PLACES THAT WE’VE NEVER BEEN

I first met (Rob and Chris) not long after my wife and I split up.

Actually, I’ve never even been married.

That’s the opening line from Jack Kerouac’s 1957 classic novel, “On the Road.” Just substitute “Dean” where you read “Rob and Chris.”

Rob and Chris are Register-Guard graphics director Rob Romig and photographer Chris Pietsch, and yes they are both married.

But their wives once again know they have a job to do starting today.

The three of us are “on the road” — again — as we take our latest great American road trip. We are going all the way to Glendale, Ariz., for the biggest University of Oregon football game ever, the BCS National Championship against No. 1 Auburn.

Last year, we drove to Los Angeles to cover the fan migration south as the University of Oregon football team played Ohio State in the Rose Bowl.

We only came close to killing one another a couple of times. Like when I worried that the steam coming out of Romig’s ears would fog up the windshield on the rental van because he wanted to throttle Pietsch for screaming at him to get ahead of traffic in Interstate 5’s slow lane so we wouldn’t lose the green-and-yellow cars we were chasing, and thus Pietsch wouldn’t lose his front page photo opportunity.

According to Mapquest.com, it’s 1,222 miles from The Register-Guard offices on Chad Drive in Eugene to University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale.

That’s doable in a couple of days, but we plan to take our time and make it a four-day trip so that we can bring you crazed Duck fans some riDuckulous and quacktacular stories along the way as we make our way to the, uh, Grand “Natty” of Them All.

In fact, we’re calling this trip the “Road 2 Natty.” Natty as in “national,” as in what came out of UO cornerback Cliff Harris’s mouth after the Ducks beat Arizona on Nov. 26: “We’re looking at the natty now,” Harris told reporters. “Ain’t about the Pac-10 and the Rose Bowl.”

So we hope you’ll join us. In fact, you can go to www.registerguard.com/video right now and see UO head coach Chip Kelly pumping our gas before we head out of town. At least, he sure looked like Coach Kelly.

You can also see what appears to be the guys from Supwitchugirl, those wacky “I Love My Ducks” guys.

We asked the UO if the Duck mascot could be in our kickoff video, too, but got a thumbs-down on that one.

No, there’s no conflict with Disney anymore when it comes to filming the Duck, and the Duck himself wanted to do it, but his handlers felt it would be some sort of conflict of interest.

But we have a feeling we’ll see the Duck on our way to Glendale. Rumor is he tends bar sometimes in San Francisco. Seriously.

And what’s a road trip without a stop in Sin City?

Yes, we plan to hit Las Vegas to see what sort of mischief Duck fans are getting themselves into before they waltz into University of Phoenix Stadium on Monday, rub their eyes, and wonder if this is all really happening.

Only one way to find out.

In the words of Otter and Boon from “Animal House”: “Road trip!”