Finally made it home, it was a truly great break, we covered 5018 miles, drove through 16 States, saw amazing landscapes and scenery, collected 108 words for my research, and worked with a group of young people to develop 10 themes. Overall the conversations and words around the research, suggest a disconnection between values and actions of people, where life chasing the American dream gets confused with actually having time to live it. It will take a while to develop the research further, but it may be that this general observation will play a more central role.

It was great to visit the Arte Americas today in fresno. A real gem of a place focussing on Latino art, with a great community feel and some fantastic work. It had a feature on the billboard campaign in SF and there was also some great local graf artists showing their work. I uploaded some photos to FB.

Some of the work around highlighting the predjudice and inequalities faced was very powerful, and seeing this mixed with the messages of resistance was profound. I would imagine it is a place few people know of but there is work there with a voice that needs to be heard.

It was great to get the Grand Canyon and stay there for the night, although a little disappointing we didint have time to hike down a way. This meant just visiting the sights, one of the downsides of being on the road so much is time to do stuff is limited. Also as you couldnt drive through it like Paulo Duro it meant looking down a lot, or as Indi said it is just load of random rocks. What happened in Vegas stays in Vegas. We headed out to death valley which was spectacular, and completely other worldly, great stars, shadows and we even saw a road runner. After the valley the hills to the sequoia national park and saw the general sherman and a BEAR! It was a real highlight for me I loved the hills the valleys, and wished i was still climbing. It was great to see the trees that I read about as a kid in one of those 101 wonders of the world books that I got for christmas when i was about 5. Now we are staying with friends in Fresno and it has been great to be in the same place for a few days, and to fit in the family tradition of always playing crazy golf when on holiday.

We have been on the road quite a bit, Tulsa to Bethany OK, to Canyon, to Albuquerque. (yes we did have prefab sprout on the play list). In Canyon we went to to the Paulo Duro which was a great canyon as you could drive down into it, but at 54 degrees C was little hot to stop.

On the way we hit a few more route 66 sites, the best being the Cadillac Ranch and TinkerTown Musuem.

Tmw is an early start as we head for momument valley, where i will mostly be speaking like John Wayne. We are supposed to heading to the hotest parts of our road trip but had rain and storms this evening. Loads of lightening which Jo managed to film. I have loved how the sceanery has changed on our trips from the green of the NY state through the prairies to the scrub of Texas and edge of the desert of New mexico. Thehours in the car have been worth it as you see and feel so much as you travel at ground level. I would love to barefoot it.

We made the efffort to leave the interstate for the mother road, but she is in need of a facelift in places. At times there seems little of the old route 66 left, the highway has bypassed most the kitsch sites and old style dinners along the way are closed down, replaced by chains along the main road. However there are still sites to be seen and taking side roads such as the 28 to the worlds largest totem pole, make you see why the road without the fibreglass giants carries such iconic status. To say the road undulated was an understatement we had to video as pictures wouldnt do it justice. We also went to possibly the sugariest place on the route the Precious Moments Chapel, which I ended up quite liking.

Carthage was a great little town and we hit the drive in movie, to watch cars 2 again. We thought you could choose but they were playing the films back to back and as cars didnt finish till 11 we missed Rio, but there was something great about the experience except for the heat. 110f is the hotest we have had, and it will get hotter as we head to the desert. Today we saw the blue whale, and got chatting to the locals, i love collecting peoples stories, and doing the research is a nice excuse.

Longish drive today from Chicago – Cuba about 6 hours. Liked the windy city a lot but wouldnt recommend the hop on hop off bus, we spent a lot of the day waiting for it. However it was a good way to see the city. The bean and public art was great and we visited the Trickster Gallery (a native american fine art), We stopped a couple of classic 66 sites along the way like the spaceman, and also saw the giant tricycle, icecream cone, flying saucer, and then visited the cahoki mounds, before making our stop in the classic wagon wheel motel but not before rounding off the day at the Hicks BBQ, which was great ribs and pulled pork, (lori had a salad).

Great day driving from Middlebury to Schumburg (just the other side of Chicago). We went via the Indiana dunes (one of the smaller national parks) for a swim in Lake Michigan. The great lakes are truely amazing, you sit on the side and wonder where it ends as it stretches to the horizon. I am so used to seeing Wales, France or Lundy, from the sea it seems bizare to have waves on a lake. Tomorrow we pick up Tufty and Clive, we have a day for them to recover from the flight then we hit the town, before route 66 beckons.

Spent a great three days in Amish, Hutterite and Mennonite area. Lots of buggys and visiting small towns and garage sales as an excuse to speak to the locals. Wonderful time at the B and B. This morning was panckae and sausage casserole for breakfast and homemade wonderful cinnamon roles. Going past Kalamazoo (I jest not) we Went to the county fair which was supposed to be the third largest in the country but was about a 1/8 of the devon county, although you dnt get elephant ears to eat in devon. Tomorrow we head for Chicago via the Indiana dunes. Highlight of the trip in this area was to the Menno Hof an info centre, It was really informative without being touristy. Also picked up about £150 worth of Wade Wimsies at a garage sale for $10.

We arrived in Indiana today after a reasonable time crossing the border. Because I am naturally chatty I got in conversation with the customs guys but Lori suggested that it made me look guilty. We are at a great B and B near Middlebury and in an Amish area. Tomorrow we are visiting locally and then Sunday is the county fare. We seem to keep landing in places on the right day, Toronto for the free musem on Wednesdays, and Yesterday we found a great fish fryer on the lakeside that is only open two days a week. We had perch and pikerel, but weren’t sure which is which, but only liked one. Today was a longer drive and through some heavy rain. The B and B is great and were served pies at 8pm made by the in house local amish chef. We had peanut butter pie, caramel fudge and Indi had blueberry. Up till now it has been too hot to eat much but I think looking at the breakfast menu that is about to change.

The local quilts are amazing but at around $800 for a double a touch on the pricey side for us.