A quick plug for Dustball Dave

Howdy y'a. Dave Maass, CityBeat staff writer, making a brief appearance on the Canvassed blog to plug a little something I've been working on in my free time with the San Diego Automotive Museum and the Balboa Park Online Collaborative.

I'm on vacation this week, but rather than kick it on the beach, I'm cramming myself into the backseat (multiple backseats, actually) on the Dustball 2000, a three-day, 2,000-mile road rally. Leaving El Paso at the crickety-crack of dawn Wednesday morning, the scavenger-hunt-style adventure runs along a mystery route across the American Southwest to Las Vegas.

If you're familiar with the Cannonball Run, the Gumball 3000 or the Bullrun, then you have a pretty good idea of what I'm talking about. The main difference is that this is a "gimmick rally," which means the 30 cars on the rally don't know where they're going. At each morning's launch, the teams are handed a worksheet that gives them clues to solve in order to determine the route. They also have to find certain roadside attractions to answer questions that will ultimately determine the rally winner. Although it's not a race (there is no prize for finishing first, or making the best time), you can bet these cars are going to blazing down the highways.

The other big difference is that while the Gumball and Bull run bill themselves as luxury, lifestyle events with five-digit entry fees, the Dustball does away with all the pretentiousness (and reality TV stars) and is open to the common car-lover.

I'll be live blogging the whole thing, hopping from car to car, posting videos, photos, updates and chatting live. You can follow the live feed at Dustballrally.info all three days or stop by the San Diego Automotive Museum to play with the interactive station in the lobby.  Props to the Balboa Park Online Collaborative for making it happen.

I'll also be posting regularly to my Dustball Dave Tumblr and to the Dustball Rally's official blog. And, of course, we're on Facebook and Twitter, where you can follow the #Dustball hashtag. Basically, whatever social-media you're on, you'll find us, except for maybe Google+, which is too new to really be useful.

Full disclosure: The Dustball Rallly sponsored my flight and lodging, while the rest was raised through the crowdfunding site IndieGoGo.