Dear Friends and Family,

YEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WE ARE SOOOOOOOO FUCKING BACK BABES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

*Huff* *Huff* *HOORF* Okay okay, I’m getting ahead of myself! But I am BACK and I am ON THE ROAD and I am BECOMING ONE WITH RHE WORLD and I am WRITING TOO MUCH PURPLE PROSE!!!!!!

And I have so much to tell you about!

But! First I have to explain the context!

So when I got home from France in Mid-March, I more or less immediately set to getting prepared for my road trip. There’s a lot to do! And most importantly, there were a lot of people to catch up with before I hit the road!

I’m very, very lucky to be meeting a lot of my friends on the road for this trip; the longest I go without seeing close friends or family is only 3 weeks throughout this entire summer. This is a far cry from 2023, when that same time separation could be two whole months! The only thing I regret from my 2023 road trip is that I couldn’t share enough of the beauty of the world with the people I care about, so I am extremely grateful to be able to rectify that in 2026.

But that being said, not everyone has the ability to drop what they’re doing and come eddy and whirl in the vortex of existence with me, so we made dinner plans instead 🙂

It was wonderful seeing Miranda, Kez, Raevyn, Izzy, Kim, Sarah, Eric, Shefali, Wes, Amelia, and other dear friends I won’t be able to see on the road. But that’s a lot of dinners! What if I could get everyone in one place for a combination of celebrations?

Pictured: me getting everyone in one place 💙

So I threw a Kegger!

Mini Kegger, anyways ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯

I threw another big party to get everyone together and have a proper send-off across the continent 🙂 And we had a grand old time!

Behold the return of D O O R P O N G ! ! !

One of the most fun things we got to do at the party was decorate my chuck box. In short, for this trip, I built an all-in-one kitchen kit that includes a stove, sink, storage, spices, and other features beginning with “s”. I was originally going to paint it to somewhat waterproof the wooden box, but then I thought, “why not just clear-coat it and let me friends decorate it?” And that’s what we did!

And the box turned out amazing! I absolutely love how this thing looks!!! Thank you to everyone for indulging my idiosyncracies and bringing such fun and unique stickers to cover the box in! Like I said before, one of the things I miss most while traveling is having my friends close at hand, but this box and its stickers will bring you all to me every time I make a meal 🙂

You guys are the absolute best!

So as much as it pains me to leave my friends behind for now, it eventually came time to depart. I was originally planning a March 27th departure date, but I pushed the start back to March 30th to wait for some better weather on the coast and to finish some last-minute preparations.

And so:

The day finally came 🙂 March 30th, 2:21 PM, a tank full of gas, a heart full of love, and a fold-down cargo area a bit too full of equipment, I hit the road:

The journey of a thousand miles begins with resetting your tripodometer or something idk ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯

I just barely beat beltway traffic I got stuck in beltway traffic, but that didn’t deter me from making for the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. Crossing this has bridge has been the start of both my last two road trips, and I saw no reason to mess with tradition. It’s too big not to encounter, too large a precipice not to climb to the edge of, too portent a symbol to ignore or avoid, that literal gateway to a whole different places and people and ecosystems and worlds. I stopped at Sandy Point Park to take in the precipice:

Was it really time to do this? Most of the trees along US-50 up to the bridge had yet to bud, let alone bloom. The water was cold and the beach was clear, undisturbed by any summering visitors. Used tire stores had yet to put their snow tires on premium discount use-it-or-lose-it-or-your-money-back clearance sale. I felt so early in my arrival, so ready to meet the word again. Was I ready?

You freaking BET I was!!!!! I blasted across the bridge at full tilt a conservative rate of speed, jamming my tunes and pumping my fist out the window and screaming my excitement all the way over! We are HERE the time is NOW and we are GOING OFF ON THIS ADVENTURE!!!!!!!!

YEEEEEEEAAAAAAAHHHHH BOIIIIIIII!!!!!!!!!!!!

And my excitement continued as I drove all the way to Cape Henlopen, Delaware. What would a coast-to-coast road trip be without the Atlantic?

From now until July, I am chasing this sunset 💙

It was exhilarating!

And there was nothing I wanted to do more than christen the start of my trip with a dip in the ocean herself. However:

The Atlantic in March is a pretty fraught and dangerous place! Swimming in 50 degrees water with offshore winds is not advisable!

Despondent, I gave up on the trip entirely and resolved to return home the next morning. I emerged from my cozy and particularly planned tent with sorrow and destitution in my belly and my eyes and my soul:

And I just drove on home :/ . I even went to Delaware Bay just to wave goodby to the ocean before I spent the next 5 months as an unemployed couch potato:

So long ocean, so long my dreams 💔

…

*SPLASH*

PSYCH!

Of course I jumped in the water, Delaware Bay is part of the Atlantic, and the wind blows you onshore here rather than offshore 🙂 what a joy it was, to wade and shiver and overwash in the water you’ll only next see a world away 💙

We are so fucking back babes.

And I couldn’t be happier 💙

That’s all for now,

Stay well everyone,

Evan 💙