It felt strange to be apart, and it kept feeling strange. I was having adventures in the Virgin Islands but I'd lost my partner in mischief and it felt hollow at times. Aby went back to England and threw herself into her work, knowing that she had a target in mind for January - America. I kept it casual, but in my head I knew I had to get there. I began plotting.
I dunno why they didn't want to let me in?
With the help of Aby's friend and travel partner Annabel, whom I am so grateful to, I managed to sail from Tortola to Grenada, fly to Trinidad, camp in some bushes then fly to Miami the next day to surprise Aby. It was already such a hair-brained scheme that nothing even went amiss! Well, not quite anyway. I had a prolonged 'discussion' in U.S. Customs due to my unemployment, laissez-faire attitude and tramp beard, but I made it through. Thank you so much Officer Aedo for helping me out!
Hire car silliness.
Bike adventures in The Everglades!
We travelled around as a trio then, in various hire cars, visited some
awesome places like Key West (most southern point of the U.S.), Charleston (epic food and wine festival, thanks
HOOCH! for the best day ever), Savannah, Nashville (home of Country music obvs), the Smokey Mountains, and New Orleans (wow). We had differing ideas for our trip though and personally the car made me feel claustrophobic and as if we were bypassing a lot. In New Orleans we decided to split and see where we ended up, Annabel heading to
California via Texas and us hanging out in N.O. for a few more days.
Hooch O'Clock baby, at Charleston.
They were the best fun people!
Alligator spotting.
We had the best time eating beignets from
Cafe du Monde (never buy their coffee mind, long story...) on the riverfront with homeless guys and 'IT' girls alike. There was an afternoon where we forgot where we were heading and lost ourselves in the street performers - a folky handsome banjo ten piece sadly with a forgettable name and a fantastic duo called
Tanya and Dorise. They were so incredible we sat on the curb with tears in our eyes and smiled along with an older couple who had bought their camp chairs with them for the afternoon! New Orleans has the best vibes of any city we've ever been to - easy going, free, non-judgemental, fun, diverse.
So there I was ready to hop onto the next train or stick my thumb out to the nearest passing car, but Aby reminded me how that might limit our opportunities to see the National Parks and all the sights we wanted. We needed something cheap, fun, accessible, with wheels and preferably a natty paint-job...
Sandy, meet our readers. Readers, meet Sandy!
After some rudimentary research at a cool shop on St Charles Avenue called
Avenue Scooters NOLA I got lucky when I visited David at
FX Motorsports and he had just the wheels for us. We kitted up with helmets, saddlebags and wobbled our way back to the hostel, thinking we were sorted... Ho ho ho!
Doug and I quickly learnt that you can buy a bike in America, you just hand over the money and it's yours. The same goes with the helmets and saddlebags. Even insurance wasn't too hard to get; only a few hours spent on the phone to various insurance companies and we were legal. The freedom of the road was finally within our reach.
Slight problem.
In our state of happiness we weren't aware that it was going to be such a problem to get a license plate. But for now, we felt awesome, zipping around the very city which epitomises freedom and fun! We thought we were invincible and damn lucky when we met two police officers on motorcycles just as we'd entered a one way street - the wrong way! They paid no attention to our missing plate and proceeded to guide us out the right way. Motorcycle escort! We'd made it into the illustrious two-wheeled club on our first day, we were certifiably cool, and the police didn't even care.
The folky ten(?) piece who rocked our world on NO streets.
Tanya and Dorise, so good we bought a CD and everything.
In hindsight we were naive and kinda dumb. NO Police Officers had better things to do than waste their time with two clueless Brits, or maybe they sensed we were having fun and didn't want to burst our bubble? I'd like to believe the latter. We were about to get a lesson in life's obstacles so we didn't need any extra trouble that day.
Foolish as we were, we weren't going to let this 'minor' legal issue defeat us. We were willing to travel anywhere in the country to get a plate, which was handy because out mettle was about to be tested. A local notary was the obvious start, right down the road from us; of course it was going to be
that easy! Nope, they'd changed their policy recently. "If you'd have been here two months ago sure we'd have given you a plate"... But not now, not ever. Helpful.
The nice lady in the Department of Motor Vehicles office in New Orleans practically laughed in our faces when we suggested getting a plate with just a UK driving license and passport. And so began the ridiculous, cyclical nature of car registration in America. You can't have a plate unless you have a Louisiana driving license, you can't have a LA driving license until you get a state I.D., you can't have one of them unless you're a U.S. citizen and you can't become one of them ever! Oh, and you need a permanent US address.
So there we were, two Brits with a crazy idea to ride a scooter across the country, and we were stuck running round and round in circles with the DMV in Louisiana. A nice lady in a different office mentioned trying a slightly less official-looking notary round the corner, as perhaps they could "find another route", and because of people like her trying to help us we never gave up. In fact for a while it was fun, scooting around, not getting caught and getting laughed at by strangers in motoring offices. We were the crazy kids people enjoyed talking and were sad when they couldn't help us out.
Eventually though, the fun ran out after one particularly blunt encounter when we were told to "sell the bike back, it's a ridiculous idea, no one in the entire States will give you a plate". It was a headache and we went back to FX Motorsports evermore desperate, our haven of free WiFi and phone calls, to pick everyone's brains. Perhaps David the owner could 'buy' the bike back, insure it in his name and then we could 'borrow' it. There was no way we were selling it back for real though, that negative ninny at the DMV was not going to win this fight! It was too risky to do it that way however, because if we had an accident then David could be liable for manslaughter or at least have to pay our parking tickets, neither of which were fair on him. We kept looking.
We stayed in that garage for an entire day, called Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, South Dakota (who apparently gave plates away like free candy!) and no one would help us. Then David's colleague mentioned Florida and the sentence: "...Pretty much guaranteed to get a plate there..." and we were on the phone and out the door in an instant. Florida wasn't our favourite place thus far because of the lack of mountains and walking opportunities, yet here it was, potentially saving our bottoms.
The Louisiana Bayou at sunset - beautiful, and buggy.
Onto the trusty scooter for the three hundred mile journey to Pensacola, the closest point in Florida. Our first stop along the journey was for dinner in the Bayou, still New Orleans apparently but worlds apart. This was small town NO - Hi-Tide Bar and Grill was a local's place and they were super interested in these two Brits who had just landed there unexpectedly. We chatted, we laughed and we drank some beer. We (Doug) also managed to run the scooter battery down by leaving the lights on, whilst we were inside. Another Doug, we'll call him Doug senior, a construction worker originally from Arkansas, helped fix our bike and we were on our way again. We're so grateful to these guys for showing us a bit of the Bayou lifestyle, for their great accents and for helping us enjoy the journey.
After making it through the bug massacre that ensues after dark in the Bayou area, we stopped along the Gulf coast and camped on some land which was up for sale on the beachfront. We figured nobody needed it more than us for that one night. We woke the next morning to an epic thunderstorm, and hadn't experienced rain on the bike yet so this new 'thing' was a novelty. Once the novelty had worn off we bundled ourselves into
a coffeehouse about ten miles down the road in Pass Christian and enjoyed the sea views from our cozy spot. They had books, coffee and English scones - we were thrilled!
We made it to Mobile that day after an interesting drive over many bridges and treated ourselves to a motel room. All this time and all these miles and we still hadn't been stopped by the Police, and we'd seen plenty of them. The idea of bypassing the law and starting our road-trip proper became more and more appealing in that motel room. Then Gloria happened!
Gloria from the Pensacola DMV told us the very next day, at 4pm on a Friday afternoon, that we could get a plate if we came back on Monday morning with a Florida address. The fact that she'd already said "Impossible!" several times and basically called us idiots didn't matter. Slightly scary and condescending Gloria was a goddess! Our naivety, stupidity and unwavering optimism had won! We finally had our ticket to freedom, well on Monday anyway. We had to wait until Monday because, you know, now would have been too easy.
So what does a young couple do with time to kill on the Gulf Coast? Hit the beach, obviously. Maybe our lives weren't so bad after all.
