Recent Exposures

Emily and I headed up early on Friday to Mt. Hood Meadows ski area for a day of skiing in the sun on the beautiful slopes of Mt. Hood with the summit towering

above us.  We found some great runs despite the very brown corn snow that was everywhere and I hit up the park a bunch of times including the half pipe.  We even found a trail that had about 20 banked turns in it like a luge run for skiers!  We packed in a full day of skiing before we had to leave around 4pm to head to the cabin to meet up with others.
    I had reserved the same cabin that we had for Thanksgiving but this time
unfortunately it was missing the massage chair.  Karen, Brendan, Eleanor, Chris Holm, Toshi, Emily and I were the crew for the night.  We began drinking around 4pm in the hot tub
and by the time Chris and Toshi showed up by 8pm the rest of us were getting sloshed.  Karen had made jello shots (about 20) out of a full bottle of brandy!  They were unbelievably strong!  Three of those combined with a 12 pack of beer and I was getting hammered…  We played Bullshit Pyramid for a while to get everyone equal and then threw in “Grandma’s Boy” – always a funny movie when drunk.  That’s about the time people (Toshi
and Brendan) began to pass out on the couches around us.  That was also the time we took down the antelope again and got pictures of it harassing them both!  Haha.  It was a pretty chill night of drinking and hanging out with friends.  I finally was able to give Eleanor her Pabst Blue Ribbon belt buckle, which she loved as well. 
    After the movie Chris broke out his guitar and played us a few songs including a remixed version of “Natty Fuckin’ Ice” which was a first for Eleanor to hear because she was blacked out by the time he was singing it at Beer Olympics… haha.  We woke up the next morning to pouring rain and Eleanor whipped up some homemade coffee cake for us all before cleaning up the cabin and bustin’ out at around 11:30am.  It was a great cabin trip as usual and I really appreciate all my friends who came along to join Emily for a night of hot tubbin’ drinking, movies and music in the mountains! 

After shopping for groceries in the morning we took off down the coast of Oregon for a trip to show Emily the Pacific, the redwoods, Crater Lake, Bend, the high desert of eastern Oregon and Santiam Pass.  When we got to Newport we took a walk down to the beach near Yaquina Bay Light House.  It was the first time
Emily had seen the Pacific.  After strolling the beach for a while and playing with some long kelp we continued our drive down the coast towards Coos Bay, stopping in many locations for Emily to take pictures. 

We stopped at the Sea Lion cave on the coast to take a 20 dollar elevator into a giant cave in the cliff filled with hundreds of stinky and loud
sea lions.  Signs
said to be quiet and not to take flash photos because it would disturb the animals but they were so damn rowdy I highly doubt they would have even noticed.  We were grateful to get out of the stench quickly to the hillside above were we spotted some whales off in the distance migrating north. 

I got to finally check out the Dunes State Park where there were tons of guys on
four-wheelers tearing up the sand and one very unlucky dude stuck in the sand in his Jeep Wrangler.  The sand was too loose to get my truck all the way to the beach but it was cool to see that it is completely legal to drive up and down the beach there!  We ended up making it to Sunset Bay State Park next to Coos Bay.  We made it just as the sun was setting and ate a picnic dinner
at a
picnic table on the beach looking out over some volcanic
stacks at the sun setting into the water which Emily had never seen before.  We packed up our stuff and made a quick walk through the woods to a ledge overlooking a bay with breaking waves where we set up camp for the night and chatted under a perfectly clear night of stars. 

It was around 9pm so we decided to get a hotel room at the Best Western in LaPine, OR just a few miles outside of Bend so I could watch 24 and rest my eyes from driving all day.  In the morning we woke up, drove through Bend and then
drove over Santiam Pass back to Corvallis.  We had wonderful views of the Sisters, and Washington from the East but when we got into the mountains we hit clouds on the western side, snow, and then rain as we continued down to the valley and back to town.   

In 3 days we had driven through blue skies down the coast, camped overnight at the edge of the ocean on a cliff above seals, checked out expansive sand dunes stretching over 30 miles down the coast, driven through a pacific storm, temperate rainforests, the Redwoods, gotten lost high in the coastal range in snow and downed trees, driven over an ancient volcano, through the high dry desert of eastern Oregon and then back over the Cascade volcanic range through rainforest again to a wine valley.  Oregon is often compared to New Zealand when it comes to having so many different climate zones and environments in such a small area and I believe it to be true.  Emily was amazed at how beautiful the varied landscapes were and how greenish blue the rivers were due to the copper (thanks Chris for explaining it to us) in the rocks being weathered.  It was an unbelievable trip with my girl that I won’t forget anytime soon and I can’t wait to get the pictures from her camera to add to this entry!

Well, I’m in Oregon now.  Corvallis, Oregon to be exact, home of the Oregon State Beavers.  I had a hell of a trip with my buddy Ken Wilhelm across the U.S. in just 7 days.  It took me all day on Monday to pack the u-haul trailer I would tow across the country.  Luckily I had the very beautiful, sexy, and helpful Emily Riggott to help me out.  I obviously bought a trailer that wasn’t big enough which meant I had to put a few things in the back of my truck and literally pack the 5×8 trailer floor to ceiling.
Atleast we finished around 9pm so Emily and I could relax at her place for the rest of the night.  It was hard saying bye to Josh and Jess but it was even harder saying bye to my mother and especially my father who I may not ever see again face to face because of his ailing health. life goes on though and I know he is proud of me which makes me feel better.   The next few posts I’m going to write about our trip. 
    Day 1 - Tuesday
    Emily dropped me off at my apartment and I had to say goodbye to the best thing that has happened to me in a long time which was excrutiatingly hard.  It’s going to be very lonely at night without her curled up at my side…  After my mom took me out to breakfast and helped me clean up the Saratoga Apartment I headed out to pick Ken up in Albany at around 10:30am.  After grabbing Ken, reorganizing the back seats of my truck with his gear and mine we took off across western NY at 11:30am, 3 hours later than I had planned…   It was a pretty uneventful day of driving across boring NY, PA, OH, and into Indiana.  We stopped in Seville, Ohio for a quick dinner around 7:30pm at a Subway in a roadside truck stop.  I had planned on trying to make it to Missouri that night but it was not to be.  I ended up driving until 2 am when I decided it was time for some much needed sleep.  I typed in "park" into my GPS and it came up with Hawthorn Park & JI Case  Wetland 
Wildlife Refuge nearby.  It sounded fine to me so we followed the GPS to a boat launch next to a wetland
preserve and set up my new Marmot NYX tent next to the parking lot for the night.  I decided to open the back traler to look for a pillow for Ken and sliced my finger open in the process bleeding all over myself.  I decided it was safer to just keep the back trailer shut for the remainder of the trip and hope that everything stayed put in it.  Ken and I passed out immediately. I had driven 853 miles on day one and had stopped for gas at a Sunoco in Canastota, NY, a Mobile in Angola, NY, a Pilot in Seville, OH, and a TCA in Eaton, OH.

Day 2 - Wednesday

    Ken and I woke up to a woman telling us "You’re not allowed to camp here"… whoops.  I said, "ok, we’re outta here", rustled Kenny awake and hit the road again.  We filled up at a local gas station for the unbelievably low price of $2.25 regular unleaded!  We then continued on through Illinoise and past St. Louis where Ken was excited to see the famous St. Louis Arch in the distance.  At St. Louis we took a left on I-55 south towards Taum Sauk Mountain, the highpoint of Missouri.  It was a good 4 hour detour from our route down winding back roads in Missouri but I wanted to get it as I’m still working on getting all the 50 state highpoints.  It was pretty hairy at times with the trailer behind
us, especially pulling the damn thing up the road to the summit tower on the mountain but we made it.  The summit wasn’t very exciting.  Ken and I climbed a ~100 foot fire tower that had the door at the top to the platform locked so we couldn’t get all the way to the top.  The views were of rolling hills… nothing spectacular.  We then climbed down, drove around the park for a bit until we found the trail to the actual summit marker.  It was a paved walkway through the woods that led to a
marker and a large boulder marking the summit of Missouri.  After snapping a few photos we left the park, stopped at a Sonic (my first Sonic experience) for lunch and continued driving towards Nebraska.  I drove as far as I could until Ken noticed me swirving all over the road and we decided to pull over for some food at a gas station at a little after midnight.  We ate a big meal and I decided to let Kenny drive for a bit as I dosed in and out of sleep.  When I woke up it was nearly 4am and we were pulling off of the highway  near Chapelle, NE.  I opened my eyes and told Ken to pull into a nearby parking lot that also had a semi parked there for the night.  It turned out we parked in a historic Pony Express mile marker station called Hughes Ranch.  I was so tired I just pulled out my sleeping bag, blew up my thermarest and crashed under the stars next to the trailer.  Kenny took the time to set up the tent and climb inside.  So far we had driven 1968 miles (1115 miles this day).  We had stopped for gas at a Pilot in Terre Haute, IN, a Quicktrip in Herculaneum, MO, a Conoco in Arcadia, MO, a Conoco near Columbia, MO, a Farris Truck Stop in Faucett, MO, a BP in Waco, NE, and one other past that which I was asleep for… :).

Day 3 - Thursday

I woke up early around 7am and put on a tarp I had bought at a truck stop the night before because the plastic one Jess had given me for the back of the truck had shredded to pieces.  I walked around
and snapped a pic of the Pony Express Mile Marker in the lot we were in.  At around quarter to 8 I shook Kenny’s tent and got him up.  We drove for a few more hours until we hit the town of Kimball, NE where Kenny decided we should go see Chimney Rock National Monument (on the back of the quarter for Nebraska) and also see Scotts Bluff National Monument.  When we got off the highway my GPS said to take highway 71 from Kimball to Scotts Bluff and back East to Chimney rock but of course kenny found another road, county road 88 through Reddington to Chimney rock.  I knew that the GPS was programmed to take the most direct route but I decided to hell with it and to follow Kenny’s suggestion.  Initally the road was beautiful pavement and rolling hills so we naturally busted out my Sector 9 Longboard for some cruisin down the hills….. Then we came to the construction…. and the end of the paved road…. Kenny was driving and the gps recalculated our best route over the mountains to the north… and Kenny missed our turn… right after saying to me, " I know how to friggin’ read the damn gps"… haha.  We turned around, which probably further confused and amuzed the construction workers (us with NY plates on a backroad in the middle of Nebraska towing a friggin’ trailer).  So we got back on track on Reddington road over the buttes to the west.  The road was gravel and was severely rutted out by tractors and other large equipement so that my whole truck and U-haul trailer shook like we were in a paint mixer the whole way across.  Ken of course thought this was fantastic (I did too actually) but I was thinking about all my stuff in the U-haul shaking and shifting to all new positions locking the sliding door shut even tighter.  On the other side of the
Buttes we encountered a herd of cows that seemed to be very interested in us.  It was Ken’s first time crossing via vehicle into an area blocked off by cattle grates we drive over that they can’t cross with their hooves.  Thus, we found ourselves surrounded by curious cows.  After another mile or so of rough road in prarie dog 
country we were back on pavement and headed to a nice viewpoint of Chimney National Monument.  We continued on to Scotts Bluff and got some great pics of the bluffs in a 270 degree view around us.  Kenny stood on the U-Haul trailer to get better pics.  Already Kenny was amazed by the geology of the West and we weren’t even out of Nebraska… this made me very happy.   After Scotts Bluff we took the very easy and fast route 71 (the one the GPS initially said
to take) back to Kimball and got on the highway towards Panorama Point (the highpoint of Nebraska).  On the way back to Kimball on 71 we saw building clouds over hills lined with giant electric wind mill generators.  Each of the three blades on them had to be atleast 100 feet in length.
The rain was cool because we could actually see the edges of where it was coming down over the plains (see pic).  Once on the highway we got into a very strong but brief thunderstorm which pounded the truck (I was very thankful I put the new tarp on that morning).  We stopped in Pine Bluffs for gas and to get a quick lunch at the A&W there before heading south from the highway towards the highpoint.  As we headed out of town the GPS directed us down wet gravel roads for about 15 miles towards the high point.  Kenny was driving and the truck was slipping so we put it in 4×4.  Then the hail storm hit…. hail the size of marbles brought us to a stop on a remote backroad.  Kenny decided it would be fun to jump out and
run it…. haha.  We finally came to a fenced in area marking the 4×4 road through wild Bison territory to the highpoint.  With the trailer still on I told Kenny to go for it and we tore it up the rutted out dirt 4×4 path for about a mile passing by Bison and running over a lot of Bison shit on the way.  The highpoint wasn’t very
spectacular so we just took a few pics and left.  The picture of my truck shows a herd of buffalo in the background that we drove by and a buffalo pattie (one of many we drove over).  By the time we got back to the highway the
trailer and back of my truck was covered in Bison shit and mud… but everything was still intact and I had my final highpoint of the trip. From that point on was a long trudging grind up through Cheyenne and Wyoming over the Continental Divide a few times towards Jackson Hole and the Tetons.
    Route 191 was very desolate and dark as we drove the several hours up it towards the Tetons.  At one point we found ourselves going down a very windy hill towards the  valley where Jackson Village is.  Kenny of course suggested we break out the Longboard again whick we did.  I turned on the lights on it and went about 3/4 of a mile down the road until the vibrations were hurting my feet and I had to stop.  It was so steep I was carving across 4 lanes and the shoulder just to turn enough to speed check.  We drove down a little further and Ken jumped on the board.  I told him to make turns
but instead he pretty much straight-lined it right down the double yellow… I kept yelling for him to turn or bail out before he picked up too much speed and eventually he waved for me to come up and get him so at nearly 25mph with a trailer behind me I had to pull up next to him while he was still moving so he could grab the truck to slow himself down…. (see pic) thankfully it worked because about 20 seconds later a huge semi came around the corner that would have crushed Ken! 
    We got to Jackson Village at midnight and I was exhausted.  I got a quick pic of me under the
famous arch of Elk Antlers.  Ken decided to talk to a local van driver to get the inside scoop and got entangled in a 20 minute conversation with the guy which ticked me off a little cause I was so tired but also gave me time to look at the amazing National Park Guidebook that Emily had given me as a going away gift (awesome book and very helpful) so that I could plan our day the next day in the Tetons.  Finally he came back to the car and after a quick stop at Wendy’s for a midnight dinner we drove through the park past many full campsites, almost hitting an elk in the road,  until we came to the Colter Bay Campground and found a spot.  I quickly set up the tent and climbed in for some sleep.  We had driven 2721 miles (753 that day).  We had stopped for gas in Kimball, NE, Laramie, WY, Rock Springs, WY, and in Pinedale, WY.

Day 4 - Friday
I woke up at 8pm and after driving to pay our camp fees for the two days at Colter Bay and paying $3.50 for a shower I kicked Kenny awake.  We took a drive down the Park Road south until we got to Jackson Lodge and went on a short hike on the Lunch Tree Loop Trail.  The Trail was a frequent picnic stop used by John D. Rockefeller Jr. who purchased much of the land in 1926 and convinced
congress to establish the Tetons as a National Park in 1929.  It was neat to stand in the place where it was decided the park should be preserved while also having an amazing view over Willow Flats to the Grand Teton Range.  After the short hike Ken and I drove up Signal Mountain.  Thankfully I had disengaged the trailer and left it at the campsite so my truck easily made it up the road.  From the summit we had great views of the Snake River to the North and over Jackson Lake to the Tetons to the West.  We could also see glacial Kettles where giant hunks of the glacier deposited in the valley had melted away leaving deep depressions which the locals call Potholes.  We then drove through the park stopping at many scenic turnouts to view the Teton Range.  We got great views of Mt. Moran (which actually looks taller and more dominating than the Grand
Teton) with its 150 foot black dike of cooled magma very visible.  At a Jenny Lake turnout we got a great view of Cascade Canyon across t
he lake between Mt. St. John to the North and Teewinot Mountain to the South.  There was a park ranger there as well displaying the hides of all the large animals of the park which was cool to see.  We then headed south down the park road again until we met up wih the one-way Jenny Lake Road which took us to the South Jenny Lake Ranger station and boat launch for our $8 ferry across Jenny lake to the mouth of Cascade Canyon for our afternoon hike.  I bought some Trail Mix (Kenny demands I call it this instead of GORP) and we headed across the lake.  The trail up to Hidden Falls was well marked
and is undoubtedly the most popular one in the park as we saw many people on the trail.  The falls were fantastatic against the backdrop of jagged peaks reaching into the
sky.  Ken and I decideded to hike further to Inspiration Point overlooking Jenny Lake.  It was a nice view but Ken discovered a much better place about 100 yards up the trail (the pic of both of us sitting on the rock).  Ken was just blown away by the scenery so despite my desire for another afternoon hike I didn’t stop him when he decided to keep hiking up the trail into Valhalla Canyon.  We heard there were moose up ahead on the trail so we hiked another mile or so
before I spotted the male moose snackin’ on some vegetation next to the canyon stream.  We took a few pictures and a nice couple that were with us let me use their binoculars to snap a couple pics of the moose close up.  Kenny and I also
came across an animal called a Pika (see pic).  When we walked by this animal it would cheep a very loud (EEEEEE) which was the funniest sounding noise Ken and I had heard.  It seemed to only come out and squawk at us as we were walking away.  The trail was beautifully maintained and there were many large boulders to walk around that had fallen down from the cliffs above.  Ken and I decided to take the horse trail back for a loop route to the dock for the boat pickup.  Our hike was 4.3 miles long and we climbed from 6826 to 7497 feet.  When we got back across Jenny Lake Ken and I were both starving so we drove back to Jackson Lodge and had dinner at the Pioneer Grill in the lodge which was basically a large cafeteria of countertop dining.  We both had a bowl of Western Chili (which became standard for the remainder of the trip) and I also had a burger….. Then I saw the desert… It was called something
like "The Grand" because it contained 3 scoops of icecream, bananas, strawberries, hot fudge, and whipped cream ON TOP of a Belgium waffle.  Well, Kenny dared me so I decided to go for.  I soon had the guests around me and the servers rooting me on… If it wasn’t for the fact that the waffle was rock hard because it was made in the morning, frozen, then reheated I may have been able to finish it but I stopped after everything on top and refused to eat the waffle.  Our very nice server still gave it to me for free for all the effort so I left him a nice tip.
    Ken and I then headed back to Colter Bay for the evening without time to do my planned hike around Hermitage Point.  In the morning a nice couple from NY had given us an extra sleeping pad for Ken to use and a different couple had given us their left over firewood.  One thing about being
west of the Mississippi is that everyone, I mean EVERYONE, is super nice and super friendly.  Ken and I both picked up on this as we traveled through the National Parks to Oregon.  Kenny became the official "firestarter" of the trip and we ended up finishing the night up with a very drunk game of cards (hi-low, good-the-bad-the-ugly) with a bottle of Captain Morgans that we tanked together in 45 minutes before 10pm quiet time (we definitely did not obide by that rule but thankfully nobody complained).  Apparently Kenny has some pretty funny video of me trashed and falling of the picnic table… haha…. before he gave me a fake DWI test (that I believe I still passed).  Kenny was all tore -up because he had only the Chili for dinner so he couldn’t even balance on a log if he tried.  It was a great day in the Tetons and the weather was still holding out for us.  We had only driven 44 and were up to 2765 for the trip.
Day 5 - Saturday

Today I let Ken sleep in until about 9:30 am because we were so hammered the night before.  Today we took a drive through Yellowstone.  As soon as we got into the park we could immediately see fire damage from the ‘88 fires and from even more recent ones.  We stopped at a turnout that had some amazing igneos rock towers hanging out from the road over the Lewis River Canyon a few hundred feet below with burnt forest in the background.  I of course jumped the gaurd rail, ran down and hopped across them to the furthest one out for a picture. :)  A road sign told us that the fires of 88 were so strong that they easily jumped the 500 foot wide canyon.  We drove up the road a bit further and stopped at Lewis Falls for a few pictures.  We decided to make a big figure "S" of the park so that we would hit all the big important sites so we continued on towards Old Faithful passing by the beautiful Kepler Cascades which we stopped at for a few photos.  When we got to Old Faithful we got a bite to eat at the visitor center diner/cafe and then went out for a walk around the natural hot springs.  Yellowstone contains half of the world’s 10,000 natural hotsprings so I’m sure Ken was going to be impressed, especially by Old Faithful which I’ve seen erupt in the past when passing through.      Because I’m a geologist I feel I must give you some info about Yellowstone so that you can fully appreciate what Kenny and I were standing on…. Catastrophic eruptions occurred here about 2 million years ago, then 1.2 million years
ago, and then 600,000 years a
go. The latest eruption spewed out nearly 240
cubic miles of debris. 
What is now the park’s central portion then collapsed,
forming a 28- by 47- mile caldera (basin).    The magmatic heat
powering those eruptions still powers the park’s famous geysers, hot springs,
fumaroles, and mud pots.)  If another
large caldera-forming eruption were to occur at Yellowstone, its effects would
be worldwide. Thick ash deposits would bury vast areas of the United States, and
injection of huge volumes of volcanic gases into the atmosphere could
drastically affect global climate. 
Scientists have revealed that
Yellowstone Park has been on a regular eruption cycle of 600,000
years. The last eruption was 640,000 years ago…so the next is overdue. The
next eruption could be 2,500 times the size of the 1980 Mount St. Helens
eruption. Volcanologists have been tracking the movement of magma
under the park and have calculated that in parts of Yellowstone the ground has
risen over seventy centimeters this century.  It is widely believed that if Yellowstone erupts again it could be a "global killer".

Ok, enough with the geology lesson.  While Kenny was watching for Old Faithful to erupt (once every 96 minutes on average) I took the long boardwalk around all the nearby springs and geysers.  In the distance I could see that there was a big one that was erupting so I hurried along to see it.  When I
got there the sign read "Giant Geyser".  Apparently the geyser became active in 2006 (Earthquakes and other changes in the ground beneath often "activate" or "deactivate" geysers for periods of time) and has been erupting 4 times a month on average since January.  I was luckily enough to catch it on the right day at precisely the right time.  Just getting to the platform in front of it got my clothes wet from the falling spring water (smells like sulfer - rotting eggs).  I walked the entire length of the walkway which turned out to be 3.8 miles (further than I thought).  I missed Old Faithful but was happy to have see all the different springs, especially Giant Geyser erupting.  I passed a herd of buffalo grazing in the field between springs and snapped a few pictures before urging Kenny, who was waiting for me, to get into the truck so we could keep moving.  We got in and Kenny asked if I saw the buffalo, I replied "yes, lets get going though"… then he said.. "yeah… but have you seen
how close they are?"  I looked up and noticed they were headed right towards us over the walkway so Kenny and I got out for some pictures…. the whole time I’m hoping they don’t congregate around my truck and trailer so we can leave.  After a few VERY CLOSE photos we took off and hit up Route 89 past Gibbons Falls - Very beautiful (check pic) towards the Yellowstone Grand Canyon.  On the way I saw a
sign for Artist Paintpots so we pulled over and hiked a short trail which was a 1.2 mile loop around bubbling springs and very cool bubbling mud pot.  We took a different road from the famous Yellowstone Mud pots area so it was great that Kenny could see what a smaller one looked like atleast as it burped up mud to the surface and splattered it everywhere.  I wanted to climb a peak in Yellowstone by 4pm but clouds were rolling in and even at Old Faithful I heard thunder in the distance and time was wanning so we pushed on towards the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone.  We took Norris Canyon Road across Virginia Meadows where we encountered our first Bull Elk sitting in a grassy meadow behind some trees posing for tourist photographs.
    The Grand Canyon of Yellostown is truly enormous.  Not as big as Arizona’s Grand Canyon but just as impressive I feel (I’ve seen both).  When we got to Canyon junction we took a one-way side road past a large glacial erratic boulder to Inspiration point overlooking the northern Canyon

(downstream) and then drove the North Riim road past several other overlooks that we stopped at where we got great views of the Lower Falls and of an Osprey’s nest on a rock tower on the side of the Canyon.  At Inspiration Point a sign stated that 10 years ago the point was 150 feet further into the canyon but after a strong 6+ quake it fell hundreds of feet to the canyon floor… glad I wasn’t standing there when that happened!  Now for a little bit about the Canyon that I read: The Canyon varies from 800 to 1200 feet in depth and from 1500 to 4000 feet in width.  It’s length is about 24 miles.  The upper 2.5 miles is the most colorful section.  Hot spring activity has continued through the ages altering the lava rock to produce amazing colors which are largely due to varied iron compounds.  Steam vents and geysers can be seen on the canyon walls.

    After leaving the Grand Canyon we drove up the Grand Loop Road again (truck still having a hard time pulling the trailer up over all the passes and even the continental divde several times) towards Mammoth hot springs.  It was way to late to climb Mt. Washburn and I was dissapointed that we
might not get to see any Big Horn Sheep but about 20 minutes later we found ourselves stopped in traffic as a black bear and its cubs crossed the road in front
of us and then half an hour later we enountered some mountain goats on the side of the road which was pretty cool.  We were definitely well on our way to checking off all the "big game" animals on the back of our free yellowstone map.  We passed by a section of the road near Devils Den where the magma cliffs above literally hung out over the road.  The columns of volcanic rock came from an ancient flow that was 25 feet deep that spread
across the yellowstone plateau.  When it cooled it formed contraction cracks forming the hexagonal columns of basalt that can be seen on either side of the canyon walls in a large band.  I tried to get a good picture of the band overhanging the road next to me but it was so big I couldn’t get it in the frame.   Ken and I took a  short loop walk at Calcite Springs over Bumpus Butte to get some pics of the Yellowstone River below and the canyon walls in "the narrows".  On the other side of the cliff we could see ospreys at their nests.  We continued on and briefly stopped at a petrified tree  because kenny had never seen one but it was pretty boring so we quickly moved on.

As we continued on we encountered a herd of elk led by a large Bull Moose at Tower Junction.  We slowly drove with Kenny hanging out the window to get pics.  I stopped right next to the Bull Elk and
it started scratching the ground with its antlers and pawing the ground… kenny yelled in, "I think it’s pissed, we should keep moving" so we did onward towards the northern end of the park and Mammoth Hotsprings which he hit up just as the sun was going down.  I remember being there about 7 to 8 years ago and seeing them more active than they were this time… I wonder why?  Kenny and I climbed up the
long network of walkways to the top to get pics of the massive hot spring.  Mammoth hot spring is basically a giant terrace of mineral springs that are extremely hot.  It is literally a large hill that has grown to it’s size by mineral accumulation.  The bluest minerals represent the hottest water while the reddest represent luke warm spring water.  Ken and I were barely able to capture some photos of the area before the sun went down and we left the park.

    Now you would think that our day was adventurous enough… nope.. not yet… I stopped in Bozeman, MT for fuel and we were just past Belgrade, MT when kenny was looking out the window at some fires on the mountain and noticed that my gas cap door was open.  I had been known to do this several times on the trip so I decided to pull over and check to make sure the gas cap was screwed in.  As soon as a did… whiff….. back tire was killed…. ok, no problem I’ve got the wrench and jack to fix it and a spare underneath… well Kenny put the lug nut wrench on, jumped on it and ripped the damn metal on the wrench… so… time to call Nissan Roadside assistance.  Thankfully I had my GPS and gave them an exact location.  Kenny and I, already very very late on our way to Rachels in Missoula 2+ hours away decided to smoke some cigars I had in a cooler in the back while we waited for the guy to arrive to change the tire.  What the hell right?  The guy showed up in just 15 minutes and chuckled when he saw us with our cigars and NY license plates.  He told us about massive forest fires that were about 200,000 acres in size north of Yellowstone that we must have passed in the dark.  He said Bozeman has been in thick smoke for days and that day was the first reprive they’ve had in a while… After thanking him we were back on the road at quarter to twelve and arrived at Rachel’s just after 2am.  I thanked her, walked in and then fell onto the couch into a deep sleep from a very exhausting yet wonderful day.  We now had driven 3191 miles so far (426 miles that day) and had filled up for gas at Old Faithful in Yellowstone, In Bozeman, MT, and in Clinton, MT.

Day 6 - Sunday
    Today Ken and I slept in until about 10am when we got up and had breakfast with Jon and Rachel at a nearby popular cafe/restaurant.  They had enormous (I mean like 5 egg omelettes) that filled all of us up pretty quickly.  It was great to hang out with Rachel and Jon again and I thank them for letting us stay with them while we were passing through.  After lunch we came back to the apartment and disengaged the trailer from my truck for the 3 hour trip up to Glacier national Park.  That’s when we noticed the right tire on the trailer was shredded down to the steel belt.  It must have happened when we blew out the back tire of my truck as well.  What did we possibly run over, a machete?  So Ken and I got a late start at about 11:30 towards Glacier National Park and I called U-Haul on the way up to go to Rachels and replace the tire.  The drive around enormous Flathead Lake was beautiful.  We saw many forest fires up in the mountains while we were slowed down by over 20 miles of road construction. 
    When we got to Glacier National Park I showed the reciept for Yellowstone and was able to pick up a year pass to all the National Parks in the country for just $25 more.  When we entered the park the mountains were stunning.  Ken and I stopped to take a walk on the Trail of the Cedars which was a wooden walkway through the woods about 1.4 miles long.  It was neat walking through a Northwest rainforest and seeing the different vegetation compared to the East Coast.  Everything was very
green and the bark on the cedars was a dark red against it all.  Combined with the bluebird skies above made for a very scenic walk.  We passed by the mouth of Avalanche Gorge, a gorge cut out by glacial melt water, and even was able to stick Kenny in a tree.
    We drove up the road a bit further and pulled over next to McDonald Creek for some photos of the surrounding mountains.  Kenny went down the river for some photos and I walked acrossed it with
my Keen sandals on to cool my dry and cracked feet down from the very dry weather of the trip.  The rocks in the river were very smooth from years of glacial erosion down the streambeds.  They were also a multitude of colors. 
    We continued onward up the Going-To-The-Sun road which soon became a very steep winding road with thousand foot drops.  Kenny has a little bit of a height issue so everytime we pulled over to  a viewpoint I think it freaked him out a little bit.  Thankfully
we didn’t have the trailer because vehicles over 20 feet in length aren’t even allowed on the road.  The views of the surrounding mountains was absolutely phenomenal and we even saw a mountain goat scramble down the road for a bit until it dissapeared.  As we gained altitude towards Logan Pass we began to see glaciers on all the surrounding peaks.  Kenny and I both agreed that the Park had the best views out of anything we’d seen so far.  The road to Logans Pass made the Mountain Washington Highway in NH look like a steep driveway. 
    When we got to Logan Pass I had wanted to take a hike but we had taken too long coming up the
road and the sun was setting so we passed on it.  Instead we traveled down the road into the valley towards the St. Mary visitor center.  We continued to stop at
roadside vistas including the weeping wall, Jackson Glacier and a waterfall.  We stopped for a long time at Going to The Sun Point on Upper St. Mary Lake.  We sat there and watched the sun set over the mountains we just traveled over.  Kenny must have gotten 30 photos of the sun going down from there.  It was amazing to see the rays of the sun hitting the other peaks and the sun itself was setting directly between two jagged peaks to the west.  It was one of the best sunsets i’ve ever seen.
    In St. Mary I filled up on gas, grabbed a case of beer and wood for a fire and continued North towards Many Glacier Campground.  We were able to get burgers at the Many Glacier Hotel in the bar before heading to the campground to set up our tent.  It was a beautifully clear night and we found a
tent site far from anyone else so we would not disturb anyone with our drinking and card games.  I will definitely say that the drive on Going-To-The-Sun Road through the park was the most beautiful scenic drive I’ve ever done.  It was absolutely amazing seeing what the glaciers had carved out in the valley and the road side exhibits were very helpful in describing everything.   3399 total miles so far (208 today).

Day 7 - Monday

Today Kenny and I woke up around 9:30am and were headed to the Many Glacier trailhead by 10am for our hike to Grinnell Glacier.  The trail left Swiftcurrent Lake and followed the north side of the valley past Josephine Lake and the very blue-green Grinnell lake up the Grinnell glacier.  The views from the very start of the hike were amazing.  We were hiking up into the bowl which was the backside of the road we drove up the day before.  Grinnell Glacier is also one of the largest glaciers in the park.  We took our time and took many stops to take pictures of the alpine glacial lakes.  The lakes had a blue-green tint to them from the glacial sill that was being carried down into them from
the glaciers upstream.  About 3/4 of the way up the trail i spotted our first big horn sheep grazing on some trees in a pasture below the trail and grabbed Kenny to take some photos.  We continued on past some small waterfalls which were great to dip my Sox cap in to cool off.  The temperature was about 85 degrees but the
Sun felt like it right on top of us and the wind gusts actually felt like blasts from an oven instead of cool breezes.  It definitely did not feel like a cool day in September… no wonder the glaciers are melting!  When we got above the large waterfall that was dumping glacial water into Lake Grinnell the breezes changed from hot to cool because they were blowing across the glacier fields.

When we came over the final crest to see the glacier it was one of the most beautiful sites I’d ever
seen.  At the base of the glacier there was an alpine lake literally filled with small floating icebergs that had broken off the enormous 200 meter wide glacier.  Behind the lake was a talll skinny waterfall called Salamander falls that was coming down from the Salamander Glacier even higher up on the ridge.  Another smaller
waterfall was also coming off of Gem Glacier higher up on Mt. Gould as well.  Mt. Gould above us and the ridge on either side was actually the Continental divide that we had driven over and were now hiking back up to.  Ken and I rock skipped across the outlet to the iceberg-filled lake (which had no name as it used to be just a solid part of glacier before global warming).  The water coming out of the lake had carved a channel through the terraces of rock left by the retreating Grinnell Glacier.  At one point I leaped a good 5-6 feet and almost didn’t make it across the freezing water….   We walked all the way across the lake and when we got to the glacier Kenny wanted to walk on it, which the signs suggested we don’t do, but I agreed having done some glacier travel before myself and knowing what to look out for. It was also late summer so the danger of fresh snow
bridges over crevasses was minimal.  So we headed across the glacier and I made sure we took a solid route far from steep slopes into the crevasses.  Kenny was amazed and kept chucking rocks into them to get a feel for how deep they were.  He was also full of geology questions as he was the whole trip… maybe Kenny missed his calling as a geologist?  We got pretty far across the glacier but I stopped us from getting too close to the falls because I knew the water would have weekened the snow there posing the danger of a collapse into a crevasse if we
ventured there.  So we walked back across the glacier and headed down the mountain where I almost ran right into the same Big Horn sheep
we saw on the way up.  I came around the corner looking down at my camera and almost got rammed by him before he jumped up onto a cliff to watch us walk by.  Our hike turned out to be 11.9 miles and we climbed from 4894 to 6539 ft.  Kenny was absolutely starving so I picked up the pace a bit to get us out as fast as possible.  On the way out Many Glacier Road we got to finally see a Grizzly way up on the slopes with two cubs.  We stopped at a great local restaurant that specializes in Pie back at St. Mary’s before heading back to Rachels.  We didn’t have any time to do the other climbs in Logan Pass that I had wanted to but I felt we had a great day and had climbed to something most people that visit the park would never see - a glacial lake filled with icebergs and a massive glacier dumping into it!  Pretty sick.  We had come 3609 miles so far (210 that day). 

Day 8 - Tuesday

Today was my final day with anyone I know in my life.  I had mentioned to Ken that we may have time to swing through Mt. St. Helens on Tuesday on the way to his 10pm flight in Portland and he seemed really excited about it.  I also told him that we would have to get an early start on Tuesday to be able to do it.  So when I was up at 7:15 I expected him to jump out of bed and get ready as well… nope… he just curled up in his sleeping bag and ignored my warnings that if he didn’t get up we wouldn’t make it.  Well… we ended up leaving Rachel and Jon’s around 9:45 so I knew in my head we wouldn’t make it and I certainly wasn’t planning on speeding down the highways with a trailer behind me using up more gas just to make it so I called off the plans for Mt. St. Helens. 

    Going through the mountains of Idaho was beautiful (and hard on the truck) but I was suprised to find myself in Nebraska-like plains when we hit Washington just past Spokane…  There was litterally nothing in site but rolling hills of crops and grazing cows, exactly like the midwest for about 2 to 3 hours.  I had no clue that Washington was like this.  When we finally made it into Oregon there were still some plains but we began to see more and more trees as well until we found ourselves going deep into the Columbia River Gorge.  It felt as if we were descending into the Grand Canyon or something.  The walls on either side of the canyon were steep with large butresses everywhere.  This created a wind tunnel effect from the Pacific which makes for great wind surfing and kiteboarding on the Columbia but also meant that we were fighting the wind the entire way on the bank of the huge river.   We passed several large hydroelectric dams and some beautiful scenery before we came to the city of Hood River which I wanted to explore so we pulled off.

     Hood River felt much like Saratoga Springs but was much more outdoorsy.  For every jewelry store or fancy clothes store there were 2 outdoor stores for wind sports, climbing, or biking in the area.  Ken and I had a good time walking around the stores before stopping for some chinese food at the Hood River Restaurant.  Kenny saw several skateboarders pick up some trash on the sidewalk and put it in a trash can which impressed him because as he said, "you wouldn’t see that in the east".  I think we found the town that Kenny wants to move to out here.  After the very filling dinner, which we had tons of left overs from, we continued on down I-84 until I noticed a sign for Waterfalls and pulled off on to the Columbia River Historic Highway which runs parallel through the river canyon next to the Interstate.  We drove by sevaral very, very tall waterfalls on the side of the
road (very rough road under construction) before we came to Multinomah Falls.  With the upper waterfall and small 40 foot waterfall below the total drop is 600 feet.  I ran up to the bridge in the photo to snap a few pics while Ken stayed below.  The forest around the waterfalls on the road was lush green from the Oregon rainfall.  It was just a totally different environment of vegetation and ancient volcanic rock than I’m used to in the Northeast.  I can’t wait to explore the region further. 

    After the falls it was an easy hour long drive in the setting Western Sun (right in my friggin’ eyes the whole way) to Portland to get Kenny to his flight.  On the way we had some quick views of Mt. Hood in the distance as well as the shattered cone of Mt. St. Helens to the north (Kenny actually did get to see it after all).  After I dropped Ken off at the airport I immediately fell very alone.  I’m on the other side of the country from everything I know… it’s a bit strange.  Every emotion possible, fear, excitement, loneliness, anxiety, happiness, wonder, confusion, etc etc I feel.  I’ve done this kind of move before when I moved to Maine to attend Bowdoin College but I’ve never gone so far as I have now.  I’m of course writing this from my computer in my new place so my next blog will be about where I’m living and my roomate but this entry has gotten completely out of control in length so I’m gonna end it here… Great Road Trip across the entire U.S. with Kenny.  We had seen the bggest variations in geology and terrain that this country has to offer.  We went from plains in Nebraska to Glaciers in Montana.  We also saw all of the biggest game animals in the country except for a Mountain lion thanfully.  It was a trip neither of us will ever forget. 

    I easily made my flight this morning at 6am to Dulles airport in Washington.  When I got there I relaxed for a bit charging my ipod and napping in and out before my next flight.  My flight to Albany was delayed due to bad weather and other problems and we didn’t board the plane until 45 minutes after the scheduled departure. 
        The flight from Dulles to Albany was a fun trip.  It was the most amount of turbulence I have ever felt in all my travels and the pilots kept apologizing.  Looking around the cabin I could see many scared faces.  It didn’t help that the captain came over the intercom once everyone had boarded and announced to us all the long list of mechanical problems the plane had just gone through including a flat tire and almost running out of gas before landing. hahaha.  I loved it.  I love that feeling of fear/nervousness in my gut in situations like that.  It’s probably why I love the sports I do.  When I got to Albany my mom was waiting there thankful to have me home again.   
        So in 12 days I had traveled to all 4 corners of the U.S.  I had flown from the Northeast to the Southwest, then drove to the Northwest and flew down to the Southeast only to return to the Northeast.  I had driven 2,684 miles between 2 cars, one that I wrecked.  I had flown on 6 different airplanes and had taken 3 ferries.  I had traveled to another country and even gotten trapped on an island in hurricane winds there.  I completed the whole trip eating fast food and only staying in a motel twice.  I had made no plans for accomodations before I left, leaving it all up to my resourcefulness.  I had been in many different climate zones and had seen a crazy array of animals - from being chased by an elephant seal to elk and then hoards of rabbits to end up driving past aligators in Florida.  I met a vast array of people with many different personalities along the way and was able to meet with most of the top faculty in the field of marine oceanography.  It was a terrific time and I got to see some of the most beautiful landscapes in America as well as visiting each of my top graduate school choices.  I returned home with 20 bucks in my pocket and only $3 left in my bank account having done the whole trip for under 900 bucks (including everything except the $500 deductible I now have for the accident).  It was a great time and a great adventure but it’s also good to be home to rest up after it!

        I’m classifying this entry under travel instead of school because when I visited the Rosenstiel school in the morning I was dissapointed.  Hector had not waited to lead me to the school in the morning which meant I had to find it myself.  It appeared to me much more of a research center than a school with lots of students.  The Professor I had such high hopes for meeting with and who seemed to have a lot of interest in me had not even read my educational background and frankly
was a bit odd.  I had sent him all my transcripts and had emailed him many times and my application had been complete for weeks.  He wrote me several emails saying that I would be a good candidate for some projects he had funding for such as studying deformation of volcanoes in Hawaii using satellite geodesy.  But, when I met with him I found out that he expected high levels of math and programming skills that I clearly did not have.  I wish he had taken a look at my file before urging me to come down to Miami like he did.  It was a very uncomfortable meeting with him as well as another professor that he introduced me to.  When I spoke to several graduate students they had g
reat things to say about their advisor but one mentioned that her car had been broken into and that there wasn’t much outdoorsy activities to partake in unless you drive far out of the city.  On my way to the school in the morning I couldn’t even find a decent non-spanish speaking radio station and I couldn’t understand any of the toll both agents.  The girls I met with told me that it is impossible to get along with the people that live in Miami - that they are very selfish people only caring about themselves and their needs.  None of this was very appealing to me. 
        I left the school telling the professor I would email him if I had any other questions knowing that I would actually not do so because I was no longer interested.  I was upset that I was going to be stuck in Miami for the next 3 days so decided to call up United and try to get an earlier flight home which I did for the next morning at 6am.  Yes!!!  I headed back to Hector’s, packed up my stuff and left him 15 bucks on the dresser and a note thanking him.  I grabbed the map that Budget had given me and located Key West… it was 1:30pm.. could I make it by sunset… may as well try! 
        I headed off down the interstate and hooked up with route 1 (remember I said I thought I had seen the last of Route 1 in California… nope).  Driving out to the Keys was amazing.  It was about 170 miles from Miami but once you got onto the islands the speed limit dropped to 40mph and I hit traffic.   It was a beautiful day and the temperature was about 75 degrees.  I was hummin’ along and then a draw bridge gate flew down in front of me with no warning lights or anything.  I slammed on my breaks and stopped with my hood just a few feet from it.  I got out along with
several bikers behind me to watch as a huge sailboat passed through the open draw bridge with pelicans floating in the water.  When the gate closed after 10 minutes I was the first one heading south, too fast obviously because as I rounded a corner a local cop pulled me over saying I had flown through a school zone at 55mph per hour… Whoops… I didn’t even see the sign or school I told him and he could clearly see I was a tourist and being honest so the old man kindly let me go with a smile.  As I was driving down the road I noticed hurricane damage to houses and billboards everywhere.  I also saw alligator crossing signs and tsunami hazard zone signs as well which I thought was odd because the likelihood of a tsunami hitting florida really isn’t that
great.  Route 1 was the only main road for over a hundred miles out to the fartherst key - Key West and there were tourist attractions every half mile along the way.  I saw atleast 3 acquarium and marine wildlife areas along with several "swim with the dolphins" places.  The road was purposefully built into the center of the islands with large bushes planted on the sides of it to keep tourists from looking at the surroundings and slamming into oncoming traffic which apparently gets really bad
during tourist season there.  So, I think if I was to visit the Keys I would only do it by renting a boat for a week and navigating the islands by sea over the beautiful reefs surrounding them.  When I could see water from bridges it was a multitude of beautiful colors due to the underlying coral reefs.  Some of the bridges spanning the islands were miles and miles long.  On one of them I could not even see the end of it.  It just looked like it continued out to see forever. 
        I got to Key West at about 5:30 right when the sun was beggining to set and I started looking for a nice waterfront place to eat dinner.  (I should note how odd it was for the sun to still be up at nearly 6pm because in Seattle at the high lattitude it was completely dark by 4:45pm).  I parked my car at a meter and put in a few quarters (which wasn’t enough because I ended up with a ticket
anyway) and wandered
down the very busy street of the Old Waterfront of Key West until I came across the Sunset Pier Ocean Key Resort which had an outside bar, tables with umbrellas and a band
playing.  It seemed very lively so I grabbed a Corona from the bar and sat at a stool overlooking the Ocean and the setting sun.  A waitress came buy and I ignored any impulse to save money ordering fresh Mahi Mahi and a half dozen oysters on the halfshell.  The setting sun was beautiful and I wished that I had someone to share dinner with.  There were sunset party booze cruises sailing about and sailboats everwhere.  My dinner was fantastic.  Nothing beats fresh Mahi Mahi and pineapple in Key West on an empty stomach at sunset.  I could not have planned the night any better if I had tried.  It worked out perfectly. 
        I returned to my rental car (and $25 dollar ticket) and drove back towards Miami on route 1 which then changed to a 35mph speed limit after dark.  I hit the Interstate with plenty of money left over for the tolls and made it back to the airport by 10pm.  On the way back I could see lightning in the distance and I heard tornado warnings on the radio for the Miami area.   Great I’ve gone from hurrican winds on an Island in Canada to tornadoes touching down in Miami, Florida!  This of course worried me because I had a flight less than twelve hours away.  It took me a while to find the rental car return area because of construction and the horrible directions of getting there.  When I did I was told I was being charged 140 bucks… What??!!  My reservation was for 70 bucks for 3 days and I was returning it 3 days early!!! I blew up.  Apparently when I rented it and told the guy I didn’t want the extra insurance he put it on anyway for me.  I could barely understand the guy as he quickly asked me to sign and I hadn’t bothered to read the printout… damnit… Well, after a few more words with the guy and the manager they managed to knock it down to 80 for me which was fine because it would have cost me 30 bucks from the airport by cab to Hectors each way… So for an extra 20 bucks and a gas tank of gas I was able to see Key West for the afternoon… well worth it. 
        I hopped on a Budget bus to the airport and sat down in a seat to watch an ipod movie and relax for the night.   I decided to spend the night in the airport because my flight was at 6am anyway the next morning and I didn’t want to spend money on a hotel room for just 5 hours.   As I was sitting there a kid sat down a few seats away with obviously the same intention on spending the night.  At this point I could hear the rain hitting the airport hard and when I looked out the sliding glass doors it looked like a fireworks display.  I noticed the airport roof starting to leak heavily and the kid and I moved trash cans underneath the leaks (hoping that the weather would pass before my flight the next morning).   We started talking and this kid was honestly the coolest, most interesting person i’ve ever met in my life.  He grew up in Alaska as a fisherman, currently fishes Alaskan King Crab (his best friend was actually on the Discovery Channel show "Deadliest Catch") and bounces between Hawaii where he owns property and Nicaragua where his mother lives.  He was just coming back from Nicaragua flying to Seattle (ironic right) to collect on some money he loaned his fishing buddies a while back.  He was in a cast which I learned was from him jumping onto a hotel balcony from above several years ago.  He had broken bones in his arm but continued to fish with one arm for over a year before he got surgery!  I sat and listened to his stories for well over 2 hours looking all the digital photos he had on his camera.  I had begun to tell him about my adventure but after he started talking I shut right up because his life made my life look like a boring waste of time.  I could write pages and pages about what he told me but I won’t.  We ended up watching a dvd on his portable dvd player and then each of us passed out asleep on the floor but not before I got his email address.  The next morning the alarm on my phone went off at 5am and I headed towards my plane.

        On Thursday I woke up early and met with Deborah Kelley and one of her graduate students only to find that she already has 3 students and can’t take on anymore… oh well…   I ran back to my car and was able to make it to the Seattle/Tacoma International airport in about 40 minutes arriving at 10am with plenty of time before my 11:30am flight.  I easily found the rental car return area…. ready for this… 2382 miles total from San Diego to the return lot.  I put that Chevy Cobalt through hell and it held together like a champ.  While walking through the airport I noticed that the sky was clearing.  It really was amazing that out of the 5 days I was there in Seattle it only rained on Sunday and Tuesday.  I stopped at an asian fast food place in the airport for some lunch and had great views out the giant glass windows of the snow coverd peaks of Olympic National Park.  I never got to see the Cascades through the clouds or Mt. Ranier but it was wonderful seeing the Olympics right before I took off to Denver for my connecting flight.
       Here is where the day gets very interesting.  In Denver I passed by the cafeteria that Kenny and I 5-finger discounted on our trip back from Tahoe last winter and gave him a quick call to laugh about it.  I had a couple hours to kill at Denver so I walked around the airport and charged my ipod and phone for the trip so I could watch movies on the 3 hour flight to Miami.  That’s when I noticed someone who looked very familiar.  Nearly a week ago and in Oregon, not Denver, I had seen G-Love front row and the upright acoustic string bass player Jimmy Prescott seemed to be on the same plane as me flying from Denver to Miami.  How could this be?… what are the chances…. If you have seen Jimmy Prescott he appears to be a man in his late thirtees to early 40s with scraggly long blonde hair.  He could be the nicest guy in the world, which I’m sure he is, but he doesn’t look like the kind of guy you would want to approach and inquire about.  And come on… what are the chances…  When we landed at 10:30pm in Miami and were waiting for our bags a guy came in and said to him that the cars were ready for him… at that point I should have walked right over and just asked. 
        Well, I later found out in a google search that G-Love indeed was playing in Miami with Jack Johnson and Dave Matthews that weekend so it must have been him.  I later found out that he had met G-Love while playing at local jazz joints around Boston, MA.  I read about several places that I used to go to while living in Boston where he first played with Garrett Dutton (G-Love).  I also heard a rumor that he was born in upstate, NY (I still have to check on that one).  I really wish I had worked up the nerve to go say something to him because I’m sure we would have had a great conversation.   
        I found my way to the rental agency where I booked another Budget car and picked up another Chevy Cobalt, although this one had 4 doors.  I was running on 50 dollars left to my name - 45 of which I had to give to a guy named Hector who was providing a place for me to stay at his apartment close to the Miami Rosenstiel School.  That left me 5 dollars to my name to last 3 days in Miami and all the interstates had toll booths!!!  So I decided to take the back roads from the airport through the city to Hectors house stopping at a Burger King for a late night meal.  Thankfully I’m good with directions and arrived at his house at a little after midnight to find the front door locked.  I called him on his cell phone and he let me in.  I had gone from freezing Seattle to staying with a latino guy named Hector who was in his late 30’s in a run down house on in the suburbs of Miami in 80 degree heat at night!  What a change!  I charged up my stuff, barely unpacked and climbed into bed for the night.  Hector had told me I could follow him to the school in the moring at about 8:45am which I was happy about because I wasn’t really sure which way to go.  I walked outside briefly to grab some stuff from my car and noticed that there were bugs all over the seats of my car.  I don’t know how the hell they got in but I spent about 5 minutes smashing them and hoping they would go away by the next morning.  So far Miami had not really given me a nice warm feeling…

        I was up at 4:30am on Wednesday driving back to the ferry terminal at Swartz bay in Victoria, B.C.  When I arrived there were already a long line of cars but I was confident I would be on the first ferry.  I pulled into line, reclined my seat and passed out again.  2 hours later I was woken by a ferry terminal worker pounding on my window telling me to move up in line and buy a ticket which I did, pulled into the final ferry lane and once again passed out in my car.  Thankfully both nights I had my sleeping bag with me and pillow as I had left them in my car instead of taking them into Erin’s apartment.
        Thankfully I was able to make the 7am ferry and was back in Seattle by 11:30am.  On the drive back I got a few glimpses of Vancouver and the mountains beyond it.  I slept on the ferry ride again so overall I think I got something like 4 or 5 hours of decent sleep during the hurricane.  After relaxing for a couple hours Erin, Eric and I went out for lunch at a place called Zesto where I ordered one of their famous hawaiian burgers.  It was great and had pineapple on it which took the place of ketchup for a tasty change. 
        We then returned to Pikes Place Market and I had another chunk of smoked salmon. mmm mmm.  After walking around the city and the shopping district for a while we ended up going to the REI store.  It was freakin’ enourmous and had a climbing wall that had to have been 50+ft tall.  I walked around for a bit and then went to the book and map section where I checked out all the mountaineering books for the Pacific Northwest.  The store even had it’s own bike trail around it to test out bikes!  It made the L.L. Bean store in Freeport Maine look small in comparison.  After REI we decided to go to a Seattle Supersonic basketball game at Key Arena just below the Space Needle.  They were playing the Oakland Warriors.. both teams are pretty bad… It looked like Oakland was going to destroy the Sonic but they came back in the 2nd half and barely won by a few points.  During breaks between quarters an inflatable blimp would be flown around the stadium and drop gift certificates to people.  The thing would just rise out of nowhere in fronto of you and scare the crap out of you because it looked like it was going to crash into you.  We didn’t sit in the seats that our tickets said and when we first sat down we were sitting in an older couples seats.. Go figure - they got picked to sit for the remainder of the game in a comfy couch right behind the net!  haha.  At half time a guy picked from the crowd even made a half court shot to win $500 bucks.  Pretty amazing!  As we left one of the ushers joked, "wow, we finally won one"..haha.  Seattle was buzzing about the Seahawks going to the Superbowl and were flying a giant #12 on the space needle to symbolize the city as their 12th man on the field. 
        We returned to the apartment and I packed up stuff for my flight the next day.  I also made plans to meet with Professor Deborah Kelley the next morning before heading to the airport as a final try to find someone at U. Dub that could take me on as their student. 

        After sleeping until nearly noon I woke up and Erin made me some pancakes for breakfast.  It felt so good to be in a warm comfortable place overnight knowing that I didn’t have to pack up my bags the very next morning.  We took Eric to work and then Erin and I went downtown to the famous Pikes Public Market.  We walked all through it as it rained outside and I bought a 5 dollar chunk of freshly smoked alaskan salmon which was as good as lobster in my opinion.  We then walked across the street and went to the very first Starbucks where I got a Chai and was hit on by a very gay counter boy who asked me what my plans were for the night… haha.  Seattle is a great city.  I couldn’t get over how steep some of the streets were.  If it ever snowed there as much as it rained the city would not be able to function at all.  Erin told me they had nearly set a record for rainfall and that the mountains had so much snow that interstates were shut down and massive avalanches were occuring everyday.  Apparently Seattle usually just drizzles for months on end but lately it had been straight out pouring rain for nearly a month (That is probably what caused all the landslides I came across on route 101). 
       Erin and I headed to Ann and Howards for dinner where Ann made a delicious chicken stew type dish.  We opened a bottle of wine that tasted a bit wierd but Howard and I drank it anyway.  I brought my ipod and hooked it up to the TV to show my cousins all the old video footage of our grandparents and family that I had recently dumped onto my computer as well as old family photos that I had taken nearly two years to scan into my computer as well.  Ann really enjoyed it and I promised to make her a DVD of it when I returned home.  While we watched Howard chilled on the porch of the appartment smoking a tobacco pipe listening to music.  At 10pm we went and picked up Eric at the restaurant and returned to Erins place to watch some tv for a bit. 
        It was great spending the day with Erin because I don’t get to see her that often now that she lives on the other side of the country.  I think she likes Seattle a lot and being closer to her sister.  It was also great to see Ann and Howard.  I can’t believe it has been so many years since their wedding!  But the best part of the day was just being able to relax before a couple more days of intensive appointments with faculty!

        Woke up around 8 and hit the route 20 back to route 101 and the coast.  I was told that I could drive to Seattle in about 5 hours from Corvalis if I took the Interstate 5.  Nope… I wanted to see the coast, ALL OF IT.  Before I left Corvalis I filled up at a gas station and was told by a guy who works there that there was no way I would make it to Seattle around the Olympic National Park Pennisula by midnight.  I took it with a grain of salt and continued on to the coast anyway.
        The northern coast of Oregon was beautiful.  Sea stacks studded the entire coastline.  It was a pretty windy day with lots of sun. The waves were crashing so hard against the coast they were actually blasting up and over the road.  I was driving way over the speed limit because I knew there were not that many state troopers in Oregon to spot me and they were probably on the interstate if there were.  Thankfully I was right and didn’t spot one for the rest of the state. The bridge into Washington State in Astoria was huge!  It had to have been well over two miles long across the bay.  As soon as I got into Washington the road followed the shores of many large bays for miles and miles.  It was beautiful and I bet the fishing would be amazing.  The road literally was about 5 feet above the water 90% of the time and I kept passing "entering tsunami hazard zone" signs.  I’m not sure what drivers could do if there ever was a tsunami there because there wasn’t any hi-ground to go to for nearly 30 miles!  It is said that if a major earthquake occurs off the coast of washington or Oregon it would trigger a very large tsunami that would hit the coast in about 15 minutes.  I kept passing through town after town that I know would be completely wiped out if one occured.  When I got to Long Beach, WA I saw a sign for an evacuation route so I decided to follow it.  The sign led me directly to a beach with full view of the open ocean.  Long Beach proclaimed itself in another sign as "a tsunami ready community" but with evacuation routes leading to beaches I’m a little skeptical of that….  I believe it was the same sign that professor Moran in the Discovery channel show "America’s Next Tsunami" pointed out as ridiculous.  After exploring Long Beach briefly and eating lunch in Hoquiam, WA I continued on route 101 which became pretty uneventful until I hit Olympic National Park.
        When I first entered the region all I could see was huge swaths of logged forest, stripped bare but as soon as I entered national forest land it was beautiful.  The trees lined up into what looked like an endless hallway of green and the speed limit kicked up to 70mph.  I was literally one of 3 cars on the road for about 2 hours.  I wanted to make it around the park before dark so I was driving about 85mph.  The weather was off and on sun showers which left beautiful rainbows all over the park.  At one point I stopped and it looked like the rainbow ended in a beautiful mountain lake.  I stopped at a few beaches within the park for some quick photos but skipped visiting the Hoh Rainforest deep in the middle of the park because I felt I was getting short on time.  I did stop briefly at the Big Cedar tree to take a few quick pictures.  The thing was cedar tree that was nearly as wide as a redwood but it wasn’t as tall.  Some of its roots were above ground and if I had time I could easily climb 20 feet up it just by climbing the roots at its base. I walked into the middle of it and looked up to see that the entire interior of it was hollow.  It was so enormous you could probably even have room to build something inside of it!  I made it to Crescent Lake just as the sun was going down and was able to snap a few pictures of the surrounding snow covered peaks.  The larger peaks and Mount Olympus was not visible through the clouds from 101 but hopefully I’ll be able to get out there some day and climb it. 
        I then passed through Port Angeles and thought it would be a straight shot over a bridge to Seattle… Nope.  They can build a 2 mile long Bridge over the bay of Astoria but they can’t build a bridge from the Penninsula to Seattle.  Luckily I found a ferry port and was able to hop on one at 7:15pm (remember the guy who said I’d never make it by midnight… hahaha).  I was able to get a hold of my cousin Erin at about 7:45 and was at her appartment by 8:15pm.  I had driven nearly 600 miles in under 12 hours at an average speed all day of 48mph.  Before I got to the Olympic National Park my average was 42mph (Chevy Cobalt has a display that tells this) but being able to drive nearly 90mph through the park for over 2 hours made up a lot of time. 
        It was great to see Erin and Eric again and have a warm place to sleep.  They blew up an air mattress for me in the living room and after chatting for a while over a few beers I passed out dead tired.

        Wednesday was officailly the first "vacation" day of driving.  When I planned this trip my priority of course was stopping at the graduate schools I’m looking at but as usual I wanted to challenge myself.  So I decided to drive the entire Pacific coast on backroads all the way to Canada from San Diego.   I would remain on route 1 and 101 all the way to Seattle.  I didn’t need many maps as it was easy to follow the road signs, but I picked up a couple anyway to locate places of interest I might want to stop at.  I got an early start on Wednesday at 8am and had gotten no further than a mile down the road when I noticed giant dark grey blobs laying on the beach.  I pulled over and was amazed to see hundreds of elephant seals squawking at each other on the beach.  They were all different sizes and I could see babies poking their heads up over their mothers as they fed.  I approached one mother and baby and must have pissed it off because if flopped over and roared at me and took a few flops in my general direction to ward me off.  I moved back quickly because the damn thing must have weighed atleast 1200 pounds. 
    My decision to stop driving last night in San Simeon worked out perfectly because I began to hit winding roads and cliffs just 5 miles out of town as I headed towards beautiful Big Sur, CA.  I spent all morning driving fast, pulling over for pictures, driving fast, pulling over for more pictures and so on.  There were many turn offs in the road for slower drivers to let me pass but that really wasn’t needed because THERE WAS NO ONE ON THE ROAD.  From the road side gift shops and hotels it was plainly apparent that this route is a major tourist route but I seemed to hit it perfectly in the offseason, mid-week under beautfiful blue skies.  There was no cell phone reception, no radio stations and I literally kept my seat belt unbuckled in case I had to dive out of my car before it plunged off a cliff into the ocean hundreds of feet below.  For 90% of the drive to San Francisco there were no gaurd rails or protection against flying off the road.  At one point I was looking around and I went off the road, fishtailed a bit towards the cliff then pulled her back in time.  Thank God I was in the north bound lane and not the southern lane closest to the cliffs.  I stopped at a scenic overlook next to a hotel that was known for whale watching and was told by a couple tourists that it was prime time to see whales migrating off the coast.  I stood there for about 20 minutes before I saw blasts of water about a quarter mile off the coast.  It must have been whales surfacing.  Every time I stopped to look at the waves crashing into the ciffs below I could see seals in playing in the surf.  The road was built right into the mountainside and when the ridge of the mountain receded from the road followed in a giant windy turn to follow the landscape.  It was like this all day.  When the mountain receded to far from the ocean bridges were built to complete the gaps.  I saw several artists on the side of the road painting pictures of the landscape.   It was a wonderful start to the day. 
        I stopped for lunch at a Burger King in the city of Seaside just past Monterey.  I then crossed through Moss Landing which is part of the University of California.  It is a marine research center.  The area around Moss Landing was flat and boring and you could see smokestacks rising in the background above the complex.  I’m glad I didn’t end up applying to that research center as well.  I continued on to Santa Cruz, CA and stopped to briefly drive around the UC campus there because it was one of the schools I was seriously considering.  The campus was odd.  All the buildings looked exactly like Vermont style barns!  Wierd.  I left the campus happy that I did not apply there and drove along the coast of the city, stopping occasionally to watch surfers out in the breakers.  I hooked back up with route 1 after a mile or so and continued on towards San Fran.  Then I realized that my camera was broken!  Shit.  Oh well, just have to buy another… I drove to a small mall just outside the city and ran full sprint through it to the Radio Shack.  The only camera that was left was the floor model which I quickly bought and bolted back to my car hoping to make the Golden Gate bridge by sunset.  Speeding through the city I made it with about 45 minutes to spare and snapped some great pics of the bridge, Alcatraz, and the city in the background. 
        The road coming down from the mountains north of San Fran was nuts!  It was one of the curviest, steepest roads I’ve ever driven and with nobody else on the road I was hitting it at ridiculous speeds, squeeling the tires of the Cobalt around every corner (Note: after this trip I fully endorse the Chevy Cobalt - it handled like a sports car.  Thank God I wrecked the Ford Focus).   I made it to one last scenic lookout over Muir Beach before it began to get dark quickly.  I drove as fast as I could trying to get to Point Reyes National Park because I had heard it was a prime place to see whales.  I saw a sign for a lighthouse so I pulled off the highway without consulting a map to go check it out.  I could tell I was heading up the western shore of a large bay and assumed I would be at the beaches and light house right away.  Nope… after half an hour of driving I found myself in the middle of a national park of rolling coastal hills with no trees and nothing in site with light quickly fading.  I decided to head out of there and return to the highway.  I checked a map later and found that I would have had to drive another 30 miles or more before reaching the lighthouse! 
        Once back on route 1 it began to rain and the road got a lot more twisty.  I ended up behind a very suspicious looking white van.  Maybe the driver thought I was the cops or something because he took off down the road at speeds I was scared to drive my coup at!  I trusted he knew the roads better than I so I kept up with him at a distance of course.  It was dark but I could tell that the ocean was still at my side.  All of a sudden around a corner the van was just stopped on the side of the road and I passed by it a little freaked out.  At about 7:15 I pulled over at an intersection to check my map to see how far I should drive.  I noticed that I was still a good distance from the Oregon Boarder which I had hoped I would hit.   Bang!!! Something knocking at my window in the middle of no where!  My heart jumped into my throat.  A cop, with a flashlight…. great… now what did I do.  I rolled down my window and he asked if I was alright and where I was going.  He was a young local cop and was very nice.  I told him my crazy plans of driving to Seattle, although not all that night, and a very worried look appeared on his face.  He told me he was worried about me driving these unfamiliar roads at night in a rain storm alone.   He pointed out, "There’s really nothing out here, small town, small town folk.  Most businesses are closed at 5pm and people are usually in bed by 9".  I asked him about hotels and he said the cheapest ones are about 200 bucks.  No way… after a 500 dollar deductable on a wrecked car I couldn’t afford that!  I promised him I would stop at the next town, Bodega Bay, to get some gas and he returned to his patrol car that had somehow creeped up on me without me noticing. 
        By now the mysterious van had vanished.  I pulled over in Gualala and the same cop pulled in right after me to fill up.  I yelled over to him, "hey, you really are worried about me aren’t you?"  He replied, "Yes, I am, but there is no law stating that I can stop you from driving if you feel comfortable to keep going".  I reassured him that I was wake, which I was because it was an amazingly fun drive, got back in my car and continued on.  After about 15 minutes I could feel myself gaining elevation and began to see large cliffs on the right side of me and blackness on the left.  I assumed that I must be high up on a mountainside with cliffs and the ocean to my left.  I started to get a little freaked out because it was pitch black and pouring.  WHAT THE!??? Shit, I almost died… a cow… a big dumb stupid cow… standing in the middle of the road… I came around a corner and there it was staring at me.  After quickly swirving and skidding a bit I pulled over and took a picture of the animal that almost cost me my life.  Apparently I had crossed some cattle grate and hadn’t noticed I was in hillside farm land!  I kept go