Hello and welcome to Phil and Fed's bogus journey. Phil, where are we?

We are currently in Shambly, Georgia, because the cheap bus that we bought dropped off in

the absolute middle of nowhere, it seems, or picks up early.

I don't hate it, man. I don't hate it. I know, it's weird, but I'm into it.

For that matter, where have we been?

We have been to Birmingham, Alabama. Yeah, yeah. That's definitely how they speak down there. Definitely. Definitely not. I just insulted loads of people from Alabama. No, we have evidence and friends of that now. Calling us y'all. Yeah, they called us y'all, so they must really like us. We know. And sweetheart. Other things. Sugar? Oh, that's too much. Enjoy being cold sugar. Me too. Me too.

But yeah, so we did the first night of Phil and Fe's excellent adventure, really, or bogus journey, sorry. Yeah. Get the movies right. It's all right. Staying in, I can't remember what the hotel was, but it was a really nice hotel in Birmingham, Alabama. You have allowed us to live large and in charge on the bogus journey so far, Phil. Look, I've still been booking cheap stuff. It just so happens that the cheap stuff happens to also just be a vaguely fine. Like, nice hotel was a nice hotel, not even vaguely fine, that was genuinely nice. I did not realise after last year's excellent adventure, I was travelling with a man of such refined taste. We squashed and boxed our way into some fairly small lodgings along the way last year. But so far so big, yeah. Last year's cities were a lot more expensive, what can I say? Yeah, yeah. Many reasons why the West Coast is the best coast, but we're finding little hidden gems. And like, I didn't expect Birmingham, Alabama, to feel like a hidden gem because it's Birmingham, Alabama.

It's a big city.

It is a big state.

Which we drove through plenty of in the rest of our travels to come on later editions of the podcast.

But the takeaway, the first takeaway, is just how quiet it was.

Like, remarkably quiet from me.

Like, almost eerily quiet. Yeah. I've never been to a major American city. When I say major, obviously, there's a lot of history there, a lot of really interesting civil rights history. There's some cool stuff on your Instagram to that point. Massive buildings, a big banking and like farmer area, lots of people seemingly working in these big buildings

are nobody on the streets yeah a real haunted quality to it yeah nobody it's real strange like

like we stumbled across a bit of life accidentally but like just in the city there's just like

it's so quiet it's weird there's not even even any like shops. Like where do the people go?

No.

What are in these buildings?

There must be people in these gigantic buildings somewhere.

Yeah.

But where do they go for food? Where do they go for lunch? Yeah. And like, why do they go to buy a bag of crisps? I've got it. Come on, guys. You can tell Phil's been travelling with me a few days now

that he starts to understand my day-to-day priorities.

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