From Neal…

It’s official: our Sk8 the St8s crew is great at making plans, snake-bit when it comes to the follow-thru.

Last night while driving, the boys searched for Pittsburgh skateparks and picked a funky-sounding place called Mr. Smalls, in a suburb called Milvale. We phoned ahead and left a message, and emailed them too. We got no response, so in the morning we headed into Milvale and drove around searching for Mr. Smalls. Turns out it’s a nice outdoor park beside the Allegheny River. But it was closed, most likely due to last night’s heavy rains (which soaked some of Nathan’s and Lou’s clothes).

The boys improvised by skating on anything concrete they could find…

…and improvised some more in a downtown parking lot, doing tricks off the steel barrier, known by the skaters as a “rail.”

We tried to have lunch at locally famous Primanti Brothers, in the Strip District, where we planned to meet up with my cousin and his wife. But a block-long line chased us to nearby Mancini’s for pepperoni rolls (a huge hit), and we got back on the road. Sorry Ethan!

On the way to Detroit, Sean talked us into an unplanned stop in Cleveland, to search for a well-known “skate spot” southeast of downtown. We drove through neighborhoods not listed in the tourist guides, and just as we were about to quit, Sean found the spot – using Google Maps on my iPad. (I’m almost embarrassed at how tech-reliant our road trip is).

See Sean’s post for more about the “King Kennedy” skate spot…

To follow the whole coast-to-coast, dads-and-sons adventure, check out http://sk8thest8s.cbslocal.com/