Monday, October 30, 2006

most of the rest......

I haven't updated my blog in a long while. I was travelling and just didn't feel like sitting for hours in an internet cafe when i should be out hiking around in a national park. It just didn't seem right. So I got to see pretty things, but you've missed out on hearing about it all.
I'm not quite sure how i wanna do this. So much happened and I saw so many beautiful things. It feels wrong to just skim over them and show a picture, but i don't know how else to do it. I'm thinking i'll put some pictures up now, but continue to post about my trip, maybe with a picture and a story every once in a while.
sound like a plan?
Here's a brief run through of the last week or so of my roadtrip.
From Canada, I headed back through the Seattle and down through Montana to Yellowstone National Park. The drive through northern Idaho and Montana was just beautiful.
I slept in my car outside of the west entrance to Yellowstone and woke up to snow the first morning. I slept in the same spot a few days, taking trips into the park during the day. Roads were shut part of the time and they were shutting down the park for the season.i checked out some trails, waterfalls, old faithful, and hot springs. it was just amazing how much wildlife is just roaming around there. it was the "off season" and there were still tons of tourists driving really slow and stopping in the middle of the road to take pictures of stuff. i can't imagine what it would be like in mid summer.From there I drove down past the Grand Tetons. I realized that i should have spent more time down there to hike around the mountains. I ended up only having an afternoon to drive by and take in the view of the peaks. While there, I remembered a little Chapel that faces the mountains and has a great view through the window behind the altar.I stopped in and took tons of pictures, before starting to drive towards Laramie, where my cousin Allison lives. The drive down route 287 was beautiful. The sun was setting behind the Tetons behind me. I kept turning around in my seat for the next 40 minutes to take in the view. They mountains just kept looming over me.
I drove several more hours and decided to sleep in the town of Landers, Wyoming, because i would only have to drive a few hours the next day to get to my cousin's house.I've got a nice story to throw in here. i'll stop and continue with this later. I just realized that i skipped a couple states. I'll have to just write a little bit about that later.
I had a great time visiting my cousin allison and her boyfriend grady in laramie. we just hung out for the evening, and then ate dinner. they love food and cooking. we started thinking about making dinner at 6, decided on making sushi, eggrolls and miso. we went shopping, cooked and ended up eating dinner at 10. it was soooo good!!!After dinner they started to fall asleep on the couch with Dixie Dog. Allison plays fiddle in a bluegrass band and Grady has just learned banjo this year. The next morning I got him to show me clawhammer style banjo and ended up ordering a book online so i can learn.
I left Lamarie the next morning and headed east.......

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Lots O' Stuff.

It's been a while since i've wrote. I been movin round pretty good. i'm presently sitting in a cafe in Astoria, Oregon, right across the river from washington. i'll be crossing over as soon as i finish this little update and get something to eat. i've got a craving for chinese food.

so.... real quick. i went to pasadena after vegas. i stayed with these lovely people.dave and rebekka stutzman let me crash at their place and even took me to IKEA for the first time(where this picture was taken). don't ask how i survived 3 years in germany without going, but i did.

we hung out, went out and tried out there fondue set. matt krabill was an accomplice as well.Dave and Matthew are out there studying at Fuller Theological Seminary. I didn't really wanna get near "LA", but the pasadena old town was really nice.

I then headed up into the mountains to see the Giant Sequoia Trees. They were big and camping cost me $20 for the night. not happy about that.
I drove out of the mountains and stopped in tucson for lunch along the way to at least "be there." i figured tacos were a good choice.then back into them to get to yosemite national park. My brother gave me the contact info for dustin smucker. he's a first generation happy camper that's living right outside of yosemite. he hooked me up with a great burrito dinner and my own trailer to sleep in.I headed into Yosemite, though i only really spent a day there. it would be great in the middle of summer when the water fall would be raging, rather than empty.
After yosemite, i headed out of the mountains, drove through sacramento and slept at a rest stop for the night. the next day i had a long drive to get up to crater lake. i picked up karla and we camped there for a couple days, enjoying the cold nights and campfires.i must add....... this was the first time during my trip that i could make a campfire and thus, use brad's hatchet.this is one BLUE lake.just good relaxing time around the camp site, plus a little bit of hiking and cooking on the rim overlooking the lake.

let me tell you bout the bugs. there are some seriously huge bugs in oregon, or at least around crater lake. i cleaned my windshield and a couple hours later it was caked with the streaks of kamakazi insects. seriously. wicked.we then we headed north to portland, where she lives and where we hung out for a couple days. Portland's a beautiful city. lots of culture. i don't really have pictures to put up right now.

i left portland this morning and drove to the coast, stopping at Seaside, Oregon to dip my toes in the waves and search in vain for a cafe with an internet connection. i'm driving up the coast on rt. 101 and plan to get to Olympic National Park tonight, then we'll see what happens.

the VW is still moving along, though making some funny noises..... keep praying.