Wes goes to Folk Life!

I could write about what all happened while we were there, but it was pretty standard. Lots of dirty hippies that aren't really hippies, more just confused teenagers grasping for any sense of counter culture that might exist. If you've ever been you know exactly what I'm talking about. We also went down to the beach by the sculpture park. Good times. 

Wes kickin' it with MNom

"Come on honey, let's go look at the birdie"

Seattle Dog

Wes made a friend!

YAAAAAY!!!!

Yuck! However, I have no idea what he put in his mouth

Memorial Day Mayhem 2010 Part 2

Aight, here's part 2. If you haven't read Part 1 you probably should. It's the post just before this one so I'm not going to include a link. Ah hell, maybe I should? Would it really make it all that much easier? Will people really struggle to figure it out without one? Do I even care? I guess I do.

So we woke up at the Elk Prairie campground and made some breakfast.



Now if you've never been camping in Northern California you might not be familiar with a "bear box". Every campsite has one. It's this metal box with a hidden latch that you have to store your food in and anything else that might attract a bear. It looks like this:



But enough about that. We tore down the camp and headed out to the visitors center. This is where we started off on our 11 mile hike. Now I should probably mention that I'm so far out of shape that I was definitely concerned about taking on this venture. The first bit of the hike was kind of strenuous. We started climbing immediately. This went on for about a mile.



SK and P were definitely handling it better than I was. But I kept on trucking. After a little while we came across a tree that had recently fallen over the path. Not too much of an obstacle, but more a minor inconvenience:



The trees were enormous and everywhere. It was pretty breathtaking. After a few miles we reached our destination: Fern Canyon. Now there were ferns everywhere along the trail and we continually questioned if we were there or not. Once we arrived there was no mistaking it:





The ferns were everywhere! We hiked down into the canyon and at first didn't know where the trail was. After some deliberation we decided that the little creek we were following was actually the trail. About half way through the canyon we stopped to have lunch. This is quite possibly my favorite memory of the trip. Little waterfalls trickled down the wall around us while we ate our sandwiches. The sun was shining and every once in a while you could hear bird or other forest creatures.

Leaving the canyon was equally as amazing. The creek spread out at the end and opened into a large area where you could see the ocean just over the hills.



Somehow we missed the cut off to go along the beach and ended up just walking along the road that accessed Fern Canyon directly. It was midday and the sun was intense. I'm pretty sure this is when I acquired a slight sun burn on my face. As we were going down the road there were amazing views of the forest fading off into nothingness:





This is when I started to cash out. I really wasn't a fan of the last leg of the hike. I just focused on the finish line and drudged on. When it was all over I was not in the most pleasant of moods. I was sweaty and ached all over. We took a short break at the end and then all piled back in the car and drove up to Jedediah Smith St Park.

I actually liked this campsite more than the other because there were actual redwoods in the site. We got all the tents up and then SK made spaghetti for dinner. P was determined to get a tarp up even though there wasn't really a place to tie to. After eating I was completely dead and called it an early night.

I woke to the sound of rain. Lots of rain. I mean LOTS of rain. This is when I was VERY grateful that P was able to secure the tarp. If he hadn't I would never have left my tent. I gathered my wits and decided that I'd grab a shower before everyone woke up. P got up while I was making breakfast, SK shortly there after. They both seemed to be hating the rain. It was slightly unpleasant but I was enjoying it for the most part. The view of the Redwoods in the torrential rain was beautiful:




Once breakfast was cooked we high tailed it out of there. Unsure what happens next we stopped at a coffee shop in Crescent City for a while. The rain steadily increased as the hours passed. I've only seen it rain like that twice in my life, once in Chicago and once in Seattle. At this point everyone's patience was being tested. We didn't know where to go next or what we'd do there if it was pouring rain. It was finally suggested that we check out the Oregon Caves. If nothing else it couldn't be wetter than where we were.

It was a couple hours to get there and the weather showed no signs of stopping. The only way to view the caves was by guided tour. Luckily they started all the time and we only had to wait about ten minutes. Now I don't have the best pictures of the caves because my batteries died on my camera but here's a little preview:




P however got a ton of great pictures from throughout the caves. I'll try to add some more once I get them.

When we left the caves the rain had stopped. Thank the maker. The last thing that I wanted to see was more rain. We drove out to Medford, so we'd be better positioned for our final plans, and got a hotel room. It was a pretty nice room. SK and P went swimming and I just chilled out reading Kafka on the Shore (you'll hear more about this in another post).

Thursday the sky had cleared a bit and I was trying to keep positive thoughts. Crater Lake was our first destination and it was a real possibility that when we got there we wouldn't be able to see the lake due to cloud cover.

The road to the lake took us through the Rogue River Valley. The river was swollen and appeared ready to spill it's banks at any time. This comes more into play after the mountain.

So we reached the lake and everything was still buried in snow. Literally:



However we did get lucky and the clouds lifted just enough to give us a view of the lake:





After the lake we took the advice of the Les Schwabb guy (we had to stop and get chains just in case) and went to Wallace Falls:




Our final destination was the Umpqua Hot Springs. We ran into a bit of trouble though. The Umpqua river is usually pretty shallow and tame that far up, but the recent rain turned it into a raging river. The bridge we had to cross was nearly non existent.

We pondered our options for a while then finally I decided to just hop in the river and build a new bridge. It was frigid and difficult to move around in, but it only took a few minutes to gather enough logs so the other guys could make it across. This isn't a pic of the bridge, but give you an idea of what we were facing:



Now my feet and shorts were soaked. It was only .5 mile to the springs so I figure there was no point in putting my shoes back on and just hoofed it in the mud. One of the best decisions I've ever made. The mud between my toes felt great and once we reached the hot springs, after a short snafu (we took the wrong trail), I immediately dunked them in. It was nearly orgasmic. There are pictures of all this, but again I don't have them yet. In time.

We left the springs, I forded the river again and then had to change real quick before getting in the car. The bathroom I changed in was disgusting and I struggled to make sure that I was always standing on my flip flops while trying not to let any of my clothes touch any of the surfaces.

We followed the road along the Umpqua river for some time. Some of the view were spectacular.



Eventually we made it to Roseburg. This in a lot of ways was the end of our trip. We ate dinner in Eugene, spent the night in Salem and then bombed up I-5 back to Seattle.

All in all the trip was great. Highlights were definitely Fern Canyon and the Umpqua Hot Springs, but the Oregon Caves deserves an honorable mention as does the Avenue of Giants. I'd like to give a huge shout out to SK and P for putting up with me and keepin' it real in general.

Next vacation is Labor Day. I'll be trekkin' across America with my ol' man. Until then it's just back to the random ramblings that you've come to expect here...

Memorial Day Mayhem 2010 Part 1

So here's how it all went down:

Friday was crazy. I was serious non-productive at work. Short timer's syndrome set in about 1pm on Thursday. We shut up shop early and I was in a mad dash to get everything accomplished. Hit up NESF and got him some keys to water my plants. Then I headed home to get the place in order. I cleaned for hours and still didn't accomplish everything that I had hoped. P came by to drink while I was cleaning and helped by leaving the instructions for watering. (I'm hoping to get a picture of it because it was a great note).

Saturday morning woke up early, 6am, and packed the last of my stuff up. SK showed up around 7 and we got it all packed up. Swooped up P by 745 and we were on the road. The first bit of the journey was very uneventful. Just I-5 down to Olympia and then cuttin' through SW Washington.


Crossed the Columbia at Astoria and hit up a Costco for some supplies. The drive down the coast was very pleasant, but time consuming. We rolled into Newport around 6 and hit up the Rogue brewery. They were having their garage sale and I picked up a hoodie. P was set on getting some of their whiskey so we cruised over to their distillery and he picked up a bottle of single malt.

We got some beers and appetizers at the brew pub. Now I don't like to speak bad of Rogue, but I have to. The service was wretched. They forgot one of the things that we ordered. It took forever to get a beer. And then to top it all off the "view" from the window was of a bird shit covered awning (indoors!) and a dead bird. They really need to step up the appearance and service because it's a good spot otherwise.

Back on the road we realized that our initial goals might be unreasonable. The plan was to get to Sunset Bay St Park, which is just south of North Bend. However the sun was fading quickly and we opted to stay a bit closer to our location. Before we called it a day with the driving we hit up a little view point and I got some great sunset pics:





We ended up camping just south of Honeyman St Park in a forest service camp ground. Pretty chill spot, the place was only half full. The only down side was the occasional ATV noise. Turns out ATV'n is huge down there. We set up camp and started a fire the easy way.



Sunday we started back down the 101. The first thing we came upon was a buncha dunes. For miles we went along side them, though usually they were blocked by the forest. We stopped at the North Spit to get out, stretch our legs and take some pics:




P even stopped to pick up some litter:



So we got back on the road and made a b-line for California. There isn't much to speak of between the dunes and the Redwoods other than a fruit check point and some killer views of the ocean:



The first notable thing we ran into in California was Paul Bunyan and Babe, his blue ox. They're huge. And Paul talked. "I'm Paul Bunyan. I'm 50 feet tall and I've been wearing these same shoes for 50 years. My feet are pretty sweaty and I'm just they stink." It was a very strange sight:



It took a bit of time but we finally broke ourselves free of Bunyan's hypnotic spell but didn't make it far before we stopped again. This time to drive through a giant tree! I have to admit I wasn't too into the idea, but it was pretty cool:



Our next stop came in Crescent City. That town is full of hippies. We had to turn around in a park and they were everywhere. A couple of girls sitting in the flowers, some people running around blowing bubbles, etc. And it wasn't just in the park, they were everywhere.

As we were going through the parks we noticed a bunch of elk just chillin' by the roadside. We missed the turn initially so had to back track. Turned out to be a good thing because on the way back we saw a black bear strolling across the highway! Wasn't quick enough with the camera unfortunately. I did however catch some elk:



After we checked out the elk for a while we busted out of there and down to Eureka where we had a room reserved at the Travelodge. Now anyone who has stayed at a Travelodge knows they are the worst. However it was the only thing available that was reasonably priced. We ate dinner at Lost Coast brewing. Better service but the beer wasn't as good. Decent but not great.

After that we went over to a lil bar called the "Shanty". However not before Scott misunderstood were the brewery was and traipsed in the shadiest part of Eureka. I was surprised how seedy the whole town was to be honest. As we were about to go into the bar a group of kids wanted to buy weed from us, then they wanted to sell it to us. Go figure.

The bar was pretty chill. Talked to the bartender about some hikes and stuff. Then the place got slammed. It took forever to order a drink. The place redeemed itself when a magician showed up and did some illusions for us. Got a bit wasted and decided to call it a night.

We decided that Monday was going to be very relaxed. Woke up around 10 and checked out of the hotel. Drove south to Humboldt St Park to check out the Avenue of the Giants. Let me tell you, they were giant. HUGE. This should give you an idea:





We hit up the visitors center and discovered that the biggest trees were yet to come. We headed out to a different corner of the park and found a GIANT tree. It was insanely large. So big in fact that I had to bear hug it:



Now at this point I took over driving for the only point in the trip, but I was felt that P was going to kill us looking at the trees and not the road. We bombed back up the 101 to Elk Prairie. Which was very aptly named being as when you enter there's a giant prairie full of elk. We checked into our site and got set up for the night. It was a pretty sweet site right on the river:



This brought us to the half way marker on our journey and as such the half way point in this post. I've got some other things I need to be doing. To be continued...

Going back to Cali

Memorial Day mayhem in effect. Yay 'Merica. Don't forget to take a few minutes to honor the spirit of the holiday - it's not just about bbq's and beer. I'm out. Peace!

Memorial day without the mayhem

It's a holiday. The sun is shining. If you want to bbq come over to my house. I want to eat copious amounts of animal flesh and drink buckets of beer...

The injury is healing nicely if I have to say so myself. It's been about a week since I've had to take any pain killers. And I'm only using the crutches when I leave the house. Tomorrow the doctor should tell me that I can ditch the sticks all together. I can't wait...

As you all can probably guess from recent posts, I've developed a sort of obsession with Deerhunter. I went through their blog and downloaded all kinds of stuff. It's all that I've listened to this weekend. It has a way of making me feel very human while still completely detached from the world. I guess that's how I've been feeling a lot lately. It's been inspiring me to write though...

I made some pasta salad last night at midnight. I'm not sure why. I guess I didn't realize what time it was when I started. I even made the dressing from scratch. It has bacon and egg and peppers. I hope it's good. When I tried it last night I decided it should chill before I give it a final verdict...

I ate so many swedish fish last night that I thought I was going to puke. But it was soooo good...

I'm starting to make some decent progress on this 7 project I've been working on. Had a meeting last week and it totally changed my prospective on the whole thing. Here's another little teaser:

St. Christopher sits behind the wheel, slightly hunched, asks for the fare. His facial features and skin tone seem to change as if a cameleon gone into shock. He admires them all, then pretends like they were never there, as he continues to constantly watch them. The Vicario brothers board in a frenzy. Behind their eyes its apparent they haven't slept or eaten in days. Pedro can't stop tapping his foot, a beat resembling the national anthem. Pablo is picking the moles from his forearm with a knife he unwrapped from a newspaper. Pedro's arms jet up from stillness, fingers pointing forward as if to sign some great event. His satchel falls scattering watches, tobacco and a variety of hot sauces all across the ribbed floor. He attempts to sell a watch to a Korean immigrant before collapsing into sleep.

Hopefully I'll be able to get the rest of what's in my head adequately expressed within the confines of words. I just have to have faith in myself, which seems to be growing every day...

Rainy day in May

The healing process is in full effect. The only down side is now I have lots of dead skin and calluses falling off. I think that the best way to deal with it is to get a pedicure. I've never had one. I wonder if my doctor would allow it...

I have a bunch of new music to listen to. It's pleasing me greatly. I got it all last week from a friend. The first thing I dove into was Cryptograms from Deerhunter. I almost forgot about everything else...

Speaking of deer, I'm going through some serious Buck Hunter withdrawals. Dangerous Hunts doesn't even compare. So I've been playing Trauma Center on my wii. Love that game. You have to perform surgeries and reconstruct bone and such...

I have no idea what I'm doing for the holiday yet. I think I'm going to have a BBQ with my family at some point (details are still sketchy). And I'm probably going to do something with Matty Ice. Maybe go to Boundary Bay or something like that. I have the whole house to myself so I might through a kegger for the peeps left in the city for the holiday. I will say though, keggers aren't quite the same when you have beer on tap at all times...

I need to find more guest bloggers. If anyone is interested in submitting something to the blog send me an email at desolatesorrows@gmail.com. As long as it's somewhat relevant to the subject matter of the blog (which as you can see is very loosely defined) I'll post it...

I had a dream a few night ago. Over the past few days bits and pieces have been coming back to me about it. It began in Magnolia. I was under an overpass in a very industrial area. I was following an animal which may have been Urban Phantom, but I'm not sure. As I wandered further I ended up at a street carnival. There were booths lining the streets and lights strung all overhead. It wasn't long before I realized that the carnival was full of whores. Nothing but whores. But none of them were "working". It was almost like a convention. At one point I went up to a ticket booth to make some purchases and have some photos developed. They told me that the photos would take 30 days to develop. That's all I remember, so far. Usually I can remember most of my dream and what I don't is lost forever. Its a very strange sensation with this one. Little things in my day lead to massive feelings of deja vu...

The coffee is lack luster today. But I guess that it is everyday...

I'll leave you with this..

No blog today

So no blog today. I did go through and get the pics added to the Memorial Day Mayhem blog. I think that the pics help a bunch. Peace out yo's...

Memorial Day Mayhem

I'm trying to get the pics in this blog...we'll see how it goes...

So here's the story...

My Dad and I left the warm Seattle weather for the chilly temps of Oakland. Not much to say about Oakland, we landed, rented a car...















...and got the hell out. Went to San Francisco, had the best hamburger of my life, walked up to Coit Tower...


























...cruised Haight Ashbury...














...Golden Gate Park and the beach...














....saw the Golden Gate bridge covered in fog...














...standard San Francisco stuff.

Then we shot up the coast, tried to go to Lagunita's Brewing but that was a bust (it was just a warehouse). Luckily Russian River Brewing was not too far away and amazingly good. The have a belgian selection to rival the best. If you're near Santa Rosa at any point I highly recommend it. The coast was beautiful...













...We drove up Highway 1 for a good distance, Point Arena to Ft Bragg. Stopped in Mendocino which was gorgeous. The sun had finally come out...













...Ft Bragg was pretty chill. We stopped at North Coast Brewing for dinner where I had the 10 piece beer sampler, got a little tipsy. Then trekked back to Ukiah to sleep.

Now at this point we were going to continue up to the Red Woods, but being as both my dad and I had been there we omitted it and just bombed east for Reno. Not much in the middle of Cali, lots of farms.

Got into the Reno and it was just like Oakland, rainy and cold...














...Roamed around some casinos and gambled for a while. The casinos made me edgy because I was quitting smoking and being surrounded by it started to grate on me. So I headed back to the Circus Circus...















...only to find that I got back to the room before my dad, go figure. We got up the next day and headed for Tahoe....














...Beautiful place. Clouds hung over the lake and once again it was raining, but still amazing...














...Casino's were much nicer there too, a lot more like Vegas...


























The next day was when we both blown away. We headed south from Reno into California. Entered Yosemite at Tioga Pass, about 10,000 feet, to a breath taking sight...












...We both agreed that if we had known we'd probably have just planned the whole week in Yosemite. Once in the park we tried to see as much as we could so here's a quick run down: Lembert Dome...















...Tuolumne Meadows, Tenaya Lake, and Olmsted Point (which had great views of Half Dome)...





























...before we dropped down into the valley. The valley was awesome. El Capitan...














...Bridalvale Falls...





























...Yosemite Falls...





























...Half Dome...





























...and a ton more to see. The entire valley was lined with rock formations littered with water falls, like Cascade Falls...





























...At this point we were both pretty spent so headed south and found our hotel for the night.

Now we had planned to go to Fresno but that also got cut out of the trip, for good reason. We needed more time at Yosemite. So on the second day we started by going the the Mariposa Grove, which had a ton of HUGE trees...





























...The most memorable was the Giant Grizzly...














...which was over 200 feet tall with branches 7 feet in diameter! We hiked a couple miles here before heading up for higher ground. Next was Glacier Point which had some of the best views in the whole park...














...We took a ton of pics from up there...














...Once the camera needed a rest...





























...we headed back down to the valley for lunch and then it was out to Hetch Hetchy.

Hetch Hetchy is on the far west side of the park and we actually had to leave and reenter to get there. The road down to the dam was small and built on a sheer cliff. Dad didn't like that so much, so I ended up driving. We got down to O'Shaughnessy Dam...





























...which is a bummer that it exists because the pre-dam pics we saw were amazing, and decided to do a "little" walk around the reservoir to see if we couldn't get a better picture of Wapama Falls...




























...Ended up hiking all the way to the falls...





























...The spray around the falls created a rainbow that hung just above the rocks...














...Once again, awesome.

We headed out of Hetch Hetchy and started towards Stockton. Not much to say about Stockton. It was a place to sleep and unwind before heading back to Oakland and Seattle.

When we landed in Seattle there was a slight drizzle and with as much fun as I had, I was glad to be home.

So that's my trip in a nutshell. I'm sure I forgot some stuff, but that's the meat of it. If you want to see the pictures that go along you can check them out at http://www.flickr.com/photos/desomniac/

I've leave you with a couple of more pics from the trip...