Motorhome Diaries had such an amazing weekend we’d thought we’d share an overview with y’all!

On Friday we woke to the sounds of Pete walking around M.A.R.V. then walked out our door and into the home of John & Molly Thrasher to discuss our plans for the next couple of days. Pete had formerly worked with John, now a PhD student at Arizona’s top-notch philosophy program, at the Institute for Humane Studies and the Thrasher’s were awesome hosts to MHD for a couple of days at their Tucson home.

We planned to work there for a while then drive to Albuquerque to be in town for our radio interview on Speak Freely with Paul Gessing, head of the Rio Grande Foundation and Jim Scarantino, at 9AM on Saturday. But then we got some tips from our friends that changed our itinerary just a bit.

• Thanks to Bob Ewing from the Institute for Justice (IJ) and Izzy Santa from the Cato Institute, we learned about an event happening that evening on the outskirts of Phoenix at San Tan Flats, a steakhouse who’s owner stood up to area bureaucrats and last year was victorious in court (video up shortly). We couldn’t pass this up.
• Then we learned that David Nolan, the founder of the Libertarian Party, was a Tucson resident. We hit him up via Facebook and got the ball rolling.

This meant we’d have to drive through the night. But this was exactly what the Motorhome Diaries is about — being flexible and spontaneous as opportunities arise.

We left Tuscon after one last greeting from our good friend, Nicky “the heel” Puglia, who brought his amazing 15 year-old daughter and a couple of her friends to meet us. Despite their youth their knowledge of and affinity for the ideas of liberty was very impressive.

We then drove a few miles to David Nolan’s house and sat-down with him on his patio in what was one of our best and most-informative interviews yet. Then, after Nolan signed our guestbook we hit the road for Queen Creek, where San Tan Flat was located, to attend their one-year anniversary over the government and interview owner Dale Bell (click here for IJ’s YouTube video).

After our interview we helped our new friend Holly celebrate her 25th birthday then we hit the road for Albuquerque. It was then that we realized that we were going to be driving into Mountain time and thus losing an hour, which meant we were going to have to drive through the night. Jason took the first shift — about three and a half hours — while I drove the second half. Despite having the pedal to the floor for much of the drive we arrived 20min late but Paul and Jim were more than understanding. The radio show went well (podcast here shortly) and we recorded it, so be on the lookout for the video.

Then we went to our second home — Starbucks — to crank out some work.

Later that afternoon, with Pete and I having less than two hours of sleep under our belts, we were on our way to Paul and Krista Gessing’s home where Paul sat down with Jason for this interview:

Next, we piled into M.A.R.V and went to Independence Grill for the meetup, which Paul helped us put together, for the best burgers in the ABQ. They even had a Gadsden flag hanging up on their wall. There we met some really good people and had some fruitful discussions. The night ended like most with the group coming out to see M.A.R.V and sign the guestbook. We then boondocked it at a local Wal-Mart.

On Sunday morning Pete and I got up and did some shopping at Wal-Mart. After breakfast, we met back up with Paul, who took us for a hike up some volcanoes. It was great — actually being on the ground in such beautiful scenery rather than just seeing it thru M.A.R.V’s window. Two hours later we said good-bye to Paul, his wife, and their two dogs and then we headed to uncle Danny and Aunt Liz’s home (Pete’s uncle and aunt).

Uncle Danny was cool enough to bring Pete and I to his gym (and cover the guest fee!) where we all had good workouts. Then it was back to their house for some homecooking, New Mexico style. On the menu was green chili — it was a first for all members of MHD and it was nothing short of amazing. We were extremely spoiled while with Pete’s relatives, in addition to the already-mentioned stuff we were able to hit their shower and they gave us some ‘road munchies’, filled our Tupperware  with green chili and generously gave us some money to fill M.A.R.V’s gas tank. And we had some good convos. Most of all they are truly genuine people with hearts of gold and we are grateful for all they did. Thanks again so much!

Though it was hard to leave all the good people we had met in ABQ, it was time to head to Congressional hopeful Adam Kokesh’s home in Santa Fe. We arrived here last night and did some work and hung out a bit. And Tracey, Adam’s girlfriend, made us some killer chili burgers, which we gladly devoured. And tonight they’ve opened up their home to host our Santa Fe meetup, so if you’re in the area come on out!

We could not have planned a better weekend. All of this is a direct cause of input from y’all and of people getting involved. Let’s keep it going!