news update links
May 26, 2009

Savannah, GA - Charleston, SC - (135.8miles -219.9km)
By Valerio;.

Hi people again, here is Kenny V.
We wake up in Mrs Anes house, the team members all together in one room, really cosy!!! Open eyes..array set up done!!Now.. Super breakfast!! Mrs Anes already prepared the coffee and bought the sandwiches. Since Lora is vegetarian, Marcelo is trying to become vegetarian and Josh just woke up vegetarian they all give me the meat inside the sandwich or their own sandwich. I am feeling like the carnivore of the team!!! But I am pretty fine with it!! Time for some updating...my poetic inspiration seems to be favored by the huge amount of coffee ingested!! We’d better leave soon...the sun is shining outside!! Gone with the sun!! better no wind for us!! After my first wrong turn as navigator…we stop to fix the cabling on the top of the car which detached and touched the motor fan!! On the road again…horses and solar cars along the way...in a harmonic although odd, synthesis of antiquity and modernity.
We just pass the last Cherry pie shop of Georgia…no more in 200 miles…People the sign says: “ Welcome to South Carolina”. Which will be the typical fruit from Carolina…no time for shopping got to go…in the rain in the shade of the tree but we manage to drive for 79.6 miles…until Colleton: stop-array setup- deserved ice-cream-mini soccer match and toilet. Just ready to go!! Lora is always at the steering wheel!!! Good pilot I have to say!
Do we have a destination?? Not really we basically have to go as far as possible!! We keep on driving until we run almost out of juice..some minor navigation mistakes but it is comprehensible some streets were not even in the map!!! And there we get in Charleston…almost along the beach!! We actually stop in Applebee restaurant..wow my first American steak. I am really satisfied!! I show some videos of my band L’Chaim on youtube…cool! Marcelo has a kind of split sight…one eye watches his dish with the other checks the car!! A bit paranoid jumps out of the restaurant to prevent people to touch the car! Good move...this way he got to know a local singer-song writer Irine and her magnificent choir…after dinner we get out of the restaurant and improvise a peculiar jam session in the parking place!!awesome!!never heard American pop music so close…It sounded like a videoclip I loved the harmonized voices of the other girls…I try to join the jam but doesn’t work really good!! Lora is learning how to play with POI (cariocas in spanish)...cool!! Ok we can either go to the beach and sleep there or keep driving a bit until the battery is completely empty!! Marcelo chooses the second alternative ..we try to get to another beach more to the east but TATTATA!!!private property. Instead of coming back to the beach Marcelo decides to park in a parking lot of WAL MART. The crew is really disappointed but understands that the following day is going to be really tough!! I go to sleep in the trailer with him..man!! 3 sleeping bad, 2 seconds, 1 word between us…and RONF!! Again both deadly asleep..see you tomorrow Wal Mart.
Kenny V.


By Josh Holton;
The weather forecast showed rain in the south for the whole week! Of course, the XOF1 team is keeping bright spirits and ever hoping for whatever last ounce of sunshine we can use to charge the car. I really enjoyed playing piano at Inez’s house. The foster kids that live with her were up and out of the house quite early. The weather forecasts were looking pretty dim. It looked like it would rain in Savannah all week. With hope in the sun, we found it to be an unusually sunny day; sunny enough to charge the car and hit the road. Laura was having her second day driving. She used to own and drive a bus powered by veggie oil, and so she was really good at handling large vehicles. We drove all the way across Georgia to South Carolina, where we stopped at an Applebee’s in Charleston, S.C. for dinner. Marcelo had been wanting to stop there for some time because he had a gift card. When we left the restaurant, We ran into a singer-songwriter named Irene Smith. She was from South Carolina, and had written a song called, “South Carolina Calls me Home.” She had some backup singers and friends with her, and after hearing that we had Valerio’s saxophone and my ukulele in the van, the played some songs of theirs with us. I’ve never had a country music jam before, but I must say, it was one of the most awesome and spontaneous musical momentts I’ve had since the festival in White Springs, Florida. We ended up sleeping in the van in a Walmart parking lot. Tomorrow, we hit the road for D.C.

By Laura Peruzzi;

Georgia offered us peaches and the hospitality of Inez, a very sweet lady who reminds marcelo of the oracle in the matrix. South Carolina offered the auditory delight of Irene, a country music singer/songwriter. Late night in the parking lot of Applebees in charleston we were blessed with the original songs of a true southern belle. “Sweet Carolina calls me home..” Irene and her younger sister, both smiles and bouncy blond hair, sang together in perfect harmony for an intimate and random solar car acoustic jam under the neon restaurant signs. Her lyrics about summertime, white oleanders, callused hands holding tender hearts, lemonade and shagging on the dock (apparently the SC state dance) flow like nectar and I hope to hear her on the radio soon. I’m so happy to meet all these creative and musically talented people on this trip. My body is an instrument and dance is my song so today I am thrilled to acquire a new talent; fire twirling!
After seeing the belly-dancers juggling and dancing with fire in the video Valerio’s showed us of his band, I am presented with a set of chains to begin learning the art of fire dance! From his saxophone case Valerio takes out a bag, heavy with a set of chains coiled around each other like snakes. The chains are about 3 feet long, each with fabric loops for two fingers and each with a wad of cotton fabric encased in chain link metal to be soaked and lit up for maximum entertainment value. I’m so grateful and so thrilled I start twirling immediately. I’m making simple circles and learning how to swing both chains together into a figure 8 pattern crossing over and under my arms and making an x in front of me. To add to today’s excitement we were charging at 7 AH, the highest I’ve seen so far! Marcelo also shared with us his drawings for a hydraulic steering apparatus to replace the mechanical one for more elegant maneuvering by compressing
liquids through tubes to turn the wheels. After an unsuccessful attempt to sleep on the beach we pull into the best hotel Charleston has to offer our solar car caravan: The Resort at Walmart Parking Lot. Swanky!
The sun woke up late tis morning from behind a thick haise
Barely any charge until late morning, only 0.6Ah (55 watts)
Inez and little Jordan
Inez and Marcelo by the solar car
Josh playing some funky tunes on the piano
Jordan
Quack quack!!!
Jordan
A sneezee cauth on camera!
Jordan
All on board!!!
A tour bus passing by, tourists looking at the sunny. Snap, snap, snap, everyone ad a camera
Still at the same intersection, a horse tour, smile, you are on XOF1 camera!
Up into the sky we drive!
A beatiful bridge,
Jordan
Salute!
Look mom, no hands!
Jordan
Shiny solar car
The law
The car
It fly
It used to fly
It drives
Its pealed
Its wet and its blue
It's going fast
Its windy!
It needs gas
It doesn't need gas
It quacks like a duck!
It quacks too!
Quack quack!
Hey, what have they been drinking
Jordan
Yeah, we are in Charleston!
its time to eat
It's pretty
Smile, you are on XOF1 camera
An out door concert, great music
Irene and her syster enchanting the crowd
Singing te night away