Possible rerouting

I had coffee the other day with a good friend and mentor of mine and he suggested I go through Banff and Jasper in Alberta/British Columbia. It's not on my current route but I think I can squeeze it in. It looks like it will be worth the extra driving.

I might also leave on Wednesday the 25th, a day later than planned so that a motorcycling friend of mine can ride with me for the first hundred miles or so. He says there's some good BBQ out in Llano, so we'll probably head there, have lunch and then he'll turn back. From that point, I'll continue on for another 320 miles to Lubbock. I tell you - you don't realize how big Texas is until you drive around it a bit. Austin is about in the center of the state and Lubbock is at the base of the stove-pipe thing at the top and they're 400 miles apart! I've got to drive about 600 miles to get out of the state.

After looking at the first few days of my drive, I wish I could fire myself out of a circus cannon across Kansas, Nebraska, and Iowa and land in Minnesota. After that it should be pretty good sightseeing until the very last part of my trip when I'm driving through west Texas again.