When Julie and I bought Tramp in early 2017 and set off on our around-the-world journey we dubbed Follow the Sun we were full of excitement and anticipation.  An almost life-long dream was finally coming true but we were wonderfully naïve about the amazing adventures and not-so-amazing challenges that lie ahead.  Six and a half years later, we completed our journey across five continents and 70 countries, which amazes us now when we think about it.  But as this trip shows, we ain’t done yet.

So we quietly patted ourselves on the back the other day when we had our 800^th day of travelling with Tramp which was all of Follow the Sun plus this super journey around the southwestern states of the US.  I can’t describe all the fantastic experiences those 800 days represent, the places we’ve visited, the cultures, the history, the languages, the beautiful and varied spots we camped at the end of each day.  Memorable, to say the least.

But as we like to say, every day has surprises and that’s why we love to travel.  We spent most of our 800^th day in Bryce Canyon National Park in the southwestern corner of Utah, an extraordinary example of uplifting land over the hundreds of millions of years and then the power of erosion. Bryce Canyon is one of America’s most popular national parks and it’s easy to see why – absolutely amazing.

We celebrated our milestone by having showers (!) and enjoying the hearty ’Cowboy Buffet’ lunch in a restaurant nearby.  Then it was back in the park for more overlooks of this amazing natural phenomenon, including a natural bridge. 

We eventually tootled down the road from the park, passing over a 9,900 foot (3,200 metre) pass into the regional town of Cedar City and camped that night in a nearby national forest where the temperatures were still over 100°F (39°C) at 7.30 at night.  This part of the States is experiencing a serious heat wave and we’ve managed to drive right into it.

Another fun family game is to keep a list of all license plates we see from the different American states and Canadian provinces. National Parks are a great place to find these plates and here’s a short collection from a single car park at Bryce Canyon National Park.

Every trip has a longest driving day and ours finally arrived in spades.  Because of the heat our mission was to drive across the southern parts of Nevada as fast as possible. We crossed the border into Nevada within the first hour and the vast dry and handsome desert of this state was evident in all directions. 

In some sections our road was perfectly straight for as far as we could see across the flat nothingness of this dry inhospitable land.  Sometimes the road would wind upward through a rocky desert mountain range with evidence of ancient volcanic activity but then drop down again into the scrubby flatlands.

One section of road had found a way to promote itself by giving this long stretch the name of the Extraterrestrial Highway and playing it up with flying saucers stuck in the sand and numerous forms of graffiti showing little green men.  We didn’t see any Martians but we didn’t see anyone else out there for that matter.

Some of these towns like Mina and Luning were so run down and abandoned they had almost become ghost towns.  Other towns such as Caliente and Tonopah were holding on to whatever they could muster. 

We stopped for some time at the larger town (population 2,000) of Hawthorne because my Uni roommate from 45 years ago came from here and the town featured a surprisingly good Ordnance Museum (yes, every country’s got to have one!) which kept in line with the town’s ongoing role as a major underground storage site for old and current war munitions. 

As it happened, the manager of the museum knew my old roommate, having gone to school with his family, and provided a personal connection to our visit.  It’s a small world…or perhaps not so small in a town like Hawthorne.

We camped that night up in the Toiyabe Forest just on the other side of the California border, hiding amongst the ubiquitous juniper trees at 7,500 feet to try to beat the heat.  It was a beautiful final night in Tramp as we knew the next day we would end this particular journey with a return to my family home.

But the last day, like almost every day, was full of wonderful surprises.  Within miles of being back on the road we passed a sign for the Bodie Ghost Town.  Screech went the brakes, another U-turn and a ten-mile dirt track up into the mountains to visit one of the few remaining authentic ghost towns in the US (or perhaps the world).

The town of Bodie was founded after a guy named Bodie (surprise!) discovered gold in them thar hills in the 1870’s.  Like all these mining boom and bust towns, Bodie grew overnight and despite it’s remote location and harsh conditions at 8,375 feet (2,550 metres), especially in winter, the town expanded to over 8,000 people, slowly declining after 1881 when the gold ran out.

In it’s heyday Bodie had a reputation for being a very hard place to live and work.  It was said that men outnumbered women 100 to one, there were 50 saloons in town and no churches.  One old timer wrote that the drinking and gambling in the saloons each night created a ‘boisterous conviviality’ which often ended in guns being pulled and shots fired.  Someone wrote that the town was ‘a bonanza for undertakers’ and the term ‘Bodie bad men’ was often used to describe it’s citizens.  Women, who were in short supply, were described as those whose ‘virtuous innocence was well behind them’.

Today the ghost town of Bodie still has over 200 buildings standing – from the original 2,000 that once stood – and visitors can enter a few and look through the windows of others.  The town provides a fascinating look at what life must have been like back in it’s brief heyday and we loved walking around the town and watching the informative – and entertaining – video that played in an old barn.  Great stuff.

Between us and my family home lie the formative Sierra Nevada mountain range, second largest and longest in the US only to the Rocky Mountains.  We chose to conquer the range via the Sonora Pass and followed the steep and rollercoaster winding road up and over the mountains, stopping frequently to take in the wonderful views. 

After topping out at 9,624 feet (2,933 metres) with snow patches below us we slowly descended the mountains until we hit the famed agricultural belt of California called the Central Valley.  Here the temperatures were well over 40°C (104°F) and at one stage hit an egg-frying 45°C (113°F).  This might have been the hottest we had ever experienced in Tramp, something significant considering how many places he had been.

We arrived at my family home well after beer o’clock and it was great to see my mother again and fall immediately into my life-long comfort zone.  We would be spending the next ten days there with a packed agenda before heading on to other family events elsewhere.

Our seven-week trip around the American Southwest had been a fabulous journey through some of the most beautiful land in the country.  We travelled with and caught up with family and friends, we visited multiple national parks, camped in many perfect 10 spots and always enjoyed the hospitality and friendliness of the American people.   As is always our problem, we discovered many more places we wanted to return to – a list that keeps getting longer and longer.  So be it.

We enjoyed celebrating our milestone moment of 800 days travelling with Tramp but as Julie said – we’re only half way!