Pikes and Longs Peaks, Colorado

Pikes & Longs Peaks, Colorado (22-26 August 2007)

I've been on a few adventures since coming to the US, but my latest effort over the 22nd - 26th August surpasses everything that I've ever done as far as challenge and adventure goes. Myself, Todd and 3 more friends of his from Denver set out to climb a fourteener in the Rocky Mountains. The term 'fourteener' is given to Colorado's highest mountains, those that are over 14 000' in elevation, and the one we attempted was Longs Peak.

It had been on the cards for a few months, since back in April when Todd first discussed climbing a mountain in Colorado sometime during the summer. When the date was finally set, we began training a month out, but our objective was only agreed to by everyone in the second last week. I'd been speaking to Bill at work, one of the bosses who had done Longs Peak by the Cable Route in winter as well as several other fourteeners, and he gave me a book where I found Longs Peak. What attracted me to Longs was the obvious range of attractions along the hike, with lakes, ridges and amphitheatres. I was unaware of its true difficulty though, and its history, someone dies on Longs Peak every year, and Todd's mates in Denver had heard stories, and warned us that it was gonna be tough. Todd also has a bad back at the moment with some turned vertebrae probably from wakeboarding, and is in therapy, so his family was persistently trying to discourage us from doing anything hard. But as I said to Todd, we weren't getting any younger, so Longs Peak we all eventually agreed to.

So, I got to running. It was more of a fun training scheme than strict, when I felt like it I would usually run, i'm guessing 5km from Todd's house, the long way through the neighbourhood, then north over Lindsey St towards a college apartment block which backed onto a green strip with a creek. I usually ran at 9:30pm at night when it had cooled from blazing hot high 90's to simmering, and running through the half-mile green strip to the sound of crickets and random bright orange flashes of lightning bugs was almost as good as running down Miami beach back home to the sound of the surf with the moon rising over the ocean. Except for an added plus, when groups of college girls were out on their balconies above the park, and they thought I couldn't hear them.

The East Longs Peak trail via the Keyhole, easiest of the various options, is a lengthy 16 mile (25.7km) return trip, with 4 845' of vertical gain in the range of 9 410' from the trail head to the 14 225' summit of Colorado's 15th highest peak. Camping options are numerous but crowded at this time of year, with spots at the trail head, a couple of km up the trail in the Goblin Forest, or up near 13 000' in the Boulder Field. Originally I liked the idea of camping along the trail, to take some of the endurance out of the hike, but it would require all of us to have appropriate light camping gear, so the plan was camp at the trail head, and get up early.

So on Wednesday, Todd and I jumped on a Frontier airlines flight from OKC to Denver, and encountered awesome storms on the way, which we had to fly between. We skirted the east side of a huge storm through grey gloom for a while, but then suddenly we came into brilliant sunset twilight, flying in clear air between the base clouds and the anvil top, with the core flashing with lightning out my window, and a near full moon to top it off.

We stayed with Todd's sister and brother in law, Shelly and Tony Wahl, in Golden, a suburb of Denver. They have a lovely daughter Abby who is nearly 4 and baby Luke who isn't 1 yet. Wednesday night I slept in the basement bedroom that has two ground level windows, and in the middle of the night a storm hit us, with one colossal crash of thunder that woke everyone up. I remember waking to the flash and crash of thunder at the same time, Todd said he sat bolt upright in bed braced like he was ready for a fight. The lightning was almost constant and it hailed, making loud clanging noises on the grates that protected my windows. Maybe it's something about Denver being so high that cloud to ground lightning is easier, coz that was not a normal storm, yet Tony and Shelly seemed used to it, and Abby & Luke didn't even wake apparently.

So Thursday, Todd and I set out in Shelly's Camry for Pikes Peak down near Colorado Springs. Pikes Peak is the most famous of Colorado's fourteeners, home of the Race To The Clouds, the only fourteener where you can drive to the summit, and the easternmost of all the fourteeners being the first mountain clearly visible as one approaches from the east. Stopping in Manitou Springs to get Subway for lunch, Todd and I drove up through Cascade to Pikes Peak Highway, paid the $10 per person toll and headed up the awesome 13 mile drive to the top. Part way up the weather cleared to almost cloudless sky, typical of the fast changing conditions in the Rockies.

This was my test for altitude, as before then, the highest I had ever been was climbing to the summit of Mt Ngauruhoe, a volcano in New Zealand at 7516' (2291m), which everyone here laughs at; I had no idea what thin air was! I was about to go almost twice as high. The body's fitness level has little bearing on its ability to cope in thin air, and while living at altitude can help, ultimately it is the luck of the draw as to whether your body's physiology can adapt to handle it. Turns out I was fine, while Todd began to feel a little off after a while at the summit. It was spectacular being so high above the clouds, like being in an aeroplane but walking around in the crisp wind and seeing a full field of view instead of looking out a tiny window.

The drive down was even more spectacular than heading up, as the road at several points seemed to be on the edge of the world. At a section of roadworks on an exposed slope, one dude was driving heavy machinery that compressed loose gravel and dirt on the wall of the road, and he had to follow the crooked road edge driving consistently within a foot of the steep slope dropping away hundreds of feet to the side! That night we met up with James & Britney, Todd's childhood mate who is now married and living in south Denver, and we ate at the Cheesecake Factory. When I exclaimed at the monstrous foot high mud cakes for sale at the entrance, Todd saw James' puzzled look and explained that I do that all the time, at things that are just normal to them.

Friday we had a lazy morning, playing with Abby & Luke until James drove up and Tony finished work. Then after lunch we packed our camping gear & day packs and headed north and west into the Rocky Mountains for the Longs Peak camping grounds. That drive was also very scenic, and while we were still out on the plains we could easily see Longs Peak towering above all the other mountains around it. Arriving at the trail head, we could see it was busy, and went to visit the Ranger Station for news on the trail. It didn't look good, the Park Ranger said a heavy storm had come through thurs night and had left the region beyond the Keyhole (south west face) fraught with black ice. Nobody had summited that day, and the chances of the ice melting in time for a summit attempt the next day were slim. Perplexed at possibly being denied the summit, we were further disheartened when the trail head camping spots were all taken. We had to back track a couple miles to the next camping ground, and eventually found a clear spot there.

After setting up camp, our 5th person Michael joined us from finishing work in Denver, and while I grilled Brautwurst sausages on the fire and watched Tony, Todd and James play horseshoes, I thought of how cool it was that I was finally camping in the Rocky Mountains. The Rockies and Yosemite are the two places I wanted to camp most in the world, except I couldn't flip the top off a bottle of beer for happy hour because we were so focused on hydrating to acclimatize and reduce our risk of altitude sickness. After a simple dinner of sausages and bread and water we cleaned up camp ready for a quick getaway at 3:30am the next morning.

I don't think I slept at all during the night, and it wasn't because I used my jumper wrapped around my backpack as a pillow; that was quite comfy. I guess it was just the anticipation and excitement about the next day. By 3am the campground was filled with voices and cars being packed and driven off, and even traffic could be heard on the road outside the grounds! After forever, a light came on in our tent and I saw Todd's face squinting at his phone. I asked 'what's the time?' he said '3:24, 6 minutes. Ah might as well get up'. We were all awake anyway. I had slept in my clothes, packed up my sleeping gear and went for breakfast, where I hunted around for my yoghurts, then remembered I had forgotten to pack a spoon, borrowed a spoon off Michael, then found I had left the yoghurts back in the fridge at Shelly's. Gave the spoon back to Michael and had 2 bananas and some chocolate instead.

We packed the tent and headed back up the road to the trail head, where to our astonishment, cars were parked in a line by the side of the road hundreds of metres from the trail head carpark! We drove up anyway, only to find the place was packed with cars and people getting ready, so we headed back, and to me it really sucked coz we would have to hike half a k uphill before we even started our 16 mile day! As we walked up the road, Tony set a freaking quick pace and Todd joked about being exhausted already. I remembered Todd had never seen the Milky Way, which was clearly visible straight above us, so I pointed it out to him. Micheal signed our group into the book at the trail head showing who is on the mountain and we set off through the pine forest.

You cover good ground when it's dark and the only thing to look at is the spot of light cast by your headlamp, and soon the forest was thinning out into smaller trees as the rays of dawn crept over the mountains to the east. It seemed to me to take forever for dawn to come, but we made the ridge to where the Diamond Face and the Chasm is visible just as dawn broke, perfect timing! After shooting some fantastic panoramas, while some of our group went to the toilet on the precariously perched pit loo on the ridge, we made for the boulder field. For the next several hours, it was an arduous haul into increasingly windy and thin air. Since before dawn from the treeline we were subjected to 30-50mph winds, with gusts that would blow you off balance as you plodded on step after step. I got winded quickly and let almost a litre of water out of my backpack, and handed the stack of 6 bananas off to Todd, as my pack was too heavy for the pace.

6 hours later we had made the Boulder Field and were staring up at the Keyhole, an obvious notch in the ridge at the top of a steep boulder climb. By this stage both my knees were hurting on the muscle tendons underneath used for lifting my body, and this condition caused me to be the slowest in the group, as pain had overcome exertion to be the main reason for how often I stopped. I'd been afflicted by the same symptoms the last two times I'd climbed any elevation, at Mt. Ngauruhoe and Mt. Warning, and while I expected knee pain it was worse than before, and incredibly frustrating. The Keyhole, as spectacular as it was with a jagged granite overhang, is the focal point of the infamous winds for that side of the mountain. Climbing towards it on the lee side, you would catch the occasional gust or calm moment, but ever-present was the noise of wind through the rocks above, and it wasn't like the high-pitched whir of wind through a partially opened window, but a deeper shearing noise. I caught some footage of that noise on a video of my camera and uploaded it to YouTube, if you persevere, it is clearly audible in the last 10 seconds:



Entering the Keyhole entailed a blast of chill wind that assaulted your balance, pushed you into the rocks, and made it seem difficult to breathe. Perhaps the most foolish decision I made that day was to still have shorts on at this point, and within 30 seconds I was shivering. The second most foolish decision was to perch myself in the middle of the Keyhole, remove a glove, pull out the camera & attempt to shoot a panorama of the spectacular valley before me. I had to focus to stop shivering and hold the camera steady when shooting, and by the time I finished my face and hand felt numb and I was shuddering more than I ever had in my life. Somehow I lost the glove, probably blew out of my numb hand on a gust of wind, Todd came back to assist and said I looked shaky and pale, but they'd heard people had been going on to the summit, and they were going to press on too. He gave me his spare set of windproof pants which I put on, and initially I resolved to go with them, but after 50m my balance felt terrible with my shivering, my ungloved hand was numb which isn't good for climbing rocks, and I knew I would hold them up. So I told him to go on and I'd remain at the Boulder Field. He gave me the other walkie talkie, and then asked to borrow my camera. I knew Tony had a camera and he was still going, so I told Todd I wanted to take more photos from the Boulder Field, and maybe go back and head up the Chasm.

I took some more photos of him setting off towards the Trough Couloir, the spot where climbers are at greatest risk from falling rocks. I then headed back through the Keyhole and ducked into the Keyhole hut, impressively made of rock and mortar, and sat down to chat with a few other hikers including two guys decked out in full mountaineering gear helmets and all, who had just returned from the summit. After 5 mins, I happened to look out the narrow doorway and saw Tony just below scanning the Boulder Field below looking for me! I called him in out of the wind and we ate some food. People from all over the world are on this hike at any given time, and we had US, English and Irish men and women in the hut at various times. Longs Peak dominated the conversation, with people exclaiming how no guide or reading materials came close to describing the difficulty and exposure beyond the Keyhole. There were also discussions of other Fourteeners and Everest, especially about the book I had read called Into Thin Air about the Everest climbing disaster in 1996.

It took me 20mins to stop shivering, then after a while Tony & I headed down to the Boulder Field. After some time more at the base of the North Face cliff we started heading back intending to go up the Chasm, when my walkie talkie started beeping. Todd had made the summit at 12:05pm and was calling me, and once he had worked out which side of the summit to walk to, we held a crystal clear conversation with him, and I took photos of him, James and Michael on the summit. They had no cameras because Tony had turned back without giving them his, so my photos are all the proof they had, other than writing their names into the Longs Peak summit book. Todd later found someone's website detailing some striking photographs of the territory beyond the Keyhole, including places like the Trough, the Narrows, the Chockstone, the Home Stretch and the Summit. These photos are at http://www.pbase.com/rianhouston/longspeak.

I told Todd our plans for the Chasm and we arranged to rendezvous at the trail fork where we stopped for sunrise. After a long way down, and a lot of knee pain as lowering myself over rocks was as bad as lifting, Tony & I reached the trail fork and started up the Chasm. I knew it was going to be good, but as we rounded the bend and descended to the valley along the steep edge of a rocky slope, I was stunned. After being in blasting wind all day since before dawn, above the timberline where only hardy tufts of grass and moss grew amongst the granite boulders, the feel of the soft breeze and warm afternoon sun, the sound of waterfalls, and sight of lush green grass and shrubs was like stepping into another world. The crystal clear waters of 'Roaring Fork Creek' flowed under a natural bridge above the waterfall, and I had an idea to use my camera's waterproof capability to dip it partially in the stream and take a photo up the Chasm towards the Diamond Face. I had to guess where I was shooting, and got Tony to tell me how far to dip it in the water, but the resulting photo was by far the best I had ever taken.

One last struggle up the slopes of the higher waterfall revealed the stunning Chasm Lake, at the base of the enormous sheer cliff of the Diamond Face, and at the end of the amphitheatre. After shooting more experimental panoramas where I did my first two-level sequence to take in the cliffs towering above me, I decided to atone for my failure to summit by going for a swim, and at an elevation of 11 800', Chasm Lake is frozen over in winter months, and I doubt I will ever swim at a higher altitude. The swim was brief :) and I have video footage of it on YouTube here :



We headed back down and made it back 5 mins before Todd and Michael, which was perfect timing. James had legged it down over an hour earlier and fallen asleep at the trail fork, while Todd waited and assisted Michael who had begun to suffer altitude sickness symptoms of nausea after 25 mins on the summit; they had taken 2 hours to get back to the Keyhole. Apparently Michael gets sick every time he goes over 12 000' despite having climbed 4 or 5 fourteeners. So we all started down again, talking and laughing non-stop about the day, how starting off at dawn felt like at least 2 days ago, how crazy the Trough, Narrows, Homestretch and Chasm Lake was, how sore we were, how nobody would climb a fourteener ever again, how good dinner would be, how great a shower would be and how awesome bed will be. As we got back below the timberline into the pine forests, we started making free bets as to how much further we had to go. I was the skeptic, coz I knew the first dark hours of pre-dawn was deceiving for how much distance you actually cover, and when Todd guessed 15 mins and I guessed at least 25 he groaned, not wanting to believe it. 40mins later we were still going down, and took another bet, this time Todd said 10mins and I said 15, and after 15mins Todd was leading and passed a sign, where he yelled in dismay "Half a mile to the Ranger Station!?". Finally, we got down at 6pm and Michael signed us out of the book, completing 14 hours on the mountain, over 16 miles and 5000' of vertical gain, and the craziest climbing experience any of us had ever had.

Tony, with good intention, took the shorter road home, which proved a mistake as it was almost constantly winding and turning and Todd got motion sickness. Todd eventually took over driving and had to fight nausea and tiredness on the way back to Denver, where dinner was waiting upon arrival. To my absolute torture, my clothes and gear was of course in the basement, and the stairs down left me breathless with pain much to Todd's amusement. But I got mine back later when I was stretching out in bed, laughing as I heard Todd's voice come down the stairs explaining to Shelly "Why is the baby crying? I don't know, that's just what babies do, they cry for no reason." Abby wanted to play, and so uncle Todd had to stay up and play, while I fell into glorious sleep.

Photos from the trip have been uploaded to Picasa, feel free to have a look at them by clicking below. Also note that both the YouTube videos and the Picasa Album have been mapped, so feel free to have a look at Longs Peak in Google Maps from the mapping links.

Pikes & Longs Peaks, Colorado (22-26 August 2007)

Austin, Texas, and floating

On the weekend of the 13th-15th of July, I headed down to Austin, Texas to meet up with Jessi who had recently moved there temporarily while she looks for work in Germany. It was a fun-filled weekend, where I was introduced to a favourite sport among the locals.. Toobing!

I had initial plans to go to the Schlitterbahn Water Park in New Braunfels, which is apparently the biggest and best water park in the US. But the word on the street was that the big kid's Schlitterbahn was floating the Guadelupe river (one of many), which involves lots of young people, sun, skin, alcohol and no queues. The lure of hydro-coasters and surf chutes and waterslides was strong, but finally I was convinced.

Saturday morning was stormy but everyone was keen to go, and from when we arrived at midday, loaded with cans of various beers and pre-mixed drinks and margaritas, the weather was fining up. I quickly got the impression that it was rather popular, by the dozens and dozens of people walking around in swimwear and the big warehouse with hundreds of truck inner tubes stacked to the ceiling. $20 got you a tube, with or without a wooden board lashed to the bottom, a bus trip back from the finish, and a tube with a bottom for a cooler and a mesh bag for rubbish.

The river was huge, it reminded me of the Logan Creek at Big Riggen that I floated down on tubes as a kid, only about 20 times the scale. It is fed by a freshwater aquifer that is 68F (20C) all year round, perfectly refreshing on a hot summer day. After the initial traffic jam on the shores while everyone got into the water and into groups, we were off. It was just minutes before we hit the first set of rapids, which turned out to be the most severe of the whole trip!

If you can imagine a scene of absolute chaos, Jessi flipped and scrambled for her tube, I got dunked but stayed upright, the sound of rushing water, everywhere people were calling out, trying to re-group, swimming around to pick up tubes, hats, thongs. There were unopened cans of beer floating down the river at a rate of one every 10 seconds because some poor person had upended their cooler tube, the contents emptying into the river. We lost the contents of the smaller of our two coolers, thank god because my Jimmys were in the big one, and I'd already dropped mine (which sank!) because I was paddling about retrieving 4 other beers that were floating past!

After we re-grouped and resumed drinking, floating in the cool water in the hot afternoon sun through the lush green countryside, it was right up there with some of my most favourite experiences. My waterproof camera drew a fair bit of attention, I had it strapped to my rip cord which was strapped to my key cord in my pocket. So many funny things happen on the river. Jessi was scared of the fearsome snapping turtles (I saw at least a half dozen of them), while she squealed and scrambled to lift her butt out of the water she tried to convince everyone that they could bite your finger off. Some guys had a blow up doll. Others had waterproof speakers. We had to drink from our unnatural hand, if someone spotted you using the other hand they'd cry 'buffalo!' and you'd have to skull/chug the rest. I asked 'why Buffalo? What's that go to do with drinking, or using the wrong hand?' I was missing the point, you could say anything, Buffalo was a country thing. I was in Texas, after all. Guys were doing flips and jumping off a rope swing, I saw two guys with their heads split open, cuts that definitely needed stitches coz they banged their head on a rock. And then with each set of rapids, protect the cooler! Eric and I were ready to put our bodies on the line to save our remaining drinks, only he got swept down the main rapid while I got swept in another direction, the cooler nearly went on its side but he held it down with one hand, the other holding his hat, legs in the air with a classic 'oh sh$!' look on his face. It was legendary.

By the end, several rapids and 4 hours of drinking later, we were all thoroughly plastered, and the last rapid ends quickly and you have to get to the side before you get swept under a low bridge. A girl had drowned under the bridge the day before, and so event organisers sat on the bridge instructing wayward floaters how to safely go under, and cops were walking about. Other staff lugged around 5ft tall bags full of empty cans. I didn't notice until later the little slashes I'd inflicted on my foot. We piled aboard the old school bus that was our ride back to the start, and off we went, at a blistering pace of 15mph, driver had a cowboy hat on, Texas country music blaring, non-stop chatter and shouting, and I thought to myself 'hmm, I'm definitely in Texas.'

Apart from the river float, Austin was absolutely beautiful, with neighbourhoods the likes of which I'd never seen, hands down the best place to live that I've seen since coming to the states. Jessi, her brother Eric and his partner Ali, and their friends made me wanting to stay, and the 6 hour drive back to Todd's house and my home was not as exciting as it usually is.

I have made my first web album of photos with Google's Picasa, which is awesome by the way, and I'm going to use it to share all of my photos from now on. The link for Austin pix is below.

Austin, Texas (13-15 July 2007)

Oklahoma D-Day 2007

For those who want to skip my little story (u slackers) and just check out the photos and videos, go ahead and click the link below.

D-Day, Wyandotte, Oklahoma (7-10 June 2007)

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=dineroseguro

A few weeks ago, at the end of May, I was on the net searching for 4WD destinations within Oklahoma, looking for an easy trail to christen my Jeep. There's not very much, one hit finally claimed to have trails, but off-roading wasn't the main attraction of the place. Called the D-Day Adventure Park, it hosts an annual event named Oklahoma D-Day, which claims to be the largest paintball event in the world. Intrigued I read on, and learnt of how it's classed as 'woods' scenario paintball, with Allies vs Germans in a re-creation of the battles of D-Day 1944 in Normandy. I then noticed with a shock that the start date was less than a week away! June 4th to 10th, it's a week long event with a series of scenarios and skirmishes, including a night game, culminating in the day-long battle of D-Day involving 4000 players!

My other plans for the night went out the window as I read through the facts, history and discussion forums, all the while forming a plan to go, as it was guaranteed to be an experience unlike any other, and it was the 10th anniversary of the event. I found a forum post from a guy named Patrick from Indiana, who had 3 friends drop out recently and was selling cheap tickets. Online registration was ending the next day, and the ticket price of $65 was about to go up to $110. I told Todd, asked him to pass it onto his mates, next day I told a bunch of people at work, the original plan was to go just to the night game taking place the following thursday night. I emailed & left a voice message for Patrick letting him know I was keen for those tickets. Only my work neighbour Kevin actually committed, being too expensive or short-notice for everybody else, and late that night Patrick called me back and I had the tickets for $35 each. Unfortunately, wednesday morning Kevin broke his thumb in an accident at his rowing club when he was moving a boat rack. So plans changed, and I ended up getting my boss to agree to giving me friday off, and I would go solo staying from thursday right through to sunday.

During the remaining days up to thursday I was hunting for gear, I went all the way to Del City (20 miles) in my lunchbreak only to find the army surplus store closed due to family emergency (what can you do). But in Okla city's surplus store I bought camo pants & matching jacket (even with the 552nd AGS insignia patches still sewn on), $15 each. Cheap boots from Wal-Mart for $15, borrowed an esky from Todd, a marker (paintball gun) from Nate with all the gear, and set up homemade fly screens for my Jeep as I would finally test out sleeping in the car.

Struggled through work thursday and scooted early in the arvo to haul ass up to Wyandotte in the NE corner of the state near the Missouri border and Grand Lake. That area is called Green Country, and is quite scenic, where patches of thick forest hang over the roads and rolling hills. It's the most scenic country I've seen since the plains infront of the Rocky Mountains of Colorado. I got to the D-Day park & met Patrick at the entrance, following him the short distance to the left where he was camped with the rest of Charlie company, 1st Infantry Division. Everyone was camped according to which forces they were assigned to, to improve group coordination, communication and to not disturb others with differing deployment times. I met Travis, Patrick's mate, a likeable bearded 19yr old who looked my age. All I had time to do was queue up for registration, get my blue allied hopper cover (a hopper is the paintball container attatched on top of the marker, which is the gun), watch the introduction video, jump in my camo, grab Travis' spare Tippmann 68 Carbine and head over to chrono. 'Chrono' is firing the marker through a chronograph so that it shoots paintballs at 250fps (feet per second). This was lower than the standard 285fps because the night game involved close quarters combat, sometimes point blank. After chrono, we went to the assembly area to form up with Charlie company.

I was amazed at the number of players, everyone fully decked out in battle gear vastly exceeding anything I'd ever seen at a paintball game, looking seriously fearsome. At least I looked the part, except these guys had belts strapped with pods of paintball ammo, allowing them to easily carry several hundred, even 1000 paintballs. the Allies had won the toss apparently and elected to assault a place called Coleville, the Germans defending. In the failing light, our company marched off along the road through the forest to the area on the map that represents Coleville, a large circular clearing containing concrete bunkers, tubes, and grassy trenches and mounds, with a single flagpole near a tower in the center flying the red German flag. It was very intimidating looking through my yellow visor to see all of the German forces dug in all throughout Coleville right to the outermost trenches, some barely 10m from the Allied lines! As we encircled them, exchanging humourous trash talk, I had a feeling I was jumping in the deep end. I was to find out later that the numbers were roughly 500 on 500, all contained within Coleville, less than 200m across. The stars were coming out, the night air was warm, the last twilight glow had 15mins left to live, and the German trenches crawled with silhouettes moving about. Referees stood spread out between the lines in bright fluorescent clothing that begged 'don't shoot me'. A megaphone announcement sounded 1 minute to game on, and all the movement stopped; everyone was ready. I focused on my objective, the nearest mound, left of straight ahead about 15m away...

Game on was an explosion of sound, the combined noise of overhead fireworks, booming concussion explosions, shouting, the rumble of soft thudding boots running on grass, and an amazing crackle of gunfire. I could hear my breathing inside my mask as I sprinted with a couple dozen allies for the mound and half-dove to the ground behind it, those who didn't fit lay flat on the ground behind. I lost Patrick and Travis within the first minute and didn't see them for the rest of the game. The sound of gunfire was constant until the last glow of twilight had gone, and then it reduced to sporadic popping and short bursts. During the dark, quieter periods, troops strategised, grouped and made advances. You couldn't see much beyond the nearest 5-10m. But every few minutes, the organisers would fire off some kind of pyrotechnics, the best of which were flares. Suddenly a whizzing orange light would shoot up from the forest line high into the air to the windward side of Coleville, and people would start shouting "Flare, Flare!" as a sign to either get ready to shoot, or take cover. The flare would fly 100m high I guess, and then there'd be a pop (parachute deployed) and then gradually over about 5 seconds, an eerie orange glow illuminated everything and everyone around you. Every single flare was the trigger for a massive firefight that would last a minute until the flare burned out, and the scene would reduce back to darkness, the gunfire reducing again to bursts and pops shortly afterwards. Travis later told me he was in the middle of crawling prone on the ground between trenches when a flare went off, and he just laid still and somehow wasn't seen (or shot). It sure was a spectacle, on a couple of occasions I stayed behind cover and simply watched, as a flare began burning and illuminated dozens of allied players all laying on the ground around me, half of them shooting like crazy, some of them getting shot with blotches of orange paint, turning and raising their gun in the air and getting quickly out of the line of fire. The din of gunfire was as if you filled a microwave with popcorn and turned it on, multiplied by 100x. Paintballs whizzed through the grass just above my head, and dozens more spattered on the concrete tube just above & next to me where a couple of Allies hid behind, leaning out to shoot briefly before pulling their bodies back and drawing heavy fire.

I heard a few good stories later about the gameplay, apparently a lone German came from the side upon a trench full of unsuspecting Allies in the dark, and after asking them if they were Allies, he ran along the trench barrel tagging about 8 players before someone shot him. A barrel tag is where, in extreme close quarters (ie. next to each other), instead of shooting at point blank, you either demand surrender or you touch the opponent with your gun. Patrick also told me he was involved in probably the biggest Allied push of the night towards the flagpole near the end of the game, and he ran and jumped and touched the flag, but got 'lit up' (slang for being shot several times) by the surrounding Germans. I got shot a couple of times, resulting in trips to the 'Dead Zone' where dead people wait until every quarter hour a field commander regrouped everyone and marched them back out to re-insert into battle. After an hour of play, a fierce storm with constant lightning had been approaching from the south, adding to the amazing atmosphere as flashes of lightning mixed with fireworks. But before the Allies could take the flagpole, drop the red and raise the blue flag, the game was called 45mins early on account of the impending severe storm, so the Germans won one of their few victories of the event.

It turned out to be one hell of a stormy night. Half of the campers had left earlier in the day ditching the night game, booking out motels for miles around, as everyone had advance warning throughout the day. Those who remained (the better half) were told by organisers on the PA to secure all their gear and take cover in their 've-hicles'. I'd barely had enough time to walk back, snap some lightning pics and change when the first storm hit. What's funny was the boys had put together a neat pile of wood and were attempting to light a big fire, squirting something flammable onto it just as the first gusts of wind blew through. It lifted all this dust from the road and I rushed to close my car doors and jump inside, and then the rain hit and the guys went scrambling for their cars and the fire was out in seconds. I ate dinner (trail mix sandwiches) safe inside while outside it all went pretty nuts for about 10mins. Then it was over, organisers drove around announcing it was over (duh), and said there was a 'slight chance of some more rain but the worst had gone'. I was woken up at about 12:30am by a second, even bigger storm, with constant lightning, wind rocking the car and rain lashing the sides. I could see, with each flash of lightning, the big-top in the center of the grounds waving about wildly, directly upwind of me. Then my phone rang and it was Jessi, she was out clubbing and had seen a tornado warning issued for my county and called to see whether I was in the storm. I said 'yeah, im pretty sure we're in it' as the wind gusted in a circle around my car so rain lashed the left side, then paused, then the right side. I spoke to her for a while and watched the tents around me being blown flat by gusts of wind, and while I was glad I was sleeping in the Jeep, it was tense watching that big top, for if it blew apart, who knows what destruction it would cause for the tents all around me.

Finally, it was all over, and I heard raised voices, some dude was complaining loudly and swearing about all his gear being soaked. I was thinking about telling him to give it a rest when he yelled 'nobody told me I was in the f%&$#ng amphibious unit!' I laughed out loud in my car and greatly lifted my opinion of him, and found out the next day it was actually Travis! Yeah, the next day I woke up, and people were laying all of their gear out in the sun, some tents had collapsed, and news was getting around that there had actually been a tornado a few miles away approaching Wyandotte, but it'd dissipated before it hit any inhabited areas. It was the second time in the 10yr history of Okla D-Day that a tornado was reported in the vicinity during the event. One family came back and opened their tent to find ankle deep water filling the downhill half of their floor.

So friday was basically about cleanup, gearing up for the next day's game, and the parade. I bought my case of paintballs, $65 for 2000 rounds, carried as 4 tickets that you swapped for 500 round bags. I also picked up a belt that held 5 pods, and bought 5 pods, all for $14! I also had to buy a barrel condom for safety (incase my gun accidentally went off). There were amazing guns for sale, ranging from $25 to $1300+, and a ridiculous range of accessories, the paintball market is huge in the USA. After lunch there was some entertainment, rumour got around the camp like wildfire that there was a dance-off going on. Sure enough a huge crowd was gathered around 2 pairs of girls and 2 pairs of guys, dancing for some prize. Two teenage girls in hot pants were trying to out-do two 21yr old girls decked out in camo and khaki, while two guys were drawing laughs from the crowd with silly antics and the other two guys basically sucked. The crowd was 99% male so you can imagine the calls and comments being made. The organiser had a good sense of humour, it was hot and the dance-off had been going a while, so he called for some water to hydrate the dancers, reminding everyone again of the importance of hydration which had been drilled into us all in the intro video. A big drum of water was carried out, but they poured it all over the girls instead of letting them drink it. One of the younger girls cried out 'I have white pants on!' The announcer had to cut in above the cheers of the audience, 'hydration is important, everyone please be reminded, this is a family event...' and they kept up pouring water. Patrick's camera batteries ran out in the middle of filming and he actually ran back to the car and got spares! The camo girls won as obvious audience favourites, coz they never stopped dancing.

The parade was very impressive, if you can imagine thousands of people arrayed in full battle gear, some in real military uniforms, carrying flags and banners, standing on trucks and tanks, chanting catch-crys and marching. I assembled with the rest of Charlie Company under Captain Sulley, 1st Infantry Division Charlie Company Commander. Also with us was Master Sergeant Spike, 1st Infantry Division Beach Commander, who led most of our shouts that went along the lines of 'Who are we!?' 'First I.D.!' We also marched near General Sulley Sr, Allies Omaha Beach General. The speeches were good, the owner & founder, Dewayne Convirs, talked about the history and heritage of the event, telling of why they hold it, to acknowledge the sacrifice of those in the name of freedom, and of course the patriotism, paying tribute to the American flag and the cross atop the flag flying high in the middle of the grounds.

So after turning in early, we woke up not long after dawn the next morning for 'the big game.'

It was quiet and serious when I got up, people were progressively getting up and going about getting ready. I had brekky, strapped my feet with duck tape to avoid blisters, and geared up. My kit involved: camo pants, my D-Day shirt (haha lucky I proof read my posts, I just noticed a missing 'r'), camo jacket, socks & boots, 2 water bottles in leg cargo pockets, car keys & paintball tickets in breast pocket, camera and hanky in left leg pocket, my ammo belt with 5 pods of over 500 paintballs, my hat on backwards and mask on forwards and my marker. I have no idea how much that all weighed but it was a fair bit. But as for others; I saw a kid with 4 paint grenades and 2 smoke grenades hanging off the front of his utility jacket, he was as wide with gear as he was tall. Sgt Spike was lugging around a yellow smoke canister the size of a fire extinguisher, weighing several kg, strapped over his shoulder. It contained enough smoke to blot out a huge area for 15-20 mins, probably as effective as a half dozen smoke grenades. In the Allied assembly area we witnessed combat divisions loading onto troop carriers and buses bound for Utah beach, while General Sulley gave us our pep talk.. "By lunchtime at noon, I want to be eating my sandwich on the top of Omaha beach!"

Omaha beach was to be my theatre of battle, along with the 1st I.D., and we 9 engineers of the 238th Mechanical, of Charlie Company, walked out to our staging area about 1km away. I had to laugh at one kid, I photographed him walking down surrounded by adults twice his size, he was armed to the teeth, carrying a beach ball! No doubt a sly-humoured Dad was nearby. Initially my crew and I were slotted to enter the fight on the second wave from the land-based drop 'boats', but at the last minute Capt Sulley called on the radio and needed our unit over at the water-based boat. While we were relocating, the battle started, and the forest filled with shouting and crackling gunfire. We were about the 3rd or 4th wave of reinforcements to go over the water boat, which was a wooden ferry designed just like the amphibious troop carriers seen in Saving Private Ryan, with a front ramp that dropped onto the shore. We were informed that we were invulnerable until we cleared the first trench line, then we'd enter play, and getting shot would result in up to half an hour at the dead zone. We boarded and our boat was half full, everyone huddled on knees against the sides of the boat, as we slowly ferried across the 30m pond to Omaha beach. I was filming the entire time, we approached through smoke, as we were about to land a spray of paint was coming off the front of the boat, then the ramp dropped and we ran like crazy under heavy fire to the first bunker. I jumped to the ground against a small wall barely 2 feet high protecting my camera, I got shot at least 3 times, and I got shot on my pods, my marker and my legs while I laid in that spot. I then found out that my gun wasn't shooting! Turned out it had leaked during the night and was out of gas. I had to leave the battle, extremely disappointed, and hurry off to diagnose the problem, finding the gun needed some repairs. Fortunately I ran into Patrick who gave me his car keys and I went and got Travis' Tippmann which I used on Thurs night. Upon my return, the Allies had advanced at record pace, and we were already half way up the 100ft high hill.

I'd never witnessed anything like it in my life. It was full trench warfare, you plucked up the courage to get up and run from one trench to another, every move drew enemy fire, I could see the paintballs coming at me. Once I jumped into a trench that was shin-deep with water without realising, I was so focused on getting to cover, and another time I crawled prone for 8m through mud to get a clear shooting position at the corner of a trench. You don't care. You're in the game. The biggest paintball game in the world, adrenaline pumping, sweating from every pore you've got, mud and minor injuries from jumping and crawling didn't matter, all you wanted to do was shoot the enemy. Advance, re-group, and charge. Charging was the best rush, although it resulted in me getting hit a couple times. Towards the top of the hill, the front lines widened out and became two fronts, one to left (Coleville) and the other to the right (St. Laurent). Allied forces were spread out for probably 200m, but I was in the push for Coleville.

It was hard to imagine the scale of the battle, everything I was seeing was only a fraction of what was going on, while other Allied forces fought for Utah beach to the north and Sword beach to the south, over a km away. Some members of the Allied command structure would walk around behind our front lines assessing the battle, and radio in reports to Allied command back at the campgrounds, where I found out later that there were military strategists plotting the fight on maps and directing resources. The field commanders would then gather ex-dead men who had served their timeout, give them new objectives, and re-insert them to reinforce gaps in the front line. Everywhere they went barking orders, motivating the troops, spurring them to advance or defend, and they were remarkably effective. I went through my first 500 paintballs and died and went to cash in a ticket and gas up my Marker bottle with CO2. I passed General Sulley on the way back, and heard updates about the battle and how we were setting records, then he headed off, fully geared and carrying a radio pack; he'd had enough of strategy and wanted to see some action. It was inspiring!

I ran into a few more from my outfit, and we exchanged stories. In fact, all conversations I overheard were related to the battle, about heroics, about strategy, about equipment. I discovered I'd lost a pod and couldn't carry my full payload of 500, but I brought the bag of up the hill anyway. After getting to the main Omaha hill bunker, finding the Germans were pushing us backwards (coz I wasn't there, tsk tsk), I ran into Capt Sulley. He was known to a lot of soldiers and everyone supported him and followed his orders wherever he went, he was a very effective leader. Patrick later joked to me how Sulley had just finished high school, and he was gonna find him after the game and congratulate him on graduating. I offered my spare paintballs in the bag to him and he gladly accepted. After reloading, we all came under fire from a group of advancing Germans that entered parallel trenches to the right. Eventually, we pushed them back, the Allies won the hill, and then we pushed across the open to the town of Coleville. A German tank came upon us spraying what looked like orange coloured water at our troops but amidst everyone's screams of 'Tank, Tank! Take cover!' an anti-tank crew came to our rescue & shot it with the special anti-tank paint before it did much damage. This part of the battle held another of my highlights of the day. I ran forwards on the edge of our line to where there was only 2 Allied guys putting up a hell of a fight, I guessed we were outnumbered 4 to 1. I crawled to their right and into a concrete tube, which then had another concrete tube on the end of it at a slight angle. This gave me 2 gaps in the sides to shoot out of from almost complete protection, and the end of the tube to shoot in any direction. Germans were running across a clearing on the edge of my range, but fortunately none looked into the tube (they were busy getting to cover). I was able to alternate between the cracks and the tube end, scampering back and forward in the tube on my knees, I drew fire numerous times without dying, and managed to take out 3 guys who'd shot at me, and 4 others who didn't know I was there until it was too late.

Another highlight of the day was mid-afternoon, when Allies had control of Coleville and were pushing north through forest next to St. Laurent towards the Airfield. After a big standoff across a gully in this forest, we finally got the upper hand and shot the Germans out of their foothold on the opposite edge of the forest. From there they went into chaos and retreated into the Airfield, and I was at the front of the charge. Allied forces threw at least a half-dozen smoke grenades into the clearing, and I advanced from the forest across the clearing under the cover of smoke, walking and firing toward scrambling German forces. When I drew fire, I quickly moved back behind the smoke screen, sidestepped and crouched, somehow I was lucky enough not to get shot. I'd kick the grenades further forward (they were too hot to touch) and I was at the front of the biggest advance of the day, we took 100m of ground from the forest out through the Airfield in a matter of 5-10mins, and I got some good footage.

The rest of the day was fun but otherwise not spectacular. I followed the advance all the way up to Utah beach, which we finally took in the last minutes of the game in a small skirmish. I shot my gun until it ran out of gas and wouldn't fire any more. Later I was to find out that the Allies had won a major victory, with 2400 points over the German's 1400 points, points being awarded for achieving objectives within set time limits. I'd had plenty of water, but was seriously hot in the afternoon sun and 80-something degree heat (I'm guessing 29C). I was soaked in sweat but couldn't take my mask off even after the game, while still out on the field of play. I slowly walked back up the hill toward the Airfield dead zone, several hundred metres away, and by the end I wasn't walking straight. I spent about 5 minutes fumbling the buttons of my shirt jacket while walking before I got it off. I walked through the meshed entrance, pulled my mask off for the first time in a couple hours, found a flagpole and sagged against it. I was so stuffed I couldn't bend over to sit down, I slid down the pole till I fell on my backside. I reckon I was close to collapse. I pulled my camera out and got someone to photograph me, more for my own amusement later, as I'd never felt so exhausted and hot in my life. I'd seen the event take its toll in heat stressed players throughout the day. Occasionally shouts would go out calling for ceasefire, and eventually within half a minute everyone would stop shooting while someone was evacuated either for dehydration, heat stress or injury (rolled ankles etc). I was re-inserting once when an ATV drove towards me, the masked driver with one hand on the handlebar, the other behind holding a chubby fellow upright from falling off, as his head lolled about in a state of near unconsciousness. I sat for 15mins recovering, drinking the last of my water, trying to cool off. Just about everyone had headed back by that time, so I got up & walked off again. A guy drove up with a troop carrier and called out if I wanted a lift, I declined, 'no thanks mate, I walked all the way down here, I'm gonna walk all the way back'. Probably the heat stress made me stupid but for some reason I was determined to walk back under my own steam. It was a nice walk though, got to see all behind the German lines, and where all the tanks drove about etc. Managed not to get lost, and when I got back to camp, I sat down for 20 mins with a cracking headache, took two paracetamol, moved my Jeep out of the afternoon sun into the shade, stripped to shorts and passed out in the back for an hour. I felt better when I got up, Travis & I jumped in Patrick's car and we drove off 20mins to grab dinner, then headed to a motel they knew of with a pool, and I swam in a pool for the first time since leaving home. Of course, at the motel we ran into people from the event (all motels were booked out for miles around), and exchanged stories with a few dudes from the French Resistance (a division of the Allies). We then hit Wal Mart, and Patrick and Travis were dumbfounded that I had never heard of Smores, America's most famous campfire snack, and so they grabbed marshmallows, hersheys chocolate, and crackers and some YooHoo chocolate drinks (a weird drink, like a chocolate milkshake, but there is no milk!). When we got back to camp, we joined our local 1st ID campers around the fire, I got out the laptop and loaded the day's footage and everyone crowded around...

The next morning I got up, packed, got everyone's contact details, said goodbye and headed off, having made good friends with Patrick and Travis, who have decided they are coming to Australia and out to Skirmish at Mudgeeraba and the three of us will take on whoever's there and show those bogans how to play real paintball.

I headed off, but not straight home; I had to detour briefly for a small town which was only minutes away. It was a strange hint of fate that D-Day was so close to this place, which I'd learned about shortly after coming to Oklahoma, but had no idea whether i'd be bothered making the considerable trek out to this corner of the state. My friends & family reading this would know that I come from a small cosy beachside suburb on the Gold Coast named Miami, nestled between Nobbys and North Burleigh. Well, Oklahoma also has a small country town that goes by the name Miami! But these Okies, they don't pronounce it Miami, it's Mi-am-uhh, as I was corrected. So I cruised through town & took a bunch of photos for folks back home, and wondered whether a bona-fide resident, not just a resident but a kid raised in Miami QLD Australia had ever been to Miami Oklahoma. I stood outside the Coleman theatre, Miami's claim to fame, wherein is housed the original Wurlitzer Pipe Organ, which by original I assume they mean the first. It was cool, the street intersections had a single 4-direction hanging traffic light, and I passed a community noticeboard for Miami High School. The best thing in the whole town was a budget self-advertsing sign painted on the wall of a business facing a gas station, which simply read 'Stuff N Things'. I saw that, and approvingly thought 'these Okie Miami locals are alright', before jumping back in the Jeep, onto the Interstate and back to Norman.

And that was my adventure to Oklahoma's North East and the world's largest paintball event, I guess I'm a veteran of sorts, and am I ever stoked that I discovered it by chance. Full credit to Dewayne Convirs and his hard working crew and supporting sponsors who put the show on every year in an awesome display of planning and organisation. And more importantly, an enormous thank you to Patrick, Travis, Nate and the other fellas who lended me equipment and time, without you all I wouldn't have been able to do it.

My photos and videos of Oklahoma D-Day 2007 have been posted here :

D-Day, Wyandotte, Oklahoma (7-10 June 2007)

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=dineroseguro

Volunteering to help Greensburg, KS

Greensburg, Kansas (13 May 2007)

The period of May 4 - 6 2007 saw a tornado outbreak in the US Midwest, one of the most significant outbreaks in recent history. Leading up to the evening of May 4, according to information compiled in Wikipedia on the event, tornado watches were in effect across much of the midwest states. At 8:35pm the first of several Kansas counties were put on tornado alert ahead of a strong supercell thunderstorm. At 9:30pm, storm chasers reported the formation of a tornado to the southwest of Greensburg, a country town with a population of over 1500 which had been on tornado alert for about 20 minutes. At this stage the main tornado also had several satellite tornadoes, and over the next several minutes, grew to an estimated half mile wide, prompting the National Weather Service in Dodge City to issue a rare tornado emergency, the highest alert possible intended for extremely life threatening situations with a large tornado approaching a population center.

At 9:38pm, the tornado, now over a mile and a half wide with estimated winds of 205 mph (330 kmph), hit Greensburg dead-center and proceeded to destroy the town for several minutes. It continued to strengthen as it left the town perimeter, and by the time it dissipated, it left a legacy of a destruction path 22 miles (35 km) long and 1.7 miles in diameter at its widest, 10 dead, 60 injured, and 95% of the town in ruins. Damage assessment the following day prompted the president to declare Kiowa County a disaster zone and the tornado was given an EF5 rating, the first level 5 event since the new EF scale was introduced this year, and the only 5 to have occurred since the infamous May 3 1999 tornado in Moore.

In the aftermath of the tornado the town was completely evacuated within hours as there was no safety from the continuing storms. An hour later and just 20 miles away a second, even bigger but slightly less powerful EF3 tornado 2 miles wide killed a policeman, and the following day another fatality from a 2 mile wide EF3 tornado occurred near Stafford. Some looting occurred in Greensburg and a dusk-till-dawn curfew was imposed, and storms and rain continued to lash the region for several days. The rain soaked the wreckage, and much of what survived the tornado was then flooded or water logged.

Greensburg is 285 miles from where I live in Norman, and during the week I was seriously contemplating heading up there to help out in what was sure to be a huge relief mission. After discussing it with a few people, who mostly thought I was crazy and not serious about driving all that way, one of my friends Mandy (who wants to be a firefighter) was the only person crazy enough to join me. Saturday night I gassed up the Jeep & packed some gear, while Mandy was out clubbing, and went to sleep wondering about what I was going to see the next day. At 5:20am I got up, trod on my sunglasses in the dark, had breakfast and headed up to pick Mandy up from her house in south Oklahoma City at 6am. I almost got in trouble when I got confused by the stupid street names changing and overshot my turnoff to her house by 50m; since it was early in the morning I backtracked the wrong way up the service road, almost got away with it until a car came around the corner and beeped at me, getting the attention of the state trooper at the adjacent gas station whom I hadn't seen before, who was filling up his patrol car and saw the whole thing. I circled through the gas station, sort of waved at him after I noticed him staring at me, he gave a half nod and turned back to his car, probably debating with himself whether or not it was too early to chase down and book a moron in a Jeep.

Driving through northern Oklahoma and southern Kansas on I-35 was great in the fine sunny morning, with fogs over fields glistening with dew and the rivers flowing rapidly as they receded from flood levels. I got hassled at a Kansas toll booth on the interstate by two lady employees who loved my accent, which Mandy thought was hilarious. Stopped for morning tea in a Kansas town where the fuel was relatively expensive but still cheaper than Australia, at $3.16 / gallon. By about 11pm we approached the main intersection of the town to the east of Greensburg, named Haviland. Police had set up a checkpoint and was redirecting traffic north to roads that bypass Greensburg. Mandy and I had a backup plan where if we were asked what our business was, if going to 'help' wasn't enough, she would bung on her best country accent and say we were going to her uncles house to clean up. We got through that checkpoint, and from then on I was on the lookout for anything unusual.

The tall concrete grain elevator which I recognised from aerial shots on the news was visible for miles around, and it marked the approach of the town. We passed a group of motorhomes, and three trucks with mobile houses on their trailers, belonging to owners maybe hoping to become the first to re-settle. A sign informed us of an AM radio station that was broadcasting disaster information, which I turned on. On the perimeter of the town, another police checkpoint was in place, and once again we had to justify our presence. But this time the officer asked what street Mandy's uncle lived in, and after a stupid pause where I looked at Mandy hoping she would say something, I said we were going to call her uncle and find out where he is, and look around. This was apparently good enough for the officer, and he tied a red band around my rear view mirror, and wished me luck. Immediately behind the checkpoint, it was all hustle & bustle. Initially there were probably a hundred cars parked in a field and a huge group of people crowded around a large marquee and walking about, probably the relief mission HQ, or some arrangement for mother's day. I thought for a moment about the mothers who would be celebrating nothing more this mother's day other than being thankful they & their loved ones are alive. I decided that could be our fallback if we couldn't find a way of helping on our own. Driving on to the next intersection, we were confronted by an incredible scene.

I have never been in a disaster zone, and the presentation of destruction around me left me awe struck. There was a bunch of trucks and heavy machinery driving around the highway, in and out of connecting streets, so I had to watch the road and could only take brief looks around me. I turned my camera on and took a bit of footage as I made my way slowly past the hub of heavy machinery work and over to a quieter part of town, and took a right northwards down a random street. I was making mental notes so as to not get lost, because I had correctly guessed long before I got to the town, that there would be no street signs left. It was a week after the event, and though the streets were cleared of debris, there otherwise appeared to be very little sign of progress. But of course, with truckloads of debris being taken away on an hourly basis every day for a week, I realise now that there probably had been loads of progress.

I drove past crumpled cars, with wheels blown out, windows shattered, roofs buckled or torn off, every panel smashed, some on their sides, some stacked on others. Around the cars were piles of rubble, and by rubble I mean the remains of houses utterly destroyed, snapped and broken timber, bright sheets of twisted tin roofing, concrete foundations exposed in places. Streets that would normally be lined with large trees in full spring bloom, now held dark trunks with all but the primary branches snapped off, stripped of bark, standing like ominous sentinels foreboding entry to the hazardous remains of their owner's properties. The naked, snapped trees are a characteristic unique to severe tornado damage, leaves get pulverised in seconds, and in the daylight for a few seconds, a tornado may appear to turn green.

Ahead, an American flag caught my attention, hanging from what looked like a snapped off power pole. I pulled over to the side of the road, turned the radio with the looping disaster information broadcast off, and went to explore a little on foot. The southerly wind, gusting to about 20 knots, kicked up dirt and light rubbish down the street to a height well over your head, so you had to shield your eyes. The sound of the relief effort was ever-present, diesel engines accelerating through the gears, and beeping from reversing trucks. You find the strangest things wandering through debris; amidst smashed chairs and tables, a butter plate undamaged, the tip of a christmas tree, blue tinsel tangled in the wreckage, some plush toys, bathroom products, chopped wood, a street sign. I walked from what was arguably one house pile to another, as no fences remained, the best way to judge properties where the houses were gone was to look for driveways.

I decided to try and hunt down some signs of impact damage, like out of the Twister movie, fence posts flying through doors and stuff. I went over to the most sturdy looking house in the immediate vicinity, which at least had straight walls and part of it's 2nd storey intact. Sure enough, I found exactly what I was looking for, a beam of wood, possibly belonging to a fence or house, rammed clean through the wall near the window, so it was wedged sticking into the room, having blasted away the surrounding wall like a 1ft wide exit wound. I hopped back down into the rubble and found my first souvenir, a small metal watch with a metal band, the links twisted and broken, the face glass gone, but the hour, minute and second hands were still intact. The face said 'HERALA 17 Jewels, Waterproof, Antimagnetic. I slipped it in my pocket just as a man called out from around the side of the house. "May I help you?"
I said "oh, we are just having a look around."
The man said "You shouldn't go in there, there's a sign out the front."
We had walked into the house from the back and hadn't seen the front of the house. From the back , you couldn't tell which way the house faced.
I explained "We're here to help out and were having a look around first."
He pointed to the side and said "Red Cross is organising the relief mission over on the highway."
We started walking out the front and Mandy was following, I explained how we'd seen that area and planned to head back there.
He paused and said "It's just, this is my house."
That came as a shock, and all I could say was "oh" as he stood there looking at his ruined home. He was perhaps in his 50's, with grey hair tied back in a pony tail, a US accent but not very country, he was tall and lean wearing glasses and a cap, in a shirt and jeans torn at the knees. Then I recovered and said "well, we would be all too happy to help you out, if this is your house, if there is anything we can do for you."
Then it was his turn to be shocked. He said "oh...well..." and thought for a few seconds "...actually yeah, I have a bunch of stuff downstairs that I need to get out and load on this trailer, boxes and crates of family stuff, you know."
I offered my hand and said "My name is Jason, this is my friend Mandy, we've come here from Norman." He introduced himself as Gary, and he started talking about the volunteers, how there had been hundreds if not thousands. He said "I'm sorry, I can't help but get a bit choked up, but the response has been incredible." He pulled Mandy and I into a hug and said "god bless you both."

From then on Gary started explaining what his immediate plans were, as he grabbed a torch out of the car and we followed him down the side of his house, through a doorway and down stairs littered with broken glass and strips of wood.The bottom of the stairs was quite dark, and the room to the right was almost pitch dark after the outside light. It was carpeted, but you couldn't really help but walk through the puddle at the bottom of the stairs to get into the room, and since Gary went walking straight through it without caring, I did too. It was a family room in the basement, and he lead us over to a joining section of rooms, and shining the torch on a cramped, little room full of boxes he said "this is where my daughter and I rode it out." He quickly explained what he needed from the room, which was piled on both sides with boxes to the roof, and said he was going to head off to try and find a structural engineer to assess the house to see if it could be saved. A sign out the front he had made had said "do not enter, do not bulldoze".

So Gary shot off and Mandy and I unloaded the boxes. She had the torch and pulled them off the shelves and stacked them out in the family room, while I took them from the family room, through the puddle, up the stairs and out to the trailer. It was only at this time that the shock of being surrounded by debris and destruction wore off and I walked about feeling 'normal', because I had a job to do. We unloaded boxes for maybe an hour and a half, Gary had a lot of stuff, and I just hoped it wasn't junk to him, coz it sure looked like it to me! Didn't take long to prove that I had the better task, it was funny hearing Mandy curse and squeal in the little soaked room when she pulled crates down where water had puddled on top of plastic lids, and this dank stinky water kept pouring over her as she lifted things. We were a bit alarmed at one point, Mandy had pulled something, and suddenly the sound of pouring water started and didn't stop. Turned out to be a false alarm, the roof wasn't about to collapse, just a crate had no lid and was full to the brim with water. It was very heavy, Mandy wasn't sure what to do with it, I said to slosh some of the water out, it's not as if any more damage could be done.

Gary came back as the trailer was almost loaded, only then did I notice that he actually didn't have a car, and was getting lifts from friends and people helping out. He loaded two massive speakers in the trailer, and helped us move some last sodden boxes, and then he asked if we could go for a ride in my car across town to the church, where he could get some bungee cords to tie down the load. So we headed off, and he started telling us about the neighbourhood, asking if we had seen the schools, he would point out where churches stood, the town used to have plenty of churches. He had owned and run an antique store, which was now rubble, but as we drove over to the church, he was waving to everyone he saw, and one fellow walked up to the car so I stopped. They knew each other, as everyone does in a little town like this, and this guy had some antique-ish things that he had nowhere to keep, and was offering them to Gary. Gary is probably on the threshold of a monopoly in a booming industry, for trinkets and antiques that have been through an EF5 tornado, I'm sure there will be a market for them! Gary gave Mandy and I a gift, which he was excited about, he gave us each a 100 year old brick from the church. I thanked him earnestly, but had serious doubts about how I would be able to continue my travels with a brick in tow. But I loaded the two bricks in the boot and changed my mind, thinking it would be a brilliant gift for my flat mate Todd ;)

Gary turned out to be a fascinating bloke, with a good story. He explained with a chuckle how a few years ago, they lived in Vegas, and his wife wanted to move out to Greensburg, for 'a better night life'. Gary's sense of humour and warm, optimistic nature made him instantly likeable. In fact, his optimism was inspiring, he talked fondly of the past, and despite everything that had happened he had grand plans for the future. His wife and son were out of town during the tornado, his wife was involved with Greensburg town marketing, and had the only known copy of the Greensburg town history with her, so it was not lost. Gary had taken his daughter and sheltered in their basement when the warning siren went off, and a short while later, the approach of the tornado was like the roar of a freight train punctuated by crashing thunder. He estimates the tornado was actually over his house for at least a minute and a half. When he emerged onto the scene of chaos, he went across the road calling out the name of the 95 year old lady who lived across the street in a house half collapsed. He called twice, with no answer. The third time he screamed out, and heard a faint reply. He cut almost all of his fingers on plate glass in a door frame trying to get to her, and managed to find her buried under broken furniture and debris. She had bad lacerations to her arm and had lost a lot of blood, and so he tied a tourniquet for her and got her out of there, and looked for a way to get help. They didn't get far on the road, as all roads were blocked with debris, but eventually they made their way out, and near the edge of town they intercepted an ambulance. She made it OK and was fortunately only one of the 60 injured and not 10 dead, quite possibly due to Gary's actions. Gary's fingers were all bandaided and he had stitches, but it didn't hinder him in lifting or anything to do with his hands, which had been working overtime during that week.

When we got back, we tied down his gear with the bungee cords, had lunch, and then he asked if I would like to do a little sightseeing. We started with his house. He said if I wanted a good shot, to follow him. He showed me the living room, where furniture removed from the wall after the storm showed the clean wall contrasting sharply with the wall spattered with dirt and mud. In fact, the entire room, roof included, and all sides were spattered to some degree, eluding to what it is like to have a 200mph breeze comng in your window. He explained how in the wedge of the tornado, all of the leaves, sticks and fine debris flying about at such speed has the effect of sand blasting. He had a 400 year old table & drawers or something which was covered in filth but otherwise undamaged. The kitchen had weird square glass blocks making up the outward wall, and miraculously they were mostly intact, which he explained was much to the disgust of his wife, as they were what she hated most in the house. We headed upstairs, and I was watching my footing closely, checking the structural integrity of the wooden staircase as Gary walked ahead, and when I got to the top, I was shocked to look up suddenly and see blue sky! Infront of me, a large hole existed where a window was, above me, no roof, to my left, a room with no roof and no walls. We turned for the master bedroom, where Gary had a 4 poster bed. I betrayed no hint of surprise when he told me that he had mirrors on the roof of the 4 poster bed, and that one of the 3 panes had lifted up, travelled across the top, down the side of the bed and underneath before shattering. This was evidenced by the fact that the pane, while shattered, was still in a rectangular shape under the bed. We walked over and stepped out his window onto the roof, and made our way along the side of the house. It was sturdy enough, and Gary had apparently already been out here on the roof before. Jumping from one sloped section of the roof to another, we climbed right up to the 2nd story at the front of the house, where a slanted 2m section of wood was all that remained of the 2nd story roof. From this point, I was higher than anything in my immediate vicinity, and level with the tallest remaining structures across town. I took a series of 26 photos for a panoramic shot, keeping a firm footing to withstand the strong southerly wind that was blowing.

Afterwards I headed back down and over to the neighbour's pile to get a photo of Gary's house and where I took the panoramic. There I found the most striking rubble-treasure yet, amidst total carnage, dark and twisted and filthy, was a bright yellow rubber ducky. I took photos of it lying on its side amongst the debris, then picked it up and put it in the back of my car for safekeeping. I'm going to give it to my future kids, and when they're old enough, I'll tell them that their ducky survived one of the strongest storms on earth. Just after I put ducky in the boot a $100 bill blew past me down the road. It was only Monopoly money though!

After lunch, which was my first ever peanut butter & jelly sandwich (not too bad), we made plans to head off. Gary had been visited by a few people who had come over when they saw him there, including the previous owner of the house. The greetings were more than simple hellos, they were more like 'it's so good to see you, glad you're OK'. It wasn't hard to see how rural communities like this bond so closely and pull together in the face of hardship like this. One dude rocked up in a massive canary yellow Hummer with an American flag sticking out the side, and while he talked to Gary, the cutest little girl hopped out of the car & came over to Mandy & I. She was holding an even cuter kitten, which was just chillin in her palm, completely relaxed and peering about with wide eyes, while the little girl patted it and told us all about the kitten being 2 months old, what they were doing with its brothers & sisters, what her Dad was doing here (volunteering).

Mandy & I decided to head off before it got too late, because of our next destination I had to check out on the way home. We said goodbye to Gary, exchanged contact information, and I wished him the best of luck. We did a bit more sightseeing before we left, first heading over to the south end of town, the direction the tornado came from. We passed the theatre, the destroyed schools and smashed school buses, the firies sitting infront of their engines having smoko while their de-roofed base lie behind. I saw a mobile house which appeared to have been lifted up and dropped back down onto a metre high pile of rubble, and while there wasn't a straight wall left in it, it was still sort of intact. 50m off to the left, I saw a wrecked car sitting out in the middle of a field, and another truck in a mini-creek shortly after. Mandy explained to me how it looked similar to the May 3 tornado of 1999, which took out her grandmother's house in Moore. She spent months helping the family clean up. While there was a greater quantity of damage in that tornado, because of the dense population area involved, at least that scene held some houses that remained standing, sometimes right next to others that were blown away to the slab. The word for Greensburg's destruction however was 'complete'. Houses were half-standing at best, and the tornado path encompassed the entire town, leaving no respite to the eye, looking for something, just something that made it untouched.

I went to the encircling road around town hoping to see the swathe of the tornado track in the grass, but the grass had either blown back straight from the winds or the track can't be seen from the ground. Heading back north, to the other side of town, we came to what must have been the edge of the path, where I found the only street sign in town, twisted but standing, and took a photo looking back up Main street.
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Going to Greensburg was a profound experience, you can't help but be filled with empathy towards the people who live there. Seeing Gary choke with emotion as he talked about the volunteer response and people like Mandy and I making special trips to help made it all worthwhile.
To shake Gary's hand in admiration of the optimism he shows when he talks about the future, I left without any worries at all. Greensburg may be all but wiped out, but the spirit of the people is as strong as ever, and I have no doubt the town will quickly become even greater and more wonderful than before. Still, it is a massive undertaking, and I'm glad to have helped in some small way.

Of course, how could I drive all the way up to Kansas and across to Greensburg, without taking a side track through the countryside to a tiny little town made famous by a hollywood blockbuster movie themed on the exact thing I had just witnessed? Yeah, I had to go and check out Wakita, which featured as the disaster zone in the movie Twister, which I'm sure you all have seen. It's like my parent's favourite movie that they watch at least 4 times a year, and it is the one place in Oklahoma that I wanted to see most. The water tower, visible for miles, looks exactly the same as in the movie, and we pulled up near to it and jumped out so I could get my photos. A group of 4 bikers were watching us, and by the time I was done, curiosity got the better of one of them and he came over with his beer and hick accent to find out what on earth we were doing. He was a pleasant young guy named J, who liked his simple name because, in his own words, he liked a simple life. He invited us both over for a beer, and I was like 'um, errr yeah why not!'.

He explained how he and his mates saw us but didn't recognise the car so knew we were from 'out of town', was fascinated to learn I was from further out of town than he could possibly have thought, he was sunburnt to a crisp from mowing grass all weekend, the tear in his jeans exposed half his leg, and he had a friendly innocent disposition. I had trouble understanding his older buddies, especially the grandpa sitting in the chair smoking, didn't understand a single word that came out of his mouth. We had a 'Natural Light' beer, or beer-flavoured water, on the house, and had a fantastic happy hour in the afternoon shade with Wakita locals. Unfortunately, the Twister movie museum was closed for mother's day. It is actually closed most of the time, and only opens when you call the phone number on the door and a lady comes out and opens it up for you. The fellas explained how big the movie was for the town, how the main street (where we were standing) was bustling with people and the town population increased ten fold. The house that collapses, was apparently carefully constructed with hinging parts that swung down in precision timing to create a controlled structural collapse that could be repeated over and over! Everyone ridicules the movie, especially the part where they hang from a water main in an F5 tornado and get a bit of dirt on their face, but they love it all the same.

And that's it! After that we cruised back home doing 80 most the way. A very interesting and rewarding trip. Time to plan the next one, and rest my fingers from typing!

I have put up a few pages on my (incomplete) website, they hold a bunch of photos and video footage that I took on the day. Those pictures are better than my thousand words.

Greensburg, Kansas (13 May 2007)

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=dineroseguro

-Jason

Tornados and stuff

And the last of four backdated emails!

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Hi everyone,

Some of you might have heard about the storms that came through the US midwest at the end of last week. I thought I might share some additional details and my own experiences with what happened (I'll try and keep this one a bit smaller than the others, so you can actually go ahead and read it and not need to print it out to read before going to bed!)

It had been cloudy and rainy all week and then thursday March 29 saw the first tornado watch issued near to me. A tornado watch is sometimes declared on a county-basis if the counties lie in the path of a severe storm, or if any evidence of tornados or rotation is given by eyewitness account or doppler radar. I'm in the Cleveland county, which is Norman's county just to the south of the Oklahoma City county. Oklahoma City county was put on tornado watch in the afternoon, and while I was at work thurs avo everyone got excited because staff from the Oklahoma city office had called to say that they were all being evacuated because the Tornado sirens had gone off. Instantly everyone was gathering around people with radios and TV to hear more, and news was unfolding about a 'moderate' tornado on the NorthWest expressway, which is to the North West of the city. The tornado sirens are the same as the old World War II air-raid sirens, and wind up to a piercing wail that carries for miles. A tornado siren going off is the sign to take immediate cover because there is a confirmed tornado on the ground in your vicinity. The siren continues until the threat is over, then it whirrs down slowly over about 10 seconds.

The tornado ended up being a strong EF2 tornado. The EF scale (enhanced-fujita) was introduced in February this year to more accurately estimate tornado winds based on actual damage. I was amazed to see on the TV coverage, one of the huge long-distance power towers (the ones that have 6 or 8 powerlines mounted a hundred feet above the ground) was bent in half sticking over to the side. These towers are all metal, built to endure for years and part of major electrical infrastructure, it's just a metal mesh with no panels, you think the wind would just blow straight through it. It was surreal to see one bent to the side at a 90 degree angle halfway up. Later that night I was chatting to one of my new mates in a bar in Oklahoma City, and he told me that he worked on kitchens and he was in his truck on the way to a house with some finishing touches to the kitchen, and heard on the radio that the tornado had hit that exact area, and upon arrival the house he was on his way to was destroyed.

More info about that tornado has been published here : http://www.srh.noaa.gov/oun/wxevents/20070329/

Friday March 30 started off with strong storms down in Texas right from the early morning. It was stormy all day, and after midday, half of Oklahoma State was on tornado watch, given the fact that the previous day had seen 65 reported tornados and 4 fatalities across several states. The watch included my county Cleveland, and all the counties around me. By the afternoon, the dry line was approaching us from the southwest, but infront of the dry line were some of the strongest storms. I went to get some groceries after work (yeah on a Friday; earlier in the week I was nearly broke, down to $30 cash in the wallet with nothin in the bank coz I only get paid once a month, and thurs night the check finally cleared). So I was in good ol Wal-Mart at about 6:15pm, half way through my shopping, when I heard a peculiar noise that was fading in and out of hearing. Straining to listen through the roar of the rain on the roof I realised with a shock that it was a siren, and then about 30 seconds later an announcement was being made over the store intercom that a tornado warning was issued and that everyone had to stop what they were doing immediately and move to the back of the store and gather along the concrete wall. I was asked by two people what the intercom announcement was saying, and I said 'apparently there is a tornado warning, and we need to get to the back of the store against the wall'. Everyone was pretty calm, very blaz-e in fact, whinging about how long this would take, the wal-mart staff were doing a very unenthusiastic job of ushering everyone to the wall, and one lady was loudly saying 'as long as it doesn't take my car, anything but the car!'

I didn't go to the same part of the wall where the other Wal-mart patrons were being herded like sheep; I stood near the entrance to the warehouse out the back so I could hear properly. Above the roar of the rain on the roof, the tornado siren was keeping it's blood curdling pitch but the volume was fading in and out, depending on how many gusts of wind were between me and the siren which was miles away. I figured if the rain & wind changed from a roar to a scream then I'd go and stand in a little recess against the wall away from the doorway, but there was nothing really to hold on to. I then thought how much it would suck to die in a Wal-mart. Still, if I had been at home by myself, as my flat mate is away in Florida at the moment, I would have been packin it at the sound of the siren. So being in a public place for my first tornado warning was a good thing. The tornado apparently touched down very close by, according to another lady I spoke to on the weekend, who said it was down the road from her near the hospital in Norman, and it jumped a few times but was brief. If she is right that means it was just over a mile away from me to the west, but I haven't been able to confirm her claims with any news reports or anyone else. Not that I care too much, as long as I wasn't in it, and yeah, as long as it didn't take my car! I only just got it!

So I hauled ass after that and finished my groceries and headed home to find the roads half flooded and Todd's backyard under at least 6 inches of water. A half hour later I noticed afternoon light and looked west and saw the veil of rain give way before my eyes to blue and yellow skies. There were kids over the road standing on their front porch and they were wow-ing at something and I walked out in the rain and looked back over the house to the east and saw a magnificent full double rainbow. Ran inside and grabbed me trusty waterproof camera and stood in the rain for a couple minutes taking a few photos for a panoramic shot.

So that's my news. Funny that two days later the Gold Coast and the eastern coast of Australia got a tsunami warning from the Solomon Islands quake; crazy stuff! Tornados & Tsunamis, what's next!?

Jason

New wheels

Third of four backdated emails :)

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Hi everyone, got some more news... I managed to get a car! So this means I'm gonna be heaps busier and this will be the last major update for a little while.
I was looking around like crazy for a mid size SUV, something that wasn't a gas guzzler but was big enough to support me in the things I want to do while I'm over here in the States, like weekend trips, heading to the lakes and the snow for water and winter sports, maybe even towing my flat mate's boat so we don't need to bother his old man for the truck. I started looking all around Norman, a couple of websites, getting a lift to the somewhat famous 'mile of cars' in Norman, and after looking over hundreds of cars, I decided on the Jeep Liberty as my favourite make & model. My first experience driving on the wrong side of the road was in a Jeep Liberty Renegade with the car salesman sitting next to me and Rajesh sitting in the back (one of the fellas from the Xyant office who was helping me look for a car, champion).
So Rajesh and this guy were chatting away, and I didn't hear a single thing they said, I was concentrating that much; keep right, indicators are on the wrong side, gear stick is on the wrong side...I managed to do fine though even in moderate traffic. Also tried driving a Saturn Vue but that was too, family-suited, too 'nice' I suppose. The Jeep was more rugged, more powerful, better looking, better fun. But this Jeep had some issues, most of all it was only rear wheel drive. In fact, I was absolutely stunned at the fact that over here, 98% of cars younger than 2000 model are automatic, and then of those that are manual transmission, they were all either rear or front wheel drive. Two car dealers joked 'what do you want a 4WD in Oklahoma for anyway'? They just thought I was crazy, when I asked for a manual transmission four wheel drive, I'd get furrowed brows and head scratches and 'um, well we don't have any of those, in fact I haven't seen anything like that in ages'. Americans love convenience (hence drive thru ATMs, Wal Marts that sell everything you can imagine, and fridges double the size of ours back home full of microwave meals), and unfortunately, manual transmission is seen as an inconvenience.

It made me think carefully about my resale potential, but I just can't do auto, I wanted that manual transmission, and 4 wheel drive incase I get stuck in weather up on the ski fields or whatever may happen. So I started looking wider, and sure enough, in Colorado where it snows, they were relatively abundant. And then I found one car that had everything I wanted. After grilling the sales guy with questions, and getting him to take extra photos of particular areas at my request and email them, I ran the VIN number check (vehicle's history, which has become important since the used car market has become littered with flood restoration jobs from New Orleans) and all checked out. So, a million bank dramas later (bank security is so tight it's a wonder they even give you your own money seriously), the deposit was down and I was trying to get my stranded a-- over to Colorado Springs. I spent a couple days seriously contemplating a plan to hire a car from Oklahoma Airport to Colorado Springs; a drive there and back again that would take all weekend, involving sleeping in the back of the rent car on friday night. My flat mate then looked at flights for me and found one out of Dallas for $200, via Denver to Colorado Springs. I hadn't considered Dallas for the obvious reason I can't get there, but Todd said he had found a motorbike he wanted to look at (he's also in the market for one of those) and was going to cruise down with another mate Chris, and we'd go early and drop me off at the airport. So that was the new plan, and at 3:10am Saturday Morning I was up and getting ready for the 2.5 - 3ish hour drive south to Dallas/Fort Worth Airport, Texas. The airport is enormous, with multiple terminals for various airlines, and after getting lost both in the car and then running the full length of a terminal on foot, I made it to the United flight with a short wait till boarding. That was a fair bit of stress think I got another grey hair from that one, because of the consequences of missing the flight, and I've had my fair share of consequences already!

Descent to Colorado showed that most of the snow had melted from the ground from my last visit two weeks previous, and the countryside was like a white tiger's fur print stripes, with only the gullies sheltered from the westerly wind facing north-south having any snow left in them, shining white strips amidst the brownish grasslands. I could finally see the front range, which was in clouds two weeks prior, and it was breathtaking. Snow capped mountains. Colorado Springs is nestled in close to the front range that lies to the west, which extends north and south as far as the eye can see, and eastward is the start of the plains, with no geographical features of any sort.
I got picked up at the airport by Lucas, the internet car salesman, and headed over to Heuberger Motors. Well it was kinda funny, like a love at first sight type of thing, I spotted the Jeep from across the car lot and knew that was it, and a thorough look and drive later, it was sold. I handed over the 'cashiers check' (same as a bank cheque) for $13 000 USD which stung me about 18k Australian. Damn. Still it was a good buy esp when considering prices of similar cars in Australia. So, the feature list is basically as follows.

• 2003 Jeep Liberty Freedom Edition (also known as sport; but an overly patriotic title don't you think?)
• Black
• 3.7L V6 5sp Manual Transmission
• 4WD, RWD when not running 4WD
• 38 000 miles
• Sunroof
• Cruise Control
• Power windows, locking, steering
• mmm, cup holders (two of them! oh wait, they usually come in pairs don't they? I never had any and was always extremely jealous of those with this superior luxury feature)
• Those neat dashboard displays that are white in the day and black at night
• 6 stacker in-dash CD player / radio, 4 door speakers
• Tinted windows (but not for front doors, illegal apparently on SUV's here?)
• Two-tone leather steering wheel and matching black cloth seats with tan leather edges (best of both worlds, durability of leather on the edges, without the cold/heat of leather where you mainly sit)
• Roof rails (I won't bother with racks though, not yet) and once I get a tow hitch, towing capacity of 5000lbs which ought to haul Todd's boat to any lake we desire :)
• $10 000 USD cheaper than the Kelly Blue Book recommended price for that type of used car, which is good

The cruise control quickly became my new toy, and for the third occasion driving on the wrong side of the road, I headed back up to Denver to meet up with Stacey, my first friend I made in the US, on the connecting flight two weeks before from LA to Denver. We spent St Patricks out to dinner and I tried Venison meat loaf. So, confirming my first impressions, she's cool, and it's great to have a friend in Denver. Staying overnight I was up early the next day excited about the interstate drive back to Norman Oklahoma. I had two choices, one quicker route was to head east to Kansas and south to Oklahoma, but that is a flat, straight, boring drive. So I went south as planned, back through Colorado Springs, following the spectacular front range all along. I passed an enormous international speedway, which was a genuinely massive grand stand in the middle of the countryside, and a high-walled circuit track. I also passed a major accident affecting north-bound traffic, where a bus had blown up I'm guessing about 20-30 minutes earlier, with a stack of emergency vehicles driving up the grass on the highway center and traffic backed up for over a mile. Never heard about it on the news tho.
Stopped just short of the border to fill up and grab subway, it was amazing how quickly the countryside changed at the border to New Mexico. The rocky hills, short pines and small bushes gave way to yellow grassy plains and hills with black rubbly slopes crowned with small cliffs. New Mexico was otherwise uneventful, and a bit tiring, and the border to Texas saw another distinct change, to flatness and numerous corn pastures varying from brown and yellow to lush green, all arranged in squares containing circles of crops, and the watering gear wheels around a central point. Another stop in Amarillo, and a second lunch, and on to Oklahoma, where I saw distinct Oklahoman farms straight out of the movie Twister, with a big house, an even bigger shed, and a wind mill, and vast green plains of crops. I was still listening to radio, about the 9th radio station I had passed through, and just after dusk I got to Oklahoma City and headed south the final leg to Norman. By this stage the front of the car was thoroughly plastered in bugs (I had cleaned the windscreen 3 times from bugs already). I got home and what was the first thing I did (after unloading my stuff)? Got straight back in the car and drove with Todd around town and gave him a drive. He's hooked on SUVs now and so his volvo sedan's days are numbered ha.

All told, I covered about 720 miles in that trip, about 1150kms, over about 11 hours. I've already worked out a dozen ways to sit in the drivers seat to make full use of the cruise control, even got a foot rest on the dash for when i'm bare foot. Was equal to the best drive I've ever done, next to the drive west from the Gold Coast to Stanthorpe on a winter friday afternoon / evening a few years back.

There are some good personalities at work, I have been put through a few group introductions, the biggest was at an office-wide meeting in the (large) kitchen to discuss major company developments, Bill the boss said 'we have a couple of new faces here, there is Jason who has come here from Aus-stralia' and someone said with perfect timing 'that's quite a commute'
And they find it funny that the Australian has bought a Jeep Liberty Freedom, pretty much the most patriotic car title around, and when I was asked if I was gonna fly the American flag on it, I said I had an Australian flag on order and 0ZB0Y plates.

Yes so it's late now, i'm behind on sleep, work is full on learning heaps and contributing heaps i've had to hit the ground running there. Meeting more people at work, some guys with similar tastes of adventure sports as me, one guy goes four wheel driving in a Jeep Wrangler (nuts 4 wheel driving though, like oh look at that river over there, lets go and drive through it). And I mean through it as in along it, not across it. That's Kevin, and Adam I met today he also has a boat and goes wakeboarding, one of the bosses windsurfs, and so half of Metavante sounds like it'll be at Lake Heffner or Thunderbird in the spring/summer months. Looking forward to my second summer :D so I can retaliate for all the stories of great surf and hot weather back home with a few pix of wakeboarding and camping by the lake. Every day at the moment is being marked by a big achievement; an important possession bought, some weird US thing or terminology learned, .NET technology ideas for work, simple discovery things like driving down a new neighbourhood the likes of which I've never seen, and I'm sure this will continue for a long time still. Exciting? Absolutely. Challenging? Wouldn't have it any other way. Homesick? No, but I think about everyone back home and other friends abroad heaps. Fulfilling? I'm living my dream, setting my goals and making them happen, and I have plenty more to go!

Hope you all are well and looking after yourselves. I'll be in touch.
Jason