Janet came to Portland on the 29th of January and we stayed in town for a few days chillin' with Parag and some friends from Seattle, Monica and Rachel. Janet and I planned out sooo many things to see and do over the proceeding 12 days, but let me tell you honey, things don't always work out like you plan! Our plans probably changed about 20 times with each setback, but we definitely rolled with the punches and tried to make the best of it.
The initial plan(while still in OR):
Day 1: Head East to the Columbia River Gorge http://www.crgva.org/, and Snowshoeing in Mt. Hood
Day 2: Hike the strenuous trail up Mt. St. Helens http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_St._Helens
Day 3: Visit Astoria, small town in NW Oregon where the Goonies was filmed! :), drive down the coast to Cannon Beach for tidal pools, drive further down the coast to Newport and Tillamook to see the cheese and ice cream tour, camp.
Day 4: Drive toward the center of OR and spend a half-day in Eugene (kinda like Athens, cool college town), then drive the 3.5 hours south to Crater Lake, camp. http://www.nps.gov/crla/
Day 5: Wake up to hike or snowshoe up to Crater lake, then drive down to N. Cali to camp in the Redwoods.
Day 6: Hike and explore through the Redwood forests.
Day 7: Drive down to Napa Valley and Sonoma and get toasted. :D
Day 8: Arrive in San Francisco to stay with our friend Heather and explore the city till Janet left.
What actually happened: : p
A huge snowstorm that covered the majority of OR, shutting down major roads, the car rental agencies try and charge close to 450 dollars to drop a car off in a different location, crazy f'ing washing machines (sorry, Parag), an unexpected school bus trip, and a beer that was not to be found.
Unable to bring ourselves to pay what would have ended up costing us each several hundred dollars we rented the car for six days with the intention of returning it back to Portland and giving ourselves some time to think over our options.
Day 1: Mt. Hood is closed off, so had to scrap that idea. So, we went ahead and drove East to the Columbia River Gorge and hiked up a couple miles to the top of Moltnomah Falls, which I believe is the highest or second highest waterfall in OR, then drove back to Parag's for some more planning.
Day 2: Ranger Bob said no on Mt. St. Helens, so that was out. So, it was to Astoria first, which is on the coast with a beach. But we actually had to drive through a blizzard to get there. We arrived and found the Goonies house and did the"truffle-shuffle," we drove down the coast to Cannon Beach, which is a small coastal town. At this point it's about 40 degrees on the beach and the rain's coming down. But, really, what else can you expect, it's Oregon? So, we made the best of it. We bought a cheap kite with a rainbow unicorn on it and set out to the beach for some recreational flying. After that we made our way down the beach to hop boulders looking for tidal pools, which have brightly-colored sea stars, sea anemones, and a whole mess of other things. Though completely soaked and frozen by the end it was still awesome since we saw a lot of beautiful creatures and almost got flooded several times when the tide turned. That night was the first camping in Beverly Beach State park near Newport. We set up my tent in the dark and froze our ASSSSES off! Camping in winter sucks, who knew?!
Day 3: Still frozen to the bone and tired of rain, we spend the day in Newport, OR. We see the OR Coast aquarium, and spend a lot more time in the little town than we expected. Newport is home to the Rogue brewery. Janet really wanted to take a certain kind home, but we didn't end up stopping at the brewery because of time, thus beginning the long search for Rogue beers distributors in OR and CA. We ate at a cool pier restaurant with Sea Lions chillin' right below us, as we watched the fishing boats go out. At that point, we'd found out that Crater lake too was closed down, so we had to scrap going there as well. So, we decided to stay on the coast since it's beautiful! One of the coolest things we say was Devil's Churn. It's a deep space cut in the rocks where the surf rushes in and shoots up. It's A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. The rest of the night was spent driving down the coast to end up in the Redwoods of N. California where we set up camp at night again. This time, however, we were camping under some of the oldest and largest trees in existence.
Day 4-5: We spent the next two days in the Elk Prairie and Jeddediah State Parks hiking around and becoming completely humbled by those amazing trees. It was an incredible experience, one that I would recommend to everyone. Some typical quotes while walking..."That's a big ass tree!" "Let's hug that one!" And, "Holy Shit." We didn't see any wildlife, but we did finally get some sunny days and tried some salmon jerky. yum, yum. We also spent one of the nights in Crescent City, CA where we whooped up on some local Native American men at shuffleboard in a dive bar, and found this incredible woodworking shop with all of these amazing carvings made out of actual redwood trees. Janet and I each purchased some cool pieces. Still no Rogue 22 ouncers to be found...
Day 6: At this point it was time to start making our way back to Portland, so we drove most of the day up central OR, through Eugene, where we stopped for a beer. Still no Rogue! Ended the day taking Parag out for some thank you drinks.
Day 7: This was supposed to be an easy day, we were just going to wake up, pack, return the rental car and meet this "van" that we'd been in contact with for this Craig's List ride share program. What actually happened was that Janet and I couldn't get Parag's washer to work, even after reading the instructions meant for a 5 year old, "load clothes into washer. Push start...." so we ended up frantically washing all of our stinky camping clothes in the bath tub and putting them into the dryer, which didn't work. Needless to say we ended up with several extra pounds of wet clothes packed in baggies rushing out the door to meet this group of strangers to drive down to CA. We'd never done anything like this so neither of us knew what to expect. We get to the meet up place and meet the other passengers, who are some cool mountain men carrying hot plates, some stoners, a female rapper escaping a relationship, and some random other young people all getting dropped off along the way. They inform us that the "van" is actually a 30-something foot school bus that this guy had bought and deemed the "Cannabus" since he had every intention of using it as a traveling hotbox to transport people around. He's an "entrepreneur" you see ; ) Two HOURS later, after we were supposed to meet him, we see a giant bus pull up. It has been painted poop brown with two huge, white wings on the back. The back exit has been jimmy-rigged shut with some spray foam and bungee cords. All of the windows were also painted, so the inside was dark with beds and couches constructed from a mat atop paint barrels. Oh, yeah! and there was also a functioning stove! I don't know why I didn't think to bring my cooking stuff! Silly me .... :) Anyway, everyone's kinda chillin' as we set off for what is supposed to be a 14 hour trip (we're set to arrive at like 2 am Thursday). some people are playing music, others are sleeping, others are smoking pot. "Others" includes the driver, who is the "entrepreneur" named Christoph. No, he's not foreign, that's just his name. He's a young guy, goofy looking, and creepy, to me at least. I would later come to refer to him as Irresponsible McGrabby hands, mostly because he kept trying to get a little to friendly with all us ladies on the bus. Maybe that's what he meant when he said he wanted to use the bus to help and "build the community." HA! It was an interesting ride to say the least. The bus broke down about 30 minutes in when a piece of the bus dropped down and was dragging along the street, throwing up sparks. Christoph secured it back to the bus with his studded belt, thankfully, and we were off once more! So, with drop-offs, pointless stops, and bus repair missions such as those we finally ended up in SF 24 HOURS later. I mean, damn. But, Janet did get to drive the school bus across the bay bridge, so that was pretty cool!
But, that's not the end, oh no. haha. We were trying to find Heather's house and the bus ran out of gas on a hill. We all had to jump out and push the bus into a side street until it started running again (thank god!)! By then, thankfully, we arrived alive, and un-maimed in San Francisco, but still running on only a couple hours of sleep. It's very difficult to sleep in a school bus it turns out. I can't say I had a great time, but it was still an adventure!
Janet and I spent the next few days in San Fran. More on that soon, cuz DAMN I just wrote a lot! Sorry!
1 comment:
Now that's more like it!!! Very entertaining! Hope all is well in hawaii!
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