So well, yeah, I am still in Kansas City….yeah yeah I know me too.

I wanted to use this “little” delay to talk about how great everyone from hourly security guards to Ford Corp Comm folks have been. Even when there is nothing they can do to help they are all really nice about it. Also this is a good chance to tell all you future SEMA builders to be careful how big and bad you want to seem, it can bite you in the butt.

But before we get to the part where I screwed up let me tell you about all the good stuff.

Sat am and no van and not likely but that is ok, there is plenty to do, roam the K CAP perimeter (Kansas City Assembly Plant)…..

I nearly had a heart attack when I saw a Red low roof van, but a little work with the zoom lens broken my heart, wasn’t mine…

So instead I went off to check out rural Kansas on my way to meet up with the fine folks of Konza Overland. This drive in movie theater is way cool and still in use.

And then you have the cool older places that I still wish were open so I could hear the stories of times gone by…..

And then I finally got to the Overlanding part of the day, well not really that would still be a bit as I drove 2hrs to join the Konza Overland group. But I did find the Great Overland Station, amazing the things you will see if you follow the little road signs instead of blasting down a highway. This place was one of the great railroad stations in the Midwest built in 1927, with 20,000 people coming to the grand opening.

Pretty soon I was in Manhattan, but not the one with skyscrapers, the one in the middle of Kansas! I found a great group of gents who were happy let me have a passenger seat and show me the dirt roads, waterfalls and history of an area I know I will return and enjoy again in the future, or sooner if I can’t get a van and hit the road.

I am working some video from the adventure…watch for that soon.

Now to the part you were waiting on….why it might be better to be nobody.

In the tactical world it is known as “grey man”, invisible because he is of little note. However when you tell Ford you are doing this 4200 mile road trip to SEMA, building the van along the way, and you plan to chase in Baja and have more adventures on the way to Overland Expo West in May, well, Ford doesn’t want anything to go wrong. Either they know how I beat on rigs, or they just don’t want a video of a Race Red Transit burning to the ground along a highway.

So the great folks at the factory are checking everything over, including the Paint which needed some work (if only they knew the desert pinstriping this thing will get). So waiting and waiting but in the end it will be worth it.

So word to the wise, before you tell anyone what you are doing, think through the “Law of Unintended Consequences”….are you better off known or unknown?