Friday, October 11 - Calexico to Hermosa, CA

October 16, 2013 Brian Nice

Yippeeeee! We made it! Coast to actual coast!

The photos are important, but it's hard to describe the feeling of having accomplished what I started talking about more than a year ago.

The smell of the air down by the water, the feeling of the sand on my feet, between my toes. Rejuvenating and magical.

That's my cousin Greg who's a soccer coach, and he was my coach in the hospital when this whole thing began four years ago. A pretty special dude.

Calexico was nice, but I think we left ahead of schedule to get to Starbucks and start our final leg.

Thursday, Oct. 10, 2013 - Tucson, AZ to Calexico, CA

October 14, 2013 Brian Nice

California! We made it! One more day of driving and we will have officially made it Coast to Coast. Really looking forward to seeing my friends and the new crew in Hermosa.

Calexico, CA is about as close as you can get to the Mexican border without crossing over. Felt like we crossed over. We all put together our high school Spanish and were able to order some dinner. Most authentico!

More amazing skies and terrain. Couldn't believe the differences from state to state.

Wednesday, Oct 9 - El Paso, TX to Tucson, AZ

October 11, 2013 Brian Nice

We have made it through 2 days of desert driving. 2 more days of driving to go until we get to Hermosa Beach.

Great skies. Wide open spaces. Fresh air. Good stuff. We had another great day.

I can't wait to see these films. I did some color and some black and white, so it should be interesting.

Tuesday, October 8 - Odessa to El Paso, TX

October 9, 2013 Brian Nice

Long drive out of Odessa. Long stretches of nothing far as you could see and oil rigs and windmills. Great for photography. The most memorable thing about Odessa was that we were in an economy hotel where a lot of oil/fracking workers were also staying. We were a little frightened to ask questions. I don't think we had either the right accent or license plates.

Part of the drive across what seemed like desert took us up to 4500 feet. I now know that's my limit. We've been hugging the coast to stay pretty close to sea level, and this was both an experiment and a challenge. I did start to feel weird at the top but it didn't last very long and I was able to recover which was good to find out.

We drove 300 miles before seeing signs of civilization. We missed lunch because along the route was a National Park where we might have stopped, but it was shut down on account of the shut down. Another place along the way was open Wednesday through Sunday. It was Tuesday. We couldn't believe it. Met some bikers from Buffalo, New York! Go figure. We did take a break by the Salt Flats which were really cool. Looking forward to seeing the shots from this day.