My Cross Conutry Road Trip Thread (02/03/12:) PART III

[dude8383]

2,989 miles in 4 days. Made it in one piece. She ran so beautifully. Smooth and strong. No warning lights, no funny noises, no wacky behavior. I was so impressed with how well she did. I ain't never giving up on her.
Pics and details tomorrow. I'm pooped.

Woot. Looking forward to it.

So that's it, San Diego for good huh?

[BrooklynMW]

2,989 miles in 4 days. Made it in one piece. She ran so beautifully. Smooth and strong. No warning lights, no funny noises, no wacky behavior. I was so impressed with how well she did. I ain't never giving up on her.
Pics and details tomorrow. I'm pooped.

[M4DE30]

Good luck man! You'll be fine.

[BrooklynMW]

ROUND 3 (And pics from Round 2)

Well, just finishing up packing and cleaning, gonna get a few hours shut eye, then embark on my 3rd cross country road trip in my e30. She has 195,600 miles on her. Sounds crazy, but I hope I hit 200k before the end of the month. Her production date is 02/87, so I think it'd be cool if she hits 200k on her 25th birthday.

Anyway I'll be keeping a log here with photos and stats. But since I never kept a log of my 2nd road trip, here are a few highlights from Round II: CA to NY 09/11:

This is how you pack a car. Who needs minivan? e30 fits all


SCHMUCK:

Montezuma:

Oh yeah, low:


Road to the Grand Canyon:

GRAND FUCKING CANYON (Seriously the most beautiful thing I've ever seen):


The MOON rising over Grand Canyon:


Continental Divide:


ROUTE 66:







St. Louis:

Artsy fartsy shots of the Arch:






Last pit stop before final destination, stopped in to see the new (at the time) GPS:


Home:



Tomorrow I'll be going the opposite way and making San Diego my new permanent home. Wish me luck.

[BrooklynMW]

I'll probably keep it clean and keep it here.

[dude8383]

Round 3 coming soon

Sweet! You going to start a new thread or just going to keep it going here?

[harv]

I fly for a living, I also have a small airplane, I still love a long distance, cross country drive!

John

[Butler]

Awesome pics dude! That looks like a great trip!

[BrooklynMW]

Round 3 coming soon

[BrooklynMW]

Thanks, man. Good luck on the rest of your trip as well.

[Joe G]

Wow, seems like there are a lot of E30s doing cross country trips right now. I just finished my first leg of my voyage from Long Island to Washington State.

Good Luck on your trip back to NYC.

[BrooklynMW]

Part ii: Heading back east

08/25/11:
Thos of you who read this thread know I moved from NY to California back in December. The plan was to move to L.A., spent 2 months there, but fell in love with San Diego instead. We've been living in SD for a few months now right next to the beach. I've been relaxing, surfing and enjoying some well needed time off. I even went on a national tour with a local SD band.
But nevertheless my un-employed lifestyle can only take me so far, work in my various fields out here is scarce and I need to head back to NYC where I have guaranteed steady income. (Plus, I admittedly miss my city).

I'm leaving in about 2.5 weeks time. Same car. Only this time, she's 14,000 miles wiser. New e36 steering rack, completely rebuilt cooling system, a coupla new bruises and a broken odometer. My girlfriend is already back in NY so I will be doing the trip all by meself. I'm not sure what route I'll be taking yet, but most likely the quickest one possible to save money. I'll post some photos and stats and keep everybody posted like I did last time.

Thanks California. I really love it here in San Diego and I plan on coming back soon. Just need to go make some money first!

[BrooklynMW]

Yeah mine just passed the 175k mark. She's got a few growing pains to get through (need to rebuild drive shaft) but once they're all taken care of, I plan to keep her for half a million miles.

[Kovs]

Good read, thanks for posting this. It's amazing that our E30s - hell, almost any 80s BMW - is capable of a cross country trip with no more drama than a check engine light. The youngest of our cars is now 18 years old and most of them are averaging 20+ years and 200K+ miles!

[BrooklynMW]

Hey everybody. Sorry I never finished my freakin thread. Once we arrived in San Diego, we just got wrapped up with settling in, family stuff, holidays, looking for apartments, setting up meetings, job hunting, etc. that the thread kind of fell by the way side.

So, to sum it up:

Total miles travelled on the trip: 3,167

Overall it was a smooth trip, and my first real long distance driving experience. Chewbacca held up well, for the most part. My check engine light was due to the faulty codes on the new ECU we installed just before we left. Since then I put my original ECU back in and the car runs much better. (That also means I'm still on the lookout for a decent chip).

Terry Sayther in Austin was a come-in-your-pants dream service station for any BMW lover:


Also, since I've been in San Diego, I've had some work done at La Jolla Independent aka Bimmerdoc. Yowza! I've never seen so many perfect e9's in my life. They also have the 2002 vert that was in some Katy Perry video.

Anyway, so we've been staying in San D with my girlfriend's mother, but will be moving up to Long Beach at the end of the Month. The girlfriend has a cousin with an empty condo there, so we'll be paying SUPER LOW rent! We'll be in Long Beach for 3 months before either looking for a place further in to LA (West Hollywood/Los Feliz, etc). Or heading back to NYC, Austin TX or Nashville.

I've been meeting a lot of people in the music industry, and trying to keep my mind, eyes and ears open, looking for good gigs and good opportunities. I may also apply for a part time job at the Petersen Auto Museum on Wilshire, so I can be around cars for a while. Maybe they'll let me wipe em down!

I'm looking forward to getting out of San D and up to LA county. I plan on heading up to Castro's once I arrive, but also looking for suggestions for decent BMW places in Long Beach in case of emergency.

Also looking for fun things to do in Long Beach. It wasn't exactly my desired destination spot so I haven't done any research on it.

Thanks a lot for reading, guys. It was a fun trip, and it was fun to document it. I'll have a link to a full photo album once I finish fucking editing them all.