PS C:\> tar -xf Operation_Unmasked_Wonder_v1.zip
Application_Install.exe
In June 2026 I got in a car and put almost 3,900 miles on it, through ten state crossings, two national parks, one salt flat, and enough Hampton Inn omelettes to build a small structure out of egg carton. I called it Operation Unmasked Wonder because that is exactly what it was: unmasking myself a little more with every mile, and finding wonder waiting for me anyway, uninvited, in gas station parking lots and at the bottom of Death Valley.
Tracking every mile, every gas station, every dollar lost to a casino is not really about the numbers. It is the thing I do instead of shutting down when the world gets too loud and too big, a way of staying present when presence used to feel impossible. Somewhere around the 300th pill and the 43rd bio break, I noticed I was still having fun. That noticing is the whole trip.
Twelve days before I originally planned to, ninety miles from my next destination, I also turned the car around. Day after day of triple digit 110F+ heat, high elevation, and a nervous system running hot had caught up with me, and continuing was no longer the right call. Honoring that signal instead of overriding it was as much the application as anything else on this trip.
I began the trip with 162 days of complete chemical sobriety under my belt, and ended with 174.
And I can assure you that there are no drivers better or safer than me. LOL.
That is the application. The rest is the source code.
Source_Code.txt
The open-source code below is free, for you to analyze, modify, and build your own application with.
> before you scroll, one disclaimer: readme_first.txt
I am, before anything else, a numbers guy. Somewhere between Bellingham and Death Valley I also apparently became a guy who tracks his own windshield washer fluid consumption, so let’s just sit with that for a second. Thirteen days, ten state crossings, one car that started the trip named Tubaru and ended it named Banana Boat, a rename directly inspired by the timeless nursery rhyme stylings of Kim Petras somewhere around day nine, and enough electrolyte drinks to reasonably concern a physician.
What follows is not a vacation recap. It is a full audit. Every gas station, every casino loss, every bathroom rated on a three point disgust scale. If you have ever wondered exactly how much of a 3,908.7 mile road trip is spent on the side of the road relieving yourself (approximately a full hour), you are in the right department.
> ninety miles from san diego, i chose myself: turnaround.log
Somewhere past the tenth day of triple digit heat, my body started keeping its own records too, and unlike the road trip stats, these ones were not fun to tally. Canker sores from the dry air. Cracked skin and lips. Days spent at elevations between 5,000 and 9,000 feet stacked on top of everything else. My nervous system had been in prolonged activation for days straight, and eventually the numbers stopped being funny and started being data I needed to actually listen to.
I was ninety miles from San Diego when I made the call to turn around, twelve days ahead of my original return date. San Diego to San Francisco was supposed to be the next segment, the one stretch of the West Coast I have never driven, and it was the entire reason I planned this trip in the first place. Ending it there instead of finishing that drive was hard. No lie, I car cried a few times on the journey home. The coast will still be there. My body needed me to be there too. This was not my first road trip, and it will not be my last. The coast can wait for a day when my nervous system is ready to meet it.
> the numbers don't lie, mostly: trip_stats.log
Operation Unmasked Wonder Ministry of Statistical Information Department Office of Data Analytics
Mission Timeline
- Departure: 6/16/26 1116
- Return: 6/28/26 1817
- Calendar days on road: 13
- Actual time away from home: 295h1m
- Total hours on the road: 121hr or 41% of time away from home
- Nights away: 12
- Time zones: 2
Cast & Soundtrack
- Starting song: Adventure / Izzamusic
- Starting car name: Tubaru
- Ending song: Get Lost – Bearson (ford. Remix)
- Ending car name: Banana Boat
Miles & Momentum
- Total miles driven: 3908.7mi
- Average miles per day: 300.6mi
- Average moving speed on the road (including stops): 32.3mph
- States driven in order: 10 (WA/OR/CA/NV/CA/NV/AZ/NV/CA/OR/WA) or 1.3/day
- Longest day on road: 16h17m or 690mi
- Longest stretch without stopping: 5.5hr or 376mi
- Fastest speed limit: 75MPH
- Slowest speed limit: 15MPH
- Miles of old Route 66 traveled: 41 or 1% of trip
- Longest distance without seeing a car: 52.5mi, Death Valley, CA to Shoshone, CA
- Construction zones: 59 total or 1 every 66 miles
- Highest number of consecutive closed rest areas: 4
- Railroad crossings with gates down: 3
- Government checkpoints: 3 or 1 every 103 hours on the road (2 in CA, 1 in NV)
Fuel, Fluids & the Car Itself
- Fuel stops: 9 or 1.4/day
- Gallons of fuel: 149.6gal or 11.5gal/day
- Mileage: 26.1mpg
- Windshield washer fluid used: 0.75gal
- Engine oil used: 0qt
- Most expensive gas price seen: $9.59, Goff, CA
- Cheapest gas seen: $3.66, Pahrump, NV
- Windshield cleanings: 3
- Cameras brought on trip (total sensors): 9
- Cameras malfunctioning and requiring repair: 1
- Car cries: 3
- Speeding tickets: 0
- Accidents: 0
- Drivers safer and better than me: 0
Sleep & Shelter
- Hotel nights: 7 / 58.3%
- Motel nights: 1 / 8.3%
- Friend nights: 4 / 33.3%
- Hours slept: 74 total or 6.2/night or 25% of trip
- Naps taken: 2 or 1/6.5 days
- Showers taken: 10 or 1/31 hours
Weather & Elevation
- Highest temperature: 118F, throughout Death Valley, CA
- Highest pavement temperature: 158F, Furnace Creek (Death Valley), CA
- Highest Chaco sandal temperature: 140F, Badwater (Death Valley), CA
- Lowest temperature: 54F, Woodrat Mountain, OR
- Temperature swing: 64 degrees Fahrenheit
- Days with rain: 2 total or 15% of trip
- Days with triple digits: 10 or 77% of trip
- Highest elevation: 9260′, Minaret Vista, CA
- Lowest elevation: -282′, Furnace Creek, CA
- Total elevation span: 9542ft
Fuel for the Human
- Meals eaten: 18 or 1.4/day or 1 every 16.4hrs
- Hampton Inn omelettes eaten: 18 or 3/stay
- Packages of candy eaten: 2 or 1 every 60 hours on the road
- Meat sticks eaten: 5 or one every 20 hours on the road
- Ice cream eaten: 5 treats or one every 20 hours on the road
- Fast food meals: 2 or one every 6.5 days
- Water: 24qt or 1.85qt/day
- Artificially sweetened drinks: 22qt or 5.5gal or 1.7drinks/day
- Naturally sweetened drinks: 16qt or 4gal or 0.6drinks/day
- Electrolyte drinks: 32qt or 8gal or 1.8qt/day
- Energy drinks: 11 12oz cans or 0.85/day
- Coffee: 7 or 0.54/day
- Total Fluids consumed: 13.44gal or 1.03gal/day or 290mi/gal of fluid consumed
- Med/Supplement Pills taken: 306 or 23.5/day
- Alcohol/Kratom/Cannabis/Drugs: Zero molecules
- Pounds of ice: 63 total or 4.85lbs/day or enough to make 168 cocktails
Bio Breaks & Bathroom Reviews
- Bio breaks: 43 total or 1 every 98 miles traveled
- Disgusting bathrooms: 13 / 30.2%
- Clean bathrooms: 8 / 18.6%
- No bathroom: 22 / 51.2%
Sights, Stops & Souvenirs
- National parks: 2 or 1/6.5 days (Lassen Volcanic NP and Death Valley NP)
- Volcanic mud pots: 1
- Malls: 7 or 1/1.9 days
- Waterfalls: 2
- Boulders/rock formations climbed: 2
- Mountains stood on top of: 2
- Salt flats stood on: 1
- Military bases visited: 1
- Dams: 1
- Radio observatories driven past: 2
- Antique stores: 2
- Radioactive antiques identified: 30
- Radioactive antiques purchased: 1
- Suspension bridges crossed: 1
- Drawbridges crossed: 2
- Post offices visited: 7
- Postcards mailed: 13 or 1/day
- Railroad cars climbed: 1
- Casinos visited: 8
- Net profit from casinos: -$19
- New tattoos: 2
Wildlife & Unexplainable Encounters
- Dogs petted: 3
- Mini donkeys petted: 1
- White horses seen: 3
- Hearses seen: 2
- Cow peeing out of trailer, splattering all over my car: 1
- Semis given the bird out the sunroof for veering into my lane in CA: 25%
- Semis given the bird out the sunroof for veering into my lane in other states: 2
- Drunk/sleepy drivers: 2
- Woken up by Harley revving: 1
- Horrible restaurant recommendation from a local: 1
- Wigs worn: 2
People
- Women I was dating at the start: 2
- Women I was dating at the end: 1
- Friends visited: 2
- Friends unable to visit: 2
- Hurtful people I have had to block: 1
Documentation
- Photos taken: 539 or 42/day or 1.8/hr
- Videos taken: 43 total or 3.3/day
- Video total length recorded: 16m16s or 3.3seconds/hr of trip or 75sec/day of trip
Stupid RV/Trailer Brand Names Seen
Solitude, Reflection, Voltage, Passport, Sonic, Genesis Supreme, Rockwood, Forest River, Jay Flight, Compass, Snow Bird, Alpine, Imagine, Alliance, Ace, Campsite Reserve, Jay Feather, Lance, Revel, Wolfpup, Arctic Fox, Paradigm Alliance, Escapade, Cougar, Land Yacht, Freedom Elite, Chinook, Okanogan, Adventurer, Real-Lite, Nash, Spirit, View, Starcraft, Fuel, Cyclone, Silverlite, Puma, One, Powerlite, Freedom Express, Chateau, Sunstar, Sunseeker, Creek Side, Force, Sprinter, Omni, Komfort, Raptor, Ambassador.
RV Name Editorial Commentary, Because Someone Had To
- Solitude, on a 5th wheel with four bedrooms and five slide-outs, sleeping up to ten people. That is not solitude. That is a subdivision with an axle.
- Starcraft, on a pop-up camper trailer. What outer space mission is this thing going on. NASA was not consulted and it shows.
- Wolfpup commits to a theme without committing to an animal or a life stage. Pick a species. Pick an age. You cannot have both.
- Land Yacht is the one honest name on this entire list, and I respect it for that.
- Freedom Elite and Freedom Express, two different trims of freedom, both requiring a truck powerful enough to tow nine thousand pounds to go find any.
- Genesis Supreme, the beginning of the universe, supreme edition, now with a propane hookup and a fold-out awning.
- Ambassador, representing what nation exactly, parked at a Flying J outside Barstow.
- Real-Lite is a legal fiction. Nothing about a travel trailer is real-lite and everyone signing the loan knows it.
- Cyclone and Raptor, toy haulers named like natural disasters and apex predators, hauling a golf cart and a folding chair set.
- Escapade with a full bathroom, a slide-out kitchen, and a queen bed is not an escapade. That is a vacation with extra plumbing.
- Snow Bird and Arctic Fox, both spotted in Death Valley in June at 118 degrees. Bold naming strategy.
Bonus Cross Tabulations, Because Raw Statistics Are Never Enough
- Pills taken per mile driven: 0.078 pills/mi
- Net casino loss per casino visited: -$2.38/casino
- Photos taken per state crossing: 53.9 photos/state
- Percentage of awake hours actually spent driving: 54.8% (121hrs driving out of roughly 221 waking hours)
- Pills taken per bio break: 7.12 pills/break, which is either impressive or concerning depending on your medical background
- Miles driven per pound of ice: 62.0 mi/lb, the closest thing this trip had to a fuel efficiency rating for the cooler
- Price markup of most expensive gas over cheapest gas: 162% (Goff, CA vs Pahrump, NV, same country, same fuel, different planets)
- Meat sticks to ice cream treats ratio: 1:1, a perfectly balanced protein-to-dessert diet that no nutritionist asked for
- Postcards mailed per post office visited: 1.86, meaning I mailed more postcards than post offices could reasonably justify
- Number of times I said “never again” out loud somewhere around Furnace Creek: lost count
- Number of times I meant it: 0
- Confidence I had in the accuracy of these statistics at the time of recording: dangerously high
> Display 202606: OUW-FULL.MP4
> home base before the chaos and after it: washington.log
The trip started at 11:16am on June 16th and ended at 6:17pm on June 28th, both times in Washington, which means Washington got to watch me leave sane-ish and come home with two new tattoos and a car that had somehow been renamed mid-trip. Tubaru left the driveway. Banana Boat came home.
> Display 202606: WA*.MP4
> Display 202606: WA*.JPG
> passed through twice, remembered once: oregon.log
Oregon showed up on both ends of the drive, southbound and north again, and quietly handed me the coldest night of the whole trip: 54 degrees at Woodrat Mountain, a 64 degree swing from the furnace I would find further south. No fanfare. Just cool air and a reminder that temperature is relative.
> Display 202606: OR*.JPG
> where the pavement hit 158 degrees and I still climbed a boulder: california.log
California did the heavy lifting for this whole trip. Lassen Volcanic and Death Valley National Parks, back to back, one volcanic mud pot, a salt flat under my feet, and Minaret Vista at 9,260 feet before dropping to negative 282 feet at Furnace Creek in the same state, same week. Furnace Creek pavement hit 158 degrees. Badwater put my Chacos at 140. Gas in Goff cost $9.59 a gallon, which felt like its own kind of heat. Two of the trip’s three government checkpoints were here, and one stretch between Death Valley and Shoshone went 52.5 miles without me seeing another car, which felt less like solitude and more like the desert testing me.
I also drove several hundred miles out of my way to stay in Lee Vining, just for astrophotography. Back in 2022, on a different road trip, I got in too late, never set up a single shot, and had to leave by 5am. I promised myself I would come back and do it right. It took four years, but I did.
The detour into Death Valley in the middle of summer was not an accident either. Twenty two years ago I took a photo there that I have wanted to recapture with a better camera ever since. This time, I got it.
> Display 202606: CA*.MP4
> Display 202606: CA*.JPG
> desert heat, neon losses, and a cow incident I still haven't forgiven: nevada.log
Nevada gave me the cheapest gas of the trip in Pahrump at $3.66, eight casinos, and a net loss of exactly nineteen dollars, which is a fair price for the story. And in Las Vegas, it gave me Omega Mart, the Meow Wolf installation I had wanted to walk through for years. Another bucket list item, crossed off. It also handed me one of the trip’s three government checkpoints, where I was pulled over for secondary inspection because nothing says terrorist like a white guy in a Subaru with two fresh tattoos and ten pounds of snacks in the passenger seat directly below a belted-in stuffed Buffalo. After opening every door on my car and letting them look around, I was cleared to drive across the damned dam.
