us through a windy cave filled with lots of interesting creatures and sights.

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Today’s Flickr Gallery | July 26th: Las Vegas to Green River, UT

After a good amount of sleep, I woke up this morning and figured I needed a bit of a different breakfast. And by different I mean I had myself some of that Tazo tea I keep seeing everywhere with my cereal, along with a muffin. My nerves and head had been a bit shaken by the heat, tiredness, and general malaise that Vegas seems to give off when you’re walking around. I can’t say if the tea helped, but I definitely was able to brush off that tiredness relatively quickly.

On my way back to the room, I got a text from Dad telling me it’d be prudent to do the usual checks on the car. I generally check the tire pressure every other day, but I figured the oil, coolant level, and washer fluid might as well be added into the mix, since I hadn’t looked at any of them since leaving Houston. As it turned out, it appeared the coolant in the car was just a smidge low—not low enough to set off the alert in the car, but it still looked a bit off to me. Theoretically, it could have been this low all the while I’d been driving (after all, how often does your coolant just vanish into thin air?), but with the 115˚ weather yesterday, I had already seen three cars sidelined with smoke billowing from the hood, so I wanted to be safe. Despite my writings to the contrary in the prior post, I was fortunate to be in a city as large as Vegas, as it made finding a dealer for BMW coolant very easy.

So, after about an hour of scrambling and a trip to get the coolant, I was finally ready to make a move for Green River.

The drive through the desert was relatively straightforward, as I headed northeast on I-15.

I passed through Arizona for about half an hour, during which time I found some more canyons and desert, stopping to take some shots…

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Today’s Flickr Gallery | July 23rd: I left Flagstaff at 8:30 in the am, and finally arrived at Rafaela’s place in Bakersfield around 5:30 in the evening. Needless to say, apart from the Houston-Amarillo drive, this was one of the longer drives thus far.

As has become the norm over the past few days, the day started with breakfast from the hotel. Having devoured the somewhat salty scrambled eggs and a sausage patty, I stopped to get some gas and check the tire pressure, which gave me a chance to snap the friendly hotel greeting:

The drive itself was filled with a variety of landscapes, starting with Seqouia National forest just outside of Flagstaff proper. Usually, when people think Arizona, they conjure images of vast, sweeping deserts and the iconic Grand Canyon. But when you get this high in elevation, you really come to appreciate the beautifully vast forest that its also home to.

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