After wedding

13th of July: Slept in really late and had breakfast at Jack-in-the-box. Just started to get ready for the wedding. We put on our best and headed for the Lutheran church where the wedding was to be held. The ceremony started soon after and it was really beautiful. It was fun to hear the familiar things in english for a change. The reception was held at the backyard of the church. The weather was perfect and the garden looked fantastic. Ate very good fingerfood and dinner. Bar was open all the time. People danced and just had fun. Great party!

14th of July: In the morning we said goodbye to the weddind party and thanked them for everything. Took a train to San Francisco and checked into a hotel there. Headed to explore the downtown. We could really feel the altitude differences in our feet. We ended up in Chinatown where we ate lunch, wasn’t a really fine culinary experience though. Continued our strolling around, visited Apple stores and just watched the life on the streets. There are a huge amount of bums on the streets, more than anywhere we have visited. Tired from the party last night we just hanged in at the hotel. Erkka walked around in the harbour for a while though.

15th of July: Had breakfast in downtown and searched for an internet cafe where we checked a few car rental places. They were out of cars downtown so we reserved one from the airport. Took a taxi there and got a chevrolet from Avis. Drove through the city, took the Golden Gate northbound. The plan was to go to Napa Valley but it was getting late so we took a hotel from Vallejo and just went to the movies to see the Wedding Crashers.

16th of July: We hit Napa Valley, USAs most famous vine cultivating area. The scenery was amazing there. There are close to 300 vineries in the valley. We visited 4 of them and tasted some excellent wines and saw how they are made. Ate good lunch in a local restaurant and started heading south driving down the coast. Stayed the night in Santa Cruz.

17th of July: Los Angeles! Drove down the beautiful Pacific coast, where the road is really curvy and the cliff is just a few inches from you. Stopped at many view points and admired the sea. Arrived to LA late at night so just found a hotel and crashed.

18th of July: Headed to Venice Beach at noon. Had a quick lunch there and walked down the boardwalk with all the performers and artists, then headed to the shore to lay down. Spent a few hours just relaxing and enjoying the sun. After the sunbathing we drove downtown for a walk there. Got our first touch to the filming industry when we saw the filming of a new Acura commercial. Tired but happy we got back to the hotel.

map

Here you can see where we have been driving. This morning we are leaving from Memphis to Oklahoma City.

Memphis, Tennesee

5th of August: We had heard that Elvis had left the building but we wouldn't believe it so we head to Memphis. Left Finchville at 11 am. Aleksi drove and we stopped at few places to get breakfast and lunch. Got a room at a hotel nearby Memphis. Refreshed a bit and headed downtown. Parked the car and started walking. Aleksi noticed John Legend posters at a club and we checked it out and John was actually performing that night. Alekis and Pirkka got two tickets from the scalptures and went in. Tuomas and Erkka walked to the main street and went to a Jazz club to eat and drink. Memphis is famous for great Jazz. A band performed and the atmosphere was amazing. Next bar we hit was an Irish one where we had a really nice bartendress who told us that she could take us to cool club after she finished her shift. So we walked to the club with her and we got in through the backdoor. Sat there for a while and went to get the other guys from the concert hall. They told they had eaten in Hooters and were all "in love" as you can see in the pictures. Went to the hotel to get some sleep.

The Potsdam part

24th of July: We woke up at 10 am and updated the web page. Aleksi and Pirkka jogged a little around the town. We ate brunch at the local Indian restaurant. Erica and Jonah study classical music in Potsdam and Erica promised us a private piano concert so we dropped her off to the school for practicing. The rest of us headed for a grocery store to get ingredients for the dinner we promised to cook in the evening.

After dropping the stuff back to the apartment we went to the school and took a small tour around it. We met Erica in a lecture hall, and the show was about to begin. And what an amazing experience it was! She played a few classical pieces and even sang a pop song in japanese. We were stunned. The music was so beautiful that we could have stayed there for an eternity. She will be something great in the future. After Erica had played Jonah showed his talents also and even Pirkka entertained us with the 150.000$ piano.
In the afternoon we headed for a park to play badminton, soccer and ultimate. It was the action we needed after the spiritual afternoon. We even had a ultimate match in the end in which Pirkka, Erkka and Tuomas crushed the others.

As a gratitude to the guys we prepared dinner to the whole gang in the apartment. The Mènu was following: For starters Avocado shrimp cocktail with chili mayo à la Aleksi, Main course was Pasta carbonara with a finnish touch à la Tuomas, Greek salad was made by Erkka and Pirkka washed the laundry.

At 11 pm we went to a near park/camp site and started a bonfire after finding the wood in the forest. Jonah teached us how to make smores: a toasted marshmallow and a piece of chocolate in between two crackers. Delicious! We chatted around the fire and listened to bullfrogs speaking to one another. At 1 am we hit the bed.

The Beginning of our journey

20th of July: Aleksi, Erkka and Tuomas left Helsinki behind as they took a plane to London in the afternoon and continued to New York from there. Late at night we arrived in JFK and took a moonlight taxi to the "luxury" hotel in Manhattan. The room was really small and it smelled terrible, but the location was great. We were exhausted from the day of travelling so we just hit the bed at like 2 am.
21st of July: We started the day with a traditional american breakfast in a small diner nearby our hotel. Eggs, bacon, toast, pancakes, coffee and fresh orange juice. With our stomachs full we headed to the centre. Just walking around, watching the life in the big apple, visiting some stores. Pirkka joined the group in the afternoon after his plane had arrived. Took his luggage to the hotel and went to crabbed some lunch to go from a deli. We ate in Cenral Park which is really a haven in the middle of the busy city. There were a few baseball games going on in the ball park in Central Park and we enjoyed them for a while. Did some shopping and it started to get late so we headed for the hotel. Dropped by for a few beers in an irish pub on the way.
22nd of July: Erkka was feeling sick in the morning so he stayed in the hotel as the other guys had breakfast the same style as yesterday. We got some stomach drug for Erkka and headed downtown. Aleksi got crazy shopping and we dragged ourselves behind him. Finally the shops started to close and we could go for a dinner. We ate pasta at this intimate place in Little Italy. The food was amazing although expensive. We had walked close to 20 kilometers during the day so we were ready for bed. Erkka was feeling better also when we arrived to the hotel.
23rd of Juy: Woke up early and got sandwiches from Subway for breakfast. Tuomas and Erkka went get the rental car from Avis while the boys checked out from the hotel. This was the real start for the roadtrip. Erkka drove and Pirkka navigated our way out of NY. It looked like a lot of trouble but the guys did a great job an d in no time we were on I-87 heading north. Ate at McDonalds on a rest area. With a half mistake we drove the rest of the way on the small roads seeing the real America with all the small towns and great scenery. 8 pm we arrived in Potsdam, NY where we met Erica, Erkkas exchange strudent friend, and her roommate Jonah. They were kind enough to bunk us on their sofa. Ate some pizza and just hanged around and went to sleep happily after a long day of driving.

Matkasuunnitelma | Travelplan

Tässä on matkasuunnitelmamme, siitä selviää reittimme ja missä aiomme matkalla poiketa. Klikkaa karttaa nähdäksesi suuremman version.








Here is the travelplan of ours. You'll find our route and the locations we're going to visit. Click the map to see a bigger version of it.

Road trip USA:han ja Kanadaan!

Keskiviikkona 20.7.2005 neljä kaveria lähtee Helsinki-Vantaalta kohti New Yorkia yhdistetylle reppumatkalle ja road tripille. Matkan suunnittelua ja edistymistä voit seurata tästä blogista.

Alunperin Erkan piti lähteä host siskon häihin San Franciscoon. Ajattelin että matkaan voisi ottaa kaverin mukaan ja kiertää katselemassa myös vanhoja vaihtarikavereita ja host perheitä. Tuomasta ylipuhuessani mukaan matkaan tarttui myös Aleksi ja aivan viime metreillä vielä Pirkkakin.

Liikkumamuodoksi Amerikan mantereelle valittiin julkiset ja auto, nehän ovat ainoat oikeat tavat matkustaa. Myös rahtilaivalle töihin menemistä ja sillä matkustamista valtameren yli harkittiin, mutta aikataulu ei moista sallinut, ehkä vielä joskus.
Kuva on Erkan edelliseltä reissulta 2002.
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On Wednesday the 20th of July 2005 4 chaps from the Arctic circle are heading from Helsinki to New York for a combined pack packing and road trip. You can follow the planing of the trip and later on the course of it from this blog.

At first Erkka was going alone to San Francisco to witness his host-sister's wedding. He realised that it might be neat to explore the United States thoroughly with a good buddy. The idea of getting together with old exchange student friends and visiting beloved host-families felt intriguing.

As he was trying to convince his long-time friend Tuomas to join him on this tour he managed to impress his childhood friend Aleksi to come along. At the very latest this group of travellers was accompanied with one cosmopolitan, Pirkka Jarvinen.

The boys decided to travel from the east coast to the west coast in the old-fashioned way. They ditched the idea of flying right away and determined that they wanted to live on the edge. The only means of travelling left by was driving a rented car and occasional use of the public transportation. The thought of travelling to the North America on a freight boat crossed their minds also, but their strict timetable wouldn't have allowed it this time. No worries, there will always be a next time. The picture is from Erkka's previous trek in 2002 to the land of versatility.