Threefoldtheory’s Tour Blog Day 2: Friday, March 9, 2007
Ever seen that movie “RV” with Robin Williams, where he has all that trouble with the RV? Yeah, all that crap is true.The morning was uneventful, except for a run in with someone from home — a Gallipolis, Ohio man who just happened to be the tour bus driver for the New York Nationals (who, until 1995, were better known as the Washington Generals — the longtime pin cushion of a basketball team that perpetually loses to the Harlem Globetrotters. There’s your history lesson for today, kids).
Driving from Savannah into the Miami area was pretty smooth. The roads down south are definitely better than some of the chewed-up Interstates we have in good ‘ol W.Va. Once we got close to Miami, I decided to give the wheel to Nik, who had been here before. This wasn’t a problem, as I-95 becomes a 7-lane parking lot about 35 miles outside of the city.
Now, yesterday we went over how large this vehicle is. Well, as one would figure, an RV just isn’t comfortable in stop-and-go big city driving. When you’re at the other end of the vehicle, there’s nothing like slamming on the breaks to send you flying toward the front seat.
Miami is a beautiful city and I regret that there are no pictures with this blog. I will include some in my next installment. We took plenty of them, but I was honestly just too exhausted at the end of the day to upload, resize and send them.
After getting lost in the city, we got redirected toward Miami Marine Stadium, which is the venue we will play Saturday. Unfortunately, we just couldn’t find the thing! After at least an hour, and after at least three conversations with random passersby on the street, we found the venue. By the time we got there, the day’s events had ended, and it was basically abandoned.
Confident that we could find it again Saturday, we left to find our hotel, which proved to be another challenge. But, we finally found it, and just in the nick of time — after 10+ hours in the RV, we were all getting restless.
But alas, no rest was to be found. When we arrived at the hotel, we were directed to a parking lot that looked rather small. We were assured that our 31-FOOT VEHICLE (I have to put that in all caps to emphasize the point that we said this phrase about 50 times to the front desk lady) would fit.
It took both Pete and me to very carefully direct Nik into the lot. As the RV inched further and further into the lot, it was becoming blatantly obvious that we were diving further and further into the abyss. This was like real life Tetris — with cars. You’ll see some great pictures of this tomorrow, too.
We had to call the hotel’s maintenance man to help with the situation. This guy was none too happy. He had to call a guest to move a cargo van that would give us room to get out of this mess. Luckily, the guy who owned the van was nice, and we were able to get the RV out and into a space more suitable for mobile homes.
Undeterred from the experience, we traversed the streets of Coconut Grove, the area we are staying in, and ate dinner at an Argentinean restaurant. However, after all the stress of the day, I felt nauseated and had to box my dinner to go.<
Ah, the life of a rockstar!
Despite all of this, Miami is beautiful and vibrant. It’s full of life that comes at you in every sense — the cacophonous din of endless traffic, the endless skyline cluttered with skyscrapers, the smell of strange spices wafting from restaurants and cafes.
Yes, despite all this, Saturday is going to be a good day.
Stay tuned.
– Scott Niles
