Our East coast tour began today. Our first excursion is a camping trip called "The Freedom Trail" tour with a company called Trek America.
The tour began in New Jersey, home of the Guido! I’ve never heard that word before but it’s been banded about since the launch of “Jerseylicious”, “Jersey Shore” and the like. We met our tour leader, Scott Liebermann, a 23 year old, 5 foot five dude with Shirley Temple curls from Baltimore. Scott seems to be having a love affair with life. He studied PR and communications in university, was offered a job in a bank with a starting salary of $35,000 but turned it down to bring the under 30's from around the world on trips around America. Good move I thought. He has his whole life to be grown up and responsible. Now is the time for fun.
At 7 am, we congregated in a conference room in the Hotel Inn Harmon Meadow, New Jersey. The room was filled with backpackers from various places around the globe. I was a little overwhelmed. Lots of the people were recalling tales of their previous foreign adventures and I didn’t have anything to say.
The first couple of minutes, the tales were interesting. But I have to be honest, after a while, I started to get bored! I started a conversation with a girl called Janice from New Zealand. I made the mistake of telling Janice that New Zealand was one of the places on our itinerary. Oh Jesus! The next 20 minutes saw Janice going through the main tourist attractions from the North Island to the South Island in minute detail. I nodded, ummed and ahhed and ooohed, eyes glazed over, hoping the fire alarm would go off so I could escape the geography lesson. Then Scott walked in and I was saved.
"Hey guys! It's early; I'm tired so please forgive me if I'm not making sense. Welcome to Trek America! Could everyone on the Freedom Trail tour come to my side of the room? The rest of you guys are on the 45 day cross country tour with another guide so can you guys go to the other side of the room."
Janice went to the other side of the room! Phew! She started chewing the ear off a girl called Ann I had met at breakfast. I guess over 45 days crossing North America would give her ample time to explain in detail the many countries she had visited!
There were twelve people on the trip. Kobus, me, Verity, a drama student from Liverpool, Rachel from Australia, she was really friendly. She sat next to me while we waited for Scott to organise himself. She asked me how long I was in the States for. When I started to tell her about our trip, I began feeling a little embarrassed, worrying I was going to sound like a spoilt brat but she was really interested and enthusiastic about it. There was Tracy, a 21 year old beauty from Manchester, Nicki, a law student from Birmingham, Jeong, an eccentric Korean girl who wore two different colour dock martin boots, one green, one yellow, Momo, a petit doll-faced Japanese sweet-heart, Jai, she is also Korean. Her English wasn’t very good but I’m sure we will figure out a way of talking to her for the week. We can use sign language. Then, there was Sean, Roy and Eamonn, collectively known as "the lads".
The obligatory "getting to know each other" ritual followed (i.e. "Hi, My name is Loren and I decided to travel because I am a lazy bitch and hate working! And my husband spoils me rotten so when I forcefully suggested we leave our full time, well benefitted jobs and travel for five months, he said yes!” I didn't say that!)
After the formalities, we met Sheila, the A-Team style Ford van with matching trailer that was going to be our mode of transportation for the next seven days. Sheila's antenna was adorned by a rubber cactus called Carl who had pink sunglasses and a red neckerchief.
My leprechaun, Séamus, our cuddly, 15 cm travelling companion had found a friend! I bought Séamus for Kobus when I first started going out with him. I thought a leprechaun with a suction cup sewed to his head would look nice in his car. Kobus hated him from day one! I think it's because he's ginger! Anyway, I decided it would be humorous to bring Séamus on the trip and take photos of him in famous places and post them on Facebook. I was right! He's a hit on Facebook with my friends! Charming little fucker! Anyway, I digress!
We piled into the van and headed towards Boston. Beantown! Home of the Chocolate Chip Cookie! Site of the Freedom Trail! Origin of American Independence! After checking into our hostel, we sauntered off in the direction of Boston Common, passing an array of designer shops; odd little stores selling art work and rare old books. We passed one store with a sign saying "Chillin' with my gnomies" which made me giggle. We reached Boston Common and what a feast for the senses! Street performers glittered the park, young men playing baseball, converse trainers tied together by their laces and thrown over the branch of a tree, lovers gazing into each other’s eyes while lying tangled in the grass, families walking with their babies in prams, others rowing boats on the lake, religious fanatics preaching that if you did not come from a lineage of Negro, Puerto Rican, Chilean or Aboriginal blood lines you were going to burn in hell! This picture of diversity was framed by the changing leaves of the trees. It was awesome!
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