Pa. Man Barters With Bacon for Cross-Country Trip
Sept. 13, 2012— -- Josh Sankey has been issued a challenge: to make his way from New York City to Los Angeles with nothing but a smile and a refrigerated trailer filled with 3,000 pounds of bacon.
That means no cash and no credit cards. The uncooked bacon is the only currency the actor and comedian has for gas, lodging, food and everything else he'll need along the way. It's not just the bare necessities either. Sankey's managing to enjoy the sites along the way.
"I got two tickets to the Jets game for six bricks [of bacon]," he said. "They were pretty good seats, too."
The nation's love of bacon has been well-documented as of late. Burger King created a bacon ice cream sundae for the summer months.
A California-based burger chain created a 100 percent bacon burger.
You can even be buried in a bacon coffin.
Sankey, an actor and comedian from New Castle, Pa., has been on the road for four days. He has so far managed to barter for a NYC taxi ride, Jets tickets, lodging, food and even a tattoo -- of bacon -- for a guy named Kevin, who ultimately gave him a place to sleep. It cost him 200 bricks to convince Kevin to get a bacon tattoo and another 200 to pay the tattoo artist.
The trip, a publicity stunt backed by the Oscar Mayer Co. and complete with a film crew, kicked off in New York City Sept. 9. He has two weeks to get to Los Angeles.
His adventures are being chronicled at BaconBarter.com and @BaconBarter. He has 730,000 facebook likes and 2,400 followers on Twitter.
The first stop was Hagerstown, Md., where he spent the night with someone he met on Twitter. "He was like, 'Yeah, just let me know when you get here,'" Sankey, 37, said. "I got there at like 1:15 in the morning. We stayed up talking until after 3 [a.m.]."
At his next stop, Charleston, W.Va., he met up with a woman named Shawn who gave him a place to sleep (nine bricks), a shower (six bricks) and a country breakfast (six bricks). She even had a bonfire waiting for him in the yard.
He has been most surprised, he said, by the "sweetness of people. I can't believe they let me in."
In Lesage W.Va., his next stop, he managed to barter a pork product for another pork product. "We went to this awesome place called Hillbilly hotdog and I managed to get hot dogs for the whole crew," he said.
The cost? 10 bricks.
Sankey was in Louisville, Ky., when he spoke to ABC News today, en route to the National Quartet Convention, a convention of gospel music fans. He hoped to barter some of his bacon to get up on the stage and sing. About bacon.
"Now I just really want to up the ante," he said. "I mean, a guy got a permanent tattoo of bacon in exchange for bacon. How do you top that?"
One idea: "It would be really great to get a penthouse at a hotel."
