Day 23

Kicked ass. I stayed an extra day to make it to a day game at Wrigley field, checking another item off the bucket list.

We left Billy’s apartment feeling strong and sober, that’s his building in the background. The plan was to walk to the El, take it to Wrigley, game on. Problem was that when Billy checked the gametime it was 2:20, eastern time. It was now 12:40 central time. We didn’t have the extra hour he thought we did. Thank goodness for Paul Smith, secured us some tickets in the bleachers, and then found us some awesome seats too. Not bad for a big guy!

According to Paul, “Sadly you’ve gotten the whole Cub experience. By the fourth inning we’re getting our asses kicked enough that nobody gives a damn anymore and just drinks.” I have to say that as far as ballparks go, it was the most awesome time I’ve had at a professional baseball game ever. The real fun began afterward when we walked around Wrigleyville, bar hopping from our choice of about 100 bars within 3 blocks of the stadium.

After we had enough we walked back to the El and rode home. When we got off at Grand, we heard the sound of violin echoing through the concrete rooms, and it was awesomely beautiful.

Day 24

I woke up, wrote that blog, left Billy’s place, and hauled ass across the flat midwest. Boring. I was headed to Columbus, Ohio to visit my sister who just moved there a month before, intending on going to Ohio State in the fall. It was great to see her, she and a couple of friends took me to a college house party which was quite entertaining, and then we walked back home.

Day 25

Woke up, breakfast at a small college breakfast place that was awesome, and then off towards North Carolina. While looking at the GPS I saw what looked like a pleasant byway, and it turned out to be awesome. I forget the name of the highway, but it followed the Muskingum river, I think, and then dumped into the Ohio river, I think. At the tail end I saw an interesting place, 3 coal plants and 1 nuclear plant on one side of the river, softball fields and a rest stop on the other side.

I then continued into Charleston the capital, stopped to wander around a bit.

From then on it was ride hard to Lake Norman where I met Court at his family’s lake properties. His family owns one lot with two single wides shaped like a ‘L’ (redneck ranch house!), a garage, a shed, and a refrigerator buried somewhere in the yard from where his grandparents tried to make a worm farm. The next lot over is his uncle’s property, and the next lot has an abandoned trailer, is for sale, and has been turned into a go kart track by the next neighbors over who liked to smoke their grass instead of burn it. Lawn clippings.

Day 26-31

Sunday I played online and hated online poker. Monday we went to the lake, Court figured out what I was doing wrong with my wakeboard start, and it turns out that when I was taught to “do nothing, let the boat do the work,” I actually did nothing. I have enough board control from surfing and all the other board/water sports I do that I could keep the board steady and just ended up plowing the lake until the rope was ripped out of my hands. He told me to turn the board a little when I felt the boat pull, and literally every time since then it was ez up. He got me jumping that day, then tried to ride the hydrafoil/air chair, and that was a train wreck. Back in home to play online, still hate online poker.

Tuesday was another day at the lake followed by going to one of the many illegal games in the area. I wrote a pretty sweet blog about that night which can be found here. I’ve started writing a new blog with unique content for Ultimate Bet, and that can be found over at http://blog.ultimatebet.com/category/team-ub/bryan-devonshire/.

Wednesday was a very productive day, I grinded two tables while writing the above blog, made a lil over $500, mostly thanks to one dude that punted $300 to me in a 1-2 nl game with 2-7. UB released last week new NL games that incorporate the deuce-seven rule, where if you win in any way with that hand then you win a set side bet from each player. It was a 6 handed game, $4 per player for the side bet, and the game degenerated into heads up. Thus he could only win my four bucks. Instead he re-raised my pre-flop raise from the big blind, then fired three barrels with middle pair on a J75ccc flop, brick, brick and I didn’t want to fold my QcJs. Ty sir. I then made 2.5 hours of a PokerVT on Stud8 cash, playing 10-20. I’m really happy with how that came out. I then played the donkaments, was doing great in four of the six, and only cashed in one for 11th. Sigh.

Thursday was spent at the “best game ever”. It was ridiculous. Held in some garage, and unfortunately I’m about to board so can’t talk too much about it. Maybe I’ll get back to it next blog? Today’s Friday and Court and I are at the Charlotte airport about to get on a plane for LA, playing Legends of Poker main event tomorrow.

Peace and good luck,

Devo

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The night of Day 14 was probably the coolest night of the trip so far. After finishing the last blog I went downstairs to the Whistle Stop Bar, ordered a pint of Grasshopper, played a round of Golden Tee, and then met four dudes from the UK. Stuart from Wales turned 22 that day, so the show was on and I ordered a round of red headed sluts. By this point Fuller had waken from his old man afternoon nap and joined the festivities, which carried into another clubish bar called Pete’s, we all had a great time, and by the time we had enough, Fuller decided that we were going for a walk.

Turns out this walk was a large animal hunt, but I didn’t know that until the next day. We got to the trainyard and I said, “Let’s go in.” We did. We got to the first train and Rick got the great idea to climb a train and “run across the top jumping from car to car.” Too bad it was a coal car. I still wanted to, but Rick talked me out of it. We headed for the passenger train on the far side of the yard.

On the way Rick says, “Moose!” Now this was awesome cause I’ve never seen a moose, but it wasn’t awesome because it was a cow elk. But it was less than 100 feet away when we spotted it so it was awesome. She was aware of us but really didn’t care about us being there. She let us get pretty dang close until we were bored with the elk and moved on to the passenger train.

I climbed the engine easily, but the gap between the engine and first car was a doozy. Shrug, did it anyways, and then James Bond style ran across the top of the train, jumping the two foot gap between cars. I could have just stepped across the gap but that wasn’t as much fun. I got to the caboose and saw a 15 passenger van parked right there, and it seemed like there should be a person nearby, so we snuck back to the front of the train, down, and off.

Walking back across the yard toward the hotel we came across another elk, and then another, and then even more. We spent a long time hanging out with this herd, and at one point there were 15 elk within 200 feet of us, half a dozen within 30 feet. We were right in the middle of a herd of elk. A train was pulling into the station, we decided to lay low until it came all the way in cause we wanted to see how the elk responded. They didn’t care. Stood there and kept chewing the grass. We climbed over the train between cars, across the others, and out of the yard.

Day 15

View from the hotel room, the trainyard and passenger train.

We left in rain and rode south through Jasper and Banff National Parks, and by the time we reached the Columbia Ice Fields most of the rain had stopped. I insisted on stopping often to take pictures of “rocks, snow, and water”.

Walking on a glacier

One of my goals while in Banff was to get to this lake:

About 9 years ago I painted a watercolor for my ex and it was of that lake. I had always wanted to stand in that spot where the view of the painting was from, and I got to do that finally. Unfortunately (for most of Banff) there was a ton of people around so it wasn’t as awesome as I had hoped. But, it turns out that Fuller is the Chipmunk Whisperer.

It all started when Rick was trying to feed the chipmunks by hand, which seemed a little aggressive. Then while we were focused on the ground munks, one of them vaulted off Rick’s inner thigh, off his chest, and up onto the table.

Hiking back down from the Moraine Rock Pile there was a trailhead to the backcountry Consolation Lakes. At the trailhead was a big sign that said it was law to not travel alone back there due to bears.

There was nobody else around.

From there we rode hard through rain out of Banff, eventually making it to Radium Hot Springs, a town and hot springs. We stayed at the lodge across from the Hot Springs (which had been commercialized into a huge pool), came back, got the front desk girl to open the bar, and we stayed until the bar closed.

Day 16

We rode south out of Canada, they heard “poker” and sent us to secondary, but just asked us to stay a little while, nothing more. We were waiting when the dude walked out with our passports and said, “Thanks.” We rode to Rick’s friend’s house on Lake Pond Orielle and I spent hours chilling on the deck watching thunderstorms roll in and trains whistle by.

Day 17

Rick left this day, headed back to Seattle and it was time for me to make up for lost time and get east. I commenced hauling ass across Montana, hit rain in Glacier National Park, and fortunately it cleared by the time I hit East Glacier Park because I probably would have stopped. Instead I kept going and ended up camping at Lake Francis, a tiny lake in the middle of eastern Montana. Why is it that the eastern part of every western state sucks? Even North Dakota was awesome on the west side. Eastern Montana was the worst though, which I would learn about the next day.

I pulled into this little lakeside campground, asked this lady if there was an office or something, and before I had even gotten off the bike I her husband had given me a Bud. Awesome! I hung out with them, Brenda and Scott, and their friend Stacie for the entire night. They were awesome people, super generous and hospitable, and a ton of fun.

Day 18

Ugh eastern Montana. Should be a new state called Western Dakota. Montana highway 200 was so desolate. I met one of the dumbest human beings I had ever talked to on one of the gas stops. I got into North Dakota, stopped in this one town that I forget the name of for dinner, and it was as cowboy as it gets. I stepped into the Saloon, and it was a damn saloon. Hats and button snaps and jeans and boots everywhere, like a movie set it was so perfect. They all looked at me funny in my rain gear and raccoon eyes, I went upstairs to eat, and left quickly. I stayed at this little RV park, pitched a tent, and left quickly in the morning.

Day 19

Today was Sunday and I was going to try to get as far east as I could before getting a room and playing online. I was a bit worried about my oil as I hadn’t had a change in a while so ended up stopping a bit earlier than I wanted to in Jamestown, ND. I went downtown, it was dead, found a hotel, checked in, and found myself in the “Gambler’s Suite.” It was sweet. And accidental, although she commented on my Nevada ID upon check-in. I somehow managed to not take any pictures of it, but I did shoot a video blog in the room. I sucked at tournaments, did well at the new 7deuce games on Ultimate Bet, and walked to a bar downtown for a couple of drinks. The bar was a liquor store too, and turns out that’s normal. Brilliant. Bar closes at 2am, buy beer, go home.

Day 20

I had to get to Minneapolis so I could make it to Chicago the next day, did easily, and had a good time hanging with friends. I didn’t really see anybody besides big Lisa, Tammer, and Kenny that I hadn’t seen in a while, and the dinner group turned out to be a bunch of good friends that I still get to see often. That was cool. The night ended early which was probably a good thing so I could get an early start to Chicago the next day.

Day 21

I got on the road by 9:30am, hauled ass across Wisconsin, and immediately got tilted by Illinios. Toll roads and traffic for mile after mile, but all was better when I finally got to Toyota Park, home of the Chicago Fire, and venue for Phish tonight. It was my first Phish show and a great time, a dream realized a bit, I am so stoked that I got an opportunity to see them and they didn’t stay broke up. They’re so good live and such amazing musicians. I wanted to hear “The Squirming Coil,” and I got my wish to close out the 2nd set, an amazing rendition of the song which finished with a long piano solo and a spotlight on the piano. It was awesome.

Day 22

Wasn’t anything special. Billy and I hung out in his 13th floor downtown flat, grinded, and relaxed. I was supposed to leave this day, but decided that a day game at Wrigley was in order the next day. I’ll come back with that hopefully sooner than later

Peace and good luck,

Devo

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Day 7: Seaside, OR to Everett, WA

I left Seaside, OR and quickly made it into Washington. I had breakfast in Long Beach, about 5 miles down the wrong highway and it was awesome. I then continued down the wrong road for another 20 miles, finally figured it out, and got heading up to Fuller’s place. I timed it perfectly actually because as I was banking left just below Boeing Field the Blue Angels flew over my head in formation about 200 feet off the deck, then by the time I was parallel with the strip they landed. It was awesome. Got to Fuller’s place, left immediately to jump in the lake, came back, showered, and then went to a BBQ with his family. They’re awesome. Then we went to the airport, rented a plane that was leaking gasoline from the engine compartment onto the front wheel, got a different airplane, flew to Bellingham, took a taxi to the movie theater, watched Bruno, cabbed it back, flew to Paine Field, almost ran out of runway on a touch and go, and returned to Snohomish.

Day 8: Everett, WA

In my attempts to kidnap Fuller he had to be around Washington over the weekend, I got invited to stay at a Bed and Breakfast out on Vancouver Island, and my friend in the city was heading out to the island and invited me, so I decided to go spend a few days out there to stall for Fuller who would meet me on Sunday. Made that plan, spent the day hanging out in WA. Went to the lake, went to the casino, played 3-5 NL, won $330.

Day 9: Everett to Vancouver, BC

So I had a little mishap at the border. Basically I’m an idiot, it’ll cost you a beer and some time at the bar to get the whole story, but I spent two minutes in handcuffs. Took me less than an hour to cross, made it to Ali’s place, hung with her brother and his buds for a while, then went to dinner, swam in the ocean finally at night, finally crashed.

Day 10: Vancouver to Vancouver Island

I woke up, did some work for PokerVT, fired off some uploads, and then got picked up by my buddy Donovan. He took me to this glorious place called Wreck Beach, 475 stairs down from the University of British Columbia.

This beach was amazing. It was a nudie beach. We bought two ice cold beers from a naked dude that turned 50 the day before carrying them around in a grocery bag filled with ice hanging off a stick like the cartoon character. Later I bought a bratwurst from a naked dude in this little community of people who lived under a parachute and had a BBQ. It was amazing. Oh, and there were good looking women there too. LOL.

Left the beach, packed the bike, picked up Ali, and made it to the 6:55 ferry to Nanaimo.

We had dinner in Parkdale at the Rod and Gun Club, finally got a hold of her boyfriend who was with his cousin and buddy, met them and drove for way too long but it turned out to be worth it.

Day 11: Tofino

Camped here.

Yup.

This is Alexi the buddy. Cool dude.

Stefan, the boyfriend.

Ali checking out “The Grotto.” I’d never seen anything like it. The waterfall was on the other side of the rocks behind me, and this pool was in a hole on the side of the rock face. Water trickled out of it, so there must have been some way in, and every stone on the bottom looked like perfect skipping stones.

From there we headed to Long Beach (whoever names a beach Long Beach should be given the most unoriginal bastard of the year award) to check the waves. It was flat (to a spoiled Southern Californian) and cold. Everybody was in full suits and it was foggy. We left Anche and Alexi there and headed into town to see about renting a board and to get supplies.

While waiting to order a Burrito in this place called Breakers, Adam one of the trio of Aussies that I kidnapped from Coachella in 2008 runs through the store. I’m like no way. At that moment realized that he told me that he lived in Tofino, that I was in the same place, and that it made sense. Then said hi, he wasn’t surprised to see me, and I realized that he was the one who invited me to the B&B. When he e-mailed me I didn’t realize it was him, he just said I was readin your blog you should come out. We swapped numbers, then he had to run off and do a surf lesson and we went back to the beach.

I decided not to surf due to cold, and I turned out to be just miserable at the beach.

Right.

Anche, Stefan’s cousin. German, damn good at soccer which I learned shortly thereafter when a game of soccer broke out.

I then bout out of this group and headed to Adam’s B&B for a crazy night. Turns out it was a holiday weekend, BC day, and the town was packed. We went to see a local band called “Hey Ocean” at the Canadian Legion and they were awesome, then hitched a ride to the community center for a dance party. I had a great time, and I think the whole town knew I had a great time.

Day 12: Tofino to Pemberton

I killed the battery on my cell phone the day before, knew I was going to meet Fuller, and had to catch the 3:10 ferry back to Horseshoe Bay. Quick goat thinking I use Adam’s phone to change my voice mail message to give Fuller Ali’s address so he could meet me.

Front of the B&B, The Briar Inn.

Back

I finally make it back around 5:30, he’s not there, and my cell phone charger isn’t in my backpack like I thought it was. It was at Fuller’s house where I left it. I then go on this goose chase to get a charger. First place just has car chargers, that doesn’t help. They send me to a mall that closes at 6pm, can’t get them there. Then to a third place, the “Great Canadian Superstore,” they don’t have them. Frustrated I ride 50 blocks back to the house, and voila Fuller is there. Nice.

We ride up the Sea to Sky Highway into Squamish, up the valley to Whistler, and stop there for dinner and a beer. The place is hoppin, we decide to stay, and the town is completely sold out. If they couldn’t handle BC Day I don’t know how they are gonna handle the Olympics this winter. It was dark already so we didn’t want to go camp, but when Pemberton was sold out and the provincial park campsite was sold out we ended up finding a pretty sweet little stealth spot.

Day 13: Pemberton to Blue River

We rode hard for most of the day through beautiful country, spending the first half of the day negotiating a fire and the second half following the Thompson River. We made it to Blue River and the Mike Wiegle Helicopter Skiing Resort. The town should be renamed to Wiegleworth or something cause he owns just about everything. Kristyn, another of the Aussies that I kidnapped last year works there and got Fuller and I taken care of in this sweet 2 bedroom chalet. She gave us a tour of the awesome town in the middle of an awesome valley, took us to the store to buy beer and Fuller bought a 2 pound bag of fresh blueberries for six bucks. We met several of the staff members for dinner, and then the night starts to get blurry. Canadian beer is amazing. It was bluegrass night or something, but it really turned out to be open mic night which then turned out into the whole staff watching (the intern?) Thomas play the drums very well to whatever music was playing. Since the place was dead and we were the only people there and the exciting guys from Vegas had beer, the party moved to our place.

Thomas, Marie, Kristyn, me, Fuller

Chuck with the bicycle that I apparently loved and wanted to trade the motorcycle for.

Day 14: Blue River to Jasper, AB

I had an amazing time in Blue River, loved it there and didn’t want to leave, Fuller convinced me to keep moving cause I’m never going to want to leave any of the places in the next few days, so we finally hit the road around 2pm.

We rode up the valley to the TC-16, headed East, and after just about 250 klicks stopped in Jasper, checked in, and Fuller’s still sleeping. So after this longest blog ever, I’m going out somewhere.

4573 kilometers done, 56 hours and 3 minutes in the saddle, and I’m so stoked. It’s been a long time since I’ve been this happy :).

Peace and good luck,

Devo

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