*Meet: Jerry. Bert’s ‘93 Honda Accord Sedan.*

Where do I even begin…

I'm still processing this trip because we did not stop moving for more than 30 minutes the entirety of the journey.

I suppose we start with why; I've had a set of 3 piece Rotiform WRW's for a minute, and never got a chance to run them on anything so I decided to partake in all of our favorite past-time, Facebook Marketplace.

*Couldn’t just leave them in the car, could we?*

Long story short, a guy from the Las Cruces area bought them for a pretty penny (my number for letting these wheels go was not cheap.) and I set up LTL shipping to get them to him. 2 weeks and a few phone calls later, and my RXO broker informed me that no carrier would do residential pickup in my area for less than $550 including insurance. I shopped around, and ultimately decided that if its going to cost that much, why not hand deliver them and essentially have a paid road trip?

Thus begins the adventure. Our chosen chariot was Jerry, Bert's '93 Accord sedan. No AC, no power steering, questionable alignment and a whole lot of character. Myself (Coob) and Bop were the only two out of the Hoodratz205 crew whose schedules allowed for this journey so we packed up and got ready to hit the road. We brought every tool you could likely need for a CB7, and then some. We took a spare 4x114.3 steelie (which you can see turned out to be a good idea) and hit the road at 8pm on Friday night.

We made it to Vicksburg, Mississippi sometime around 2-2:30am that night, and stayed in an Econo Lodge. Vicksburg is an absolutely beautiful southern town, and we will be going back to check out the local sights and spots. We needed to be in El Paso (which ended up turning into Las Cruces) Saturday night so we could meet the guy who bought the wheels Sunday morning, so we set out on the longest leg of the trip; roughly 14 hours.

We stopped in Shreveport for a few minutes to stretch, check out the Riverwalk and the old drawbridge and then it was on to Texas. We stopped at the welcome facility/rest stop on the state line, and I've got to say it really put Alabama to shame. Not sure where it was along the journey other than between the state line and DFW but we found the coolest little theme park called Yesterland Farm. Unfortunately they were closed, so we marked this as a spot to return to at some point in the future.

*Yesterland Farm, which we will be re-visiting.*

We hit the Dallas/Fort Worth/Arlington area sometime around 7pm, at which point we passed Summit Racing and we marked them as well to hit on our way back through. As the sun set, the Texas grasslands and rolling hills turned flat and arid. Cities turned into oil fields, and eventually wind farms with blinking red lights on top of turbines as far as the eye could see in every direction. We stopped at a picnic area somewhere in the middle of the wind farms, checked the car over, and took the expanse in for a moment. Once we got back on the road, the traffic gradually thinned until it was only us and a white Ram 1500, for the entirety of a 150+ mile stretch.

*‘Texas - Big X Tha Plug’ was played here.*

At some point after midnight, along the horizon and only barely illuminated by the moonlight, the wide open expanse began to reach into the sky. Gargantuan silhouettes loomed, and to our southeastern brains they registered the same way a group of trees do, but we knew it couldn't be trees. Mile over mile, the lower end of the Guadalupe Mountain range grew, and eventually we saw that the interstate was cut right through them. We took a moment to discuss and marvel at the engineering feat that is the American interstate system (thanks Eisenhower), and express our love for a country that we've felt too much angst towards for the majority of our lives.

A few hours later, we approached El Paso and decided to land there for the night. This begins the most infuriating part of the trip. Unbeknownst to us, BTS, El Paso Comic-Con, and the Sol Summit Music & Culture festival were all happening this weekend. Motel 6 rooms that were typically $47 for a night, were upwards of $500 if they even had availability. We reached El Paso and we did not have time to deliberate so we essentially turned Jerry into a tent in a Valero parking lot.

All things considered, it was very comfortable and once we decompressed a bit we were just happy to finally be stopped. We'd only seen the desert by the light of streetlamps and the moon so far, so we put on some sleep sounds, tucked in for the night, and drifted off to sleep as we contemplated what wonders the morning might hold.

*Sometimes a wheel design looks so good, you just gotta sleep with it. Ya feel?*

Sunday morning came too fast, but we were as recharged as we were going to be. We took down the window coverings (some towels, shirts, blankets, and cardboard we'd packed with us), used Valero's facilities to brush our teeth, grabbed some snacks, and set out to meet up with the buyer. Due to some complications, we ended up having to deliver them to his spot in Las Cruces, but at that point what was 25 more miles and another state added to the journey?

We dropped the wheels off, received payment, and took a moment to truly relax for the first time in 48 long hours. We let whimsy take over for a few moments, and just drove around and took in the beauty of New Mexico. Bop was especially struck by the geography and architecture of Las Cruces, and I wasn't far behind him. It truly is a sight to behold, and if you ever get the chance I highly recommend visiting. We found a hole in the wall spot to get some authentic Tex Mex, filled our bellies with real food for the first time in days, and enjoyed the best dopamine release you can possibly experience, in my humble opinion.

Now that we were fed, and didn't really have a deadline to meet, we decided to break up the trip home into equal halves, which meant our destination was Dallas. We hit the road at about 1, excited to see everything we couldn't the night before. The mountains, small west Texas towns, and the desert were some of the most breathtaking things we'd ever laid our eyes on.

We stopped a few places along the way, including the plateaus in West Texas, took the time to take in the local flora and fauna (or lack thereof) and grabbed some rocks to bring home with us as souvenirs. As gradually as they had the night before, the mountain ranges turned back into flat, wide open expanse.

As the sun began to set, somewhere outside of Pecos, all of a sudden Jerry wouldn't rev above 3500rpm and then shut off as we pulled off an exit. The 3500rpm momentary limit told us one thing; distributor. Jerry is not a perfectly maintained example, but he is reliable and easy to repair when needed. So we began the process of diagnosis, and as we did so a man that would come to be our life-saver pulled up behind us in a bright green Ford F-750.

*Well, that’s what happens when you put grease in an oil-bath hub.*

Bert had replaced the dizzy a few months prior with an aftermarket OEM style replacement, and in the process we made a crucial error- his new dizzy did not have a set screw on the rotor even though it had a hole in the sleeve for one. You Honda guys will know there are two styles of rotor for OBD1 Hondas, and if yours has the provision for the set screw it is CRUCIAL that it is present and loctited in place.

We lucked out in that there was an O'Reilly's one exit behind us, so our savior TJ, who runs a mobile mechanic service based out of Alabama of all places (small world, right?), set off to grab us the parts. 45 minutes later, with the new parts installed, Jerry fired right up and ran better than he had at any point thus far in the trip. We thanked TJ profusely and he insisted on not taking anything other than what he paid with his commercial account for the parts. After what we'd done for us, we couldn't let that fly so we paid him every bit of what we could spare for his time and generosity.

If you ever need mobile mechanic services, check him out. 'TJ - Your Mechanic', website link below!

As the sun set, the red blinking lights of the wind farms appeared all around us, and then that gradually faded back into the sparse fires burning out of the stacks of the oil refineries we'd seen the evening before. The stars overhead dotted the sky like holes in an old wool blanket, and the dry, arid heat turned back into the familiar humidity we were so accustomed to.

Oil fields gradually turned back into grasslands on rolling hills, and small towns turned into cities. We made our way into DFW sometime around 3am, located a Taco Bell and a Comfort Inn, ate, and crashed hard. Like the last two, the morning would come all too quickly. We woke up and checked out of our hotel, gave Jerry another once over, and headed to Summit Racing.

We do not have stores like this anywhere near us, so you can only imagine what kind of heaven we were in. Everything we'd stared at on screens was now right in front of us, and we took the time and opportunity to get our hands on some parts and answer some questions we'd had about potential mods and build ideas. I very heavily contemplated going into debt for an aluma-frame and quadra-link setup for my '65 Mustang coupe, but ultimately decided I'd like to see it and the rest of my projects leave jack stands by the end of this year so I tore myself away and made the reasonable decision to buy the things I need to treat the rust on it.

We found a local spot to get some real tacos, which were absolutely delicious, found a park to eat and relax in for a little while, and just took it all in. It was the first time we'd truly stopped moving in days, and it was wonderful (other than being propositioned to smoke meth, thanks Texas. I'm all the way good on that lol)

It was nearing 4pm, so we hit the road for the final leg of this incredible journey. We hoped to beat 5 o'clock traffic in DFW but that hope was all but that, and we descended into the kind of traffic nightmares are made of. We battled it for what felt like forever, but soon enough we were clear and the roads of east Texas opened up more and more.

At this point, we were very tired and very ready to sleep in our own beds, so we decided not to stop until Shreveport. Texas came and went as it had days earlier, and we once again marveled at a land we'd never been given the means or opportunity to appreciate.

We rolled into Shreveport at sunset, and stopped for one of my absolute favorite things on this great planet of ours; Cajun Food. I got my Crawfish Etouffee that I'd been craving for so long and Bop got a Poboy. Now, It's been a few years since I'd been to Louisiana. Me going without authentic Cajun food for that long as alot like deciding not to breathe, it just ain't right. As you can imagine, especially given the juxtaposition of all that we'd experienced so far, this brought on a form and degree of catharsis I've experienced only a handful of times in my life. 10/10 highly recommend.

*Dry docked riverboat in Vicksburg. Very very cool*

Bellies full and minds pacified, we hopped back on the road for a straight shot home. Louisiana turned to the red roads of Mississippi, and we knew it wouldn't be long now. We passed through Meridian, and the anticipation of a warm bed grew like a wildfire.

We knew we hit Alabama when the roads turned into what felt like the surface of the moon, and we noted how spoiled we'd been in that regard throughout every other state thus far in the journey. The plants, landmarks, and infrastructure that we'd seen all our lives was no longer the background. It was all fresh and new, and so different than everything we'd been taking in over the course of the last 96 hours.

We approached home, and the exhaustion hit like a runaway freight train. Despite it, we were overjoyed to see everything in our city in such a fresh, new light and ecstatic that we'd actually accomplished the feat that we set out to do, and nearly without a hitch at that. We touched down at Hoodratz Headquarters, got out, and just stared at everything.

*Obligatory old gas station pic. Period correct, of course*

The sh!tbox project cars, the trees, the stars, our 'shop' which is just a closed in metal car port, my house, a mobile home. There was so much we'd stopped taking in because we saw it everyday, or were always playing the game of comparing our lives to what we see online, and this trip made us realize just how grateful we actually are for everything we have and get to do.

There aren't many experiences like this.

Us, some tools, some parts, and a questionably reliable vehicle. It's a formula thats now hard-coded into us thanks to years of Motortrend, Mike Finnegan, and David Freiburger. To that end, we've dreamed for years of doing it this big, and this was a test run for that.

Stay. Tuned.

If you made it this far and enjoyed what you read, please take the time to check out our merch and Amazon/Ebay stores. Full transparency, our goal here is to be able to do this as much as possible, with vehicles no one's done it with so far. We need every bit of help we can get from you guys to get there, and we intend to give back in every possible way we can as enthusiasts and general lovers of all things on wheels.

And if you can, get out there and do it yourself. It'll be one of the greatest things you've ever done.

Much love, Coob out.

We drove a 1993 Honda Accord 2700 miles, halfway across the country and back, in 4 days.