Labor Day Weekend On The Road

WOW! What a terrible time to drive ANYWHERE!

We left LA early in the morning on Saturday and made our way up the 101 & Coastline Highway Rt 1. It took us a slow three hours to get out of the traffic leaving LA, but it was worth the views! Saturday was another day of straight driving, but we got some great images and made it to an amazing spot near Big Sur just in time for the sunset.

Once we hit Big Sur it was dark and we decided it wasn't safe to drive on a highway on the edge of a cliff with no street lamps. So we stopped somewhere more inland and tried to find motels. Lucky for us, it being Labor Day Weekend, and ALSO the weekend the Europeans have vacation, there was NOTHING with vacancy NOR was there anything under $100 for one night. 

DON'T FRET! WE FIGURED IT OUT! 

About an hour away from San Fran, we finally find a Motel 6 that was decently priced and we got to take nice long showers and make some art until we checked out Sunday at noon.

Sunday the 31 of August:

WE ARE SO CLOSE TO SAN FRAN! We checked out of the hotel and drove into the sunny, colorful city of San Fran. On this morning, we counted our dimes and decided that it was best to not make our way up to Portland or Seattle due to financial situations. So we are staying in San Fran until Tuesday and enjoying ourselves and the rest of our spending cash we have and then we will be making our way back to our lovely homeland of New Jersey!

But enough of that, we're in San Fran! We spent a few hours in Dolores Park where we attempted to sell some of the jewelry and arts we've been making, but we were more focused on enjoying the beautiful weather than socializing and being sales persons. They had free live music and plenty of people were out and about enjoying the Sunday. We made more crafts and decided to head out. We drove around the old neighborhoods Rosie used to live in, we ate at the Crepe House in the Mission and enjoyed some delicious salads that our bodies were oh so happy to inhale. Yes inhale.

Then around 8 we drove to Oakland to find an affordable Motel, which we did, and once again, we called the night in early and just made some more crafts while watching naked and afraid.

Monday the First of September:

Now we are at the House Of Coffee in Sunset, San Fran enjoying some yummy coffees and getting ready for our day. We are meeting with Rosie's tattoo artist friend and plan to get some ink! We will potentially be interviewing a tattoo artist for our San Fran section of this journey, which would be an amazing form of art to get some insight about!

Stay tuned!

HAPPY LABOR DAY, FRIENDS!

Peace ~

SoapSkeptics

Andrea + Rosie

THE FIRST DAY ON THE ROAD

HI FRIENDS!

We left Metuchen around 4:30 AM Saturday August 9th, everything was smooth sailing until we reached exit 8 on 287 and realized we forgot a few vital items at Andrea's house such as back up batteries. SOOO we had to turn around and we didn't ACTUALLY leave Metuchen until around 5 a m. 

Our Lucky Barbie Dream Catcher

Our first stop and destination for the end of the day was Asheville, North Carolina. We booked an airbnb somewhere in the outskirts of the city and planned to meet with some locals to talk about art for the documentary. 

We followed the map that AAA provided us with and it helped us out a TON- we didn't have to waste battery and data on the GPS on our phones which was great. 

Blue Ridge Mountains

We took turns driving, about 3-4 hours each, PA was easy because we were just pumped to be on the road, once we hit West Virginia and Virginia we were ready to just nap and get to where we needed to go. VIRGINIA IS SO BIG OH MY GOD!! So many cows, so many fields, so many cars. 

About 1/4 way into Virginia, around 1 pm Rosie checked how far we actually were from Asheville, and we were far. Destination time was estimated at 6 pm- the event we wanted to go to with the locals of Asheville ended at 5 pm, so since we were no longer able to make it, we figured, hey… when in Virginia, do as the tourists do... and we visited Natural Bridge!

Natural Bridge is a 200 ft tall bridge that was naturally made out of erosion in the earth when all of that hunk of rock was UNDERWATER. Now, it is just a free standing bridge with a stream running 200 feet below it. It was epic. We did a little hike that followed after the bridge and got to see some exampled of Native American living: huts, TP's, weaving, artisan work, etc.

Afterward we hit the road again and fell in love with Tennessee! The most lively state out of all the ones we drove through by far- and the mountains are just amazing. I can't speak for Rosie,  but I fell in love with a mountain today… Wait, I just checked... yeah, Rosie fell in love with a mountain today too.

The rest of the ride to NC was super cloudy, foggy, and rained on and off. Our shelter for the night was quite a drive outside of Asheville which we didn't really realize, but it was the most beautiful drive ever. We drove 2,000 ft up a mountain to this lovely little house (we will document the drive in the morning because it's actually insane…. WE DROVE THROUGH CLOUDS) 

You Can Book A Stay Here on Airbnb "Mid-Century Barn Sleepover... YES!"
We HIGHLY Recommend it for a nice mountain getaway in NC.

This home is magnificent, the hosts, Brenda and Mo, are just so nice and they greeted us with home made oreos. Where we are staying looks straight out of a movie! Now that it is morning and we are well rested, we will be starting our day exploring Asheville and heading toward TN where we will meet with Jeanne Brady and others at the Appalachian Center for Crafts!

Peace and thanks for sharing this experience with us, guys!

~

Andrea + Rosie

#SoapSkeptics 

 @SoapSkeptics