To continue where we left off, we loaded up the bike at carl's house then stopped by her work for one last photo and to drop off some keys. The other day that we hung out with the girl from rehab we also rode along with this Australian dude who recomeded that we take highway 20 near the Canadian border. As soon as we hopped onto the freeway north we got completely bogged down with traffic and shortly after saw a sign say highway 2 next exit. Close enough. It was an awsome right as soon as we got off the beaten path up to stevens pass and then following the Columbian river until we were able to pull off to the side of road and go for a swim. Upon further inspection there were campfire rings benches, boulder to climb, and fish to catch. We ended up stowing the bikes behind a big rock and stayed for night (hit a rock on the way in, dumped my bike for the third time going 3 mph, dang). blah blah.
On the road again in the morning with our sights set on spokane, which we later learned was actually spokomptan. Gross, nothing there and still in washington. We jumped the border into Idaho and pulled into Cour' da lane. Beautiful place, quiet little college town right on a huge lake with tons of jumping rocks and rope swings. We did what any respectable transient would do, shot gunned beers in the parking lot and looked for our next meals. Once we found a safeway I opted to buy steele reserve and while sitting at the front of the store waiting for Luke I made a new friend. He was a dirty little mexican man with three teeth and a great smile. He asked me how I was doing, and to try and keep him away I just murmured incoherent words. In bum speech that apparently ment "great, how bout you sit down next to me". Which he did and gave me a wonderful bum hug. He then went on to offer me cigerattes and also and invitation to go inside and chug mikes hard lemonades in the booze isle. Tempting... but I said I'd watch his bike for him. Luckily Luke came out right then and we sat back to watch the entertainment. As we sat on the porch of an abandoned house and drank our steele's and ate chicken sandwiches I thought back to my short interaction earlier. It all made perfect sense, the bum, seeing one of his own and a 12 pack was just trying to make me feel at home, and with that experience I knew we had graduated from bum college. The night went on with some live music and strip clubs and when all the steele's were gone and we realized that Luke had left his tab open at the first bar. The band had just ended and the whole crowd was getting ready to go skinny dippin in the lake. On my walk down I ran into one of the singers of the band a big ole gal with dreadlocks who had a thing for tall skinny guys. Being polite and a little scared I walked to the lake with her and when she whispers to me that she want to take me down into the grass I started to scream Lukes names. Out of thin air he appears with a wheel barrow, I jumped in and he rolls me to safety. I jumped out of that thing at the bottom and ran into the hills where I lost a croc and had to leave it behind. Luke's heroics though didn't go unnoticed and for that chick one dude was as good as another. Long story short Luke ran into the hills. After waiting for a few minutes I decided that the coast was clear and started to shimmy down back towards the trail. I ended up stepping on some guy camping up there and after a short apology found a tree and waited behind it. No sooner had I gotten there that Luke stumbles out of the bushes next to me and we agreed that maybe skinny dippin wasn't on the recipe tonight. We set up camp on the hillside and as a tip from the toll booth operated got out of the parking lot at 7 and found our holiday inn. We've made it to Craigmont and that adventure will have to wait till next time.
Friday, July 31, 2009
Seattle and such
First of all I would like to thank David for being our only follower on this blog. Doesn't go unnoticed. Not at all.
Also I have received some comments regarding our tabs. We always pay our tabs, unless there is no tab. Settled.
On to the goods.
Seattle was fun. Let me think. ok. yes. it began in the morning when i awoke spooning a velvety siamese cat. great start. then took the morning slow. kevin tended his moonshine contraption which consists of a juice bottle, some shampagne yeast, and a condom. Lot of science involved. At noon we hit the town, and it was hot. muy hot. we found ourselves in a used bookstore. The shopkeeper was very into backpacking and such. learned about the enchantments in eastern Wa which are supposed to be amazing. Bought an old school adventure book. Now I read Kevin a tale from it every night. Helps him sleep.
On to the hustling and bustling of Pike's market. Eh. After 30 seconds of wading through sweaty foreigners we headed for the pier. At the pier we contemplated jumping off into the water 20' below. But luckily commonsense had struck hard that day so we decided not to jump there. But rather on the patio above. We climbed the two flights of stairs and upon reaching the top I encountered a bummish man. So I looked him in the eye and said "Are you going to steal our stuff?" And he said that wasnt his thing. I had to beleive him. So once again we stripped to our boxers in public. Before we jumped we enlisted some Japanes girls to take pictures of us. They obliged. And we jumped, and it was good. So we climbed out the barnacle encrusted ladder. Got back to the top and a photo op with the our asian admirers. Sun dried and back to the bar.
Found a quaint place, got a bucket of something delicious. Met some ferry folk. they left. Pillaged an abondoned pint. Met some canadians in town for the Mariners-Jays game. We decided we should to the game. so we went. Not good game for mariners, luckily we were sitting with the canucks on the upper echelon in right field. Huge Ichiro fans we are. More stuff happened. blah blah blah.
Climbed the next day at stone garden. sweet gym. went to first rei. took picture wish carly. skadoodled back on the road.
Also I have received some comments regarding our tabs. We always pay our tabs, unless there is no tab. Settled.
On to the goods.
Seattle was fun. Let me think. ok. yes. it began in the morning when i awoke spooning a velvety siamese cat. great start. then took the morning slow. kevin tended his moonshine contraption which consists of a juice bottle, some shampagne yeast, and a condom. Lot of science involved. At noon we hit the town, and it was hot. muy hot. we found ourselves in a used bookstore. The shopkeeper was very into backpacking and such. learned about the enchantments in eastern Wa which are supposed to be amazing. Bought an old school adventure book. Now I read Kevin a tale from it every night. Helps him sleep.
On to the hustling and bustling of Pike's market. Eh. After 30 seconds of wading through sweaty foreigners we headed for the pier. At the pier we contemplated jumping off into the water 20' below. But luckily commonsense had struck hard that day so we decided not to jump there. But rather on the patio above. We climbed the two flights of stairs and upon reaching the top I encountered a bummish man. So I looked him in the eye and said "Are you going to steal our stuff?" And he said that wasnt his thing. I had to beleive him. So once again we stripped to our boxers in public. Before we jumped we enlisted some Japanes girls to take pictures of us. They obliged. And we jumped, and it was good. So we climbed out the barnacle encrusted ladder. Got back to the top and a photo op with the our asian admirers. Sun dried and back to the bar.
Found a quaint place, got a bucket of something delicious. Met some ferry folk. they left. Pillaged an abondoned pint. Met some canadians in town for the Mariners-Jays game. We decided we should to the game. so we went. Not good game for mariners, luckily we were sitting with the canucks on the upper echelon in right field. Huge Ichiro fans we are. More stuff happened. blah blah blah.
Climbed the next day at stone garden. sweet gym. went to first rei. took picture wish carly. skadoodled back on the road.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Too many pictures
Top to bottom: Grandpa's crude art "the secretary," 3 fingered jack,
work of tornado, wakeboarding
My post on things
First of all, let me say for all you "english" majors out there... get over it. I have no time for spell check nor do I care to proofread what i write. Or read it at all for that matter. on to the recap.
Here in Carly's condo in Seattle I am hot. It is hot and I want to swim. But i blog instead.
Starting at Green Peter lake (not green pepper) we met up with Aaron again for a day of wakeboarding, camped and generally hung out. Then as soon as we were there, we were gone and headed to... Tillamook!
Tillamook? Is it necessary to take a 200 mile detour to the coast for a tour of a cheese factory?
No. But it's sterile and I like the tastes.
sorry that was dumb. anyways we had our fill of cheese and ice cream, a great combo, and headed for the hills/ someone's property. Sticking to our policy of never paying for lodging through the trip we skimped on the 4 dollar campsite and found an overgrown ATV road to follow into the hills. It turned out to be amazing, didn't even get run over by offroad enthusiasts.
The next morning we woke up early because we had 70 miles to Portland to cover before the continental breakfast closed. (sidenote: Kevin just mascared his mustache, pretty amazing. pic to come) Ate the breakfast, the folks at moliday binn nexpress know their biscuits and gravy and I commend them for it. Not enough to actually "pay" but kudos are in order.
Feeling rather comatose we hit the road again. Got to Mt. St. Helens where we listened to a ranger give us and others the deal with the volcano. It was ok. The mountain itself is absolutely incredible. Riding up to the lookout ridge there were downed trees for miles, nothing like the typical forests surrounding peaks like these.
Anywho, met some other bikers on KTM's, but they had nothing on our K75's. Tired of writing.
anyways put this in:
At the bottom of st. helens we were at the gas station eating ice cream, because it was hot, when we started to talking to an outpatient gal who knew of a local swimming hole. With a little rearranging I now had some new cargo on the back of my bike and she navigated us to the spot. Sketchy to say the least. We park at and abondoned building (in washington this means meth lab) where our bikes were sure to be a ok. then she and kevin started walking towards the spot while I nakeded into my board shorts. as im walking to catch up kevin has left her and is walking back towards me with a scared look on his face, moreso than usual. He says something like "gawrsh Luke, I dont know about this..."
I am partial to swimming so I followed her through the woods towards the creek. At the spot there were 3 other guys who knew her, and she kept reassuring me that it was going to be ok. which was weird because I hadn't said a word. But I love swimming so I something something jumped into the river where these guys who were now groping their long lost friend were. I flexed, showed my beard, and everything was fine. Turns out they were hillbillys, not even the stabbin kind, and they also like beer. We got on great.
The story told as told to kevin by our friend stacybill (name changed due to memory reasons) went as follows:
I was walking with her along the bridge. 3 guys start waving toothily at me from the watering hole. Stacybill shies aways, and says, omg it's buckwheat and jimfrank his dad. I say "is that a problem little lady?" She says "they all wanna s * x me (taken verbatem with asterisk and all). and the father grabbed my chesticles so i stole his cars." Flabbergasted I exclaim nothing at all. urinate a bit. she replies "they were only antiques (aka hot wheels)." This is when kevin turns around without a word to "check on the bikes."
Thats the story, later we were gonna camp at mt. ranier, but a landslide took out the road we were planning on taking in. so we made it to seattle. Definetly going to combe back and climb ranier when we can. it is impressive. very craggy.
Un necessary Risks
After that magical night with dreams of trains and delectable biscuits and gravy we set off from Eugene towards Salem OR. Arriving early we did what any transient would do... found the nearest park for a nap. I laid out and basked in the rays while Luke attempted to sew rare earth magnets into his tank bag so that it would stick on the drive. Little did he know that 2 hours later after sewing them that Aluminum gas tanks are not magnetic, oops. We hooked up with Aaron, Luke's cousin, a couple hours later and went to the Ram for a couple of beers and stayed the night with good ole aunty Sue and the home of the Oldest cat in the world. The following morning we took our first major detour through Oregon and headed east to stay en la casa de Wood, near sister oregon. On the way we stopped by a delightful peak named three finger jack and shimmied up the thing. On the way up we asked a guy how high he got to the peak because we had heard it was quite sketchy. He said "oh about 95% up", psssshhh 95%!!! you might as well have not climbed it at all! Well some might say that 95% was the "safest" distance you could go, we crushed it by going 97% up, and when Luke called out to me that "hey, I see the anchors" and we were on a 3000 foot knife ridge we decided that it would be a great time to crack open our Busch light and enjoy the view. Kiel was gracious enough to let us sleep in his bed and because we had poison oak so bad it was a great place to catch up on some sleep.
The next day we headed back west to meet up with Aaron again and go wakeboarding in Greenpepper lake, sweet home OR. It was a glorious day of drinking, face plants, and inflateable beer pong capped off with a night swim across the lake and a jump off a crazy looking rock. The rock wasn't so much too crazy it was getting up it that was the tricky part. There something about climbing up weathered ropes that you knew were hung by some professional drunk that really gets your heart pumping.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Trikes and Trains
Thisll be quick.
Started by cruising through some property in Veneta. Got our poison oak quota and got out. Then to Eugene. tried to hook up with our long lost friend Kristen but no such luck. We even showed up at her work (thank you tara) but she must have known we were coming. So we did what anybody else would do in the same situation and stripped down and swam in the Willamette River. Changing in the park I was spotted naked by a family young coed and her family. This is the point in the trip where I have started to feel like a transient, and ive come to terms with it. Back to the bar. We made a bartender friend. She fed us and told us of a place across town where we could race tricycles. We were out the door before she had a chance to close our tab.
At McShanes we enlisted in the race for a chance to win 25 big ones. Obviously I was elminated in the first heat in a massive 3 trike pile up. Kevin won his heat but sadly had a blowout coming around turn 3 in the semifinals. Wasnt our night. Great time that night. And it ended like any good night at a bar ends... camping behind it.
First we were relocated by a Harley dealership owner's security force. Heard some stories seeking revenge for other things so we kindly obliged. Luckily there was a prime abandonded warehouse with a great gravel for sleeping. As Im falling asleep Kevin has to tell me there is a giant rat trying to eat my croc (they're organic). I sleep.
Thats it.
In the morning we ask where the nearest Holiday Inn Express at the gas station is and make our way to the first of many free continental breakfasts.
P.S. Anybody needing to rent a house in Santa Rosa, Regan from McShanes would love to meet you.
Started by cruising through some property in Veneta. Got our poison oak quota and got out. Then to Eugene. tried to hook up with our long lost friend Kristen but no such luck. We even showed up at her work (thank you tara) but she must have known we were coming. So we did what anybody else would do in the same situation and stripped down and swam in the Willamette River. Changing in the park I was spotted naked by a family young coed and her family. This is the point in the trip where I have started to feel like a transient, and ive come to terms with it. Back to the bar. We made a bartender friend. She fed us and told us of a place across town where we could race tricycles. We were out the door before she had a chance to close our tab.
At McShanes we enlisted in the race for a chance to win 25 big ones. Obviously I was elminated in the first heat in a massive 3 trike pile up. Kevin won his heat but sadly had a blowout coming around turn 3 in the semifinals. Wasnt our night. Great time that night. And it ended like any good night at a bar ends... camping behind it.
First we were relocated by a Harley dealership owner's security force. Heard some stories seeking revenge for other things so we kindly obliged. Luckily there was a prime abandonded warehouse with a great gravel for sleeping. As Im falling asleep Kevin has to tell me there is a giant rat trying to eat my croc (they're organic). I sleep.
Thats it.
In the morning we ask where the nearest Holiday Inn Express at the gas station is and make our way to the first of many free continental breakfasts.
P.S. Anybody needing to rent a house in Santa Rosa, Regan from McShanes would love to meet you.
Feudal Fisherman
Alright. Here at my Aunt Sue's casa in Salem, Or. Splendid. When we last left you, Kevin and I were hanging out with my brother Josh and his fam in Arcata. They made some excellent pork loin. Amazing. Back to the journey...
In the morning we were on to Coos Coos Bay, Or. about 220 miles out. Along the way... we saw some of the tallest redwoods in the world. Big deal. Later I skipped rocks all they way across a river. Impressed many onlooking children. Almost hit one. We went for a swim upriver of the poopy pants children wading across and later realized we were downriver. ?Como se dice Giardia?
In Coos Bay we found a local watering hole, the type where locals come in and get the same drink everyday and the bartender asks Kevin if he's not from around here. We met up with Uncle Nick and he took us around the area and eventually to Charleytown where his boathous on the water is. Nick is an all around great guy and if the sea wasnt so windy we would have taken his boat out and caught somethin delicous. At dinner that night the three of us salty seamen were having some beers when nick's ex wife, crazy aunt carol, showed up out of the blue. She started talking about family feud this, Mary Kay that, at which point Nick promptly fell asleep at the table leaving me and kevin to ignore this woman.
Anwyays we slept in a trailer, and woke up at 4 to go clamming like we ha planned the night before. All of us being a bit hungover, we decided clamming would have to wait. After a great breakfast with carol, we skadoodled.
On to Eugene.
In the morning we were on to Coos Coos Bay, Or. about 220 miles out. Along the way... we saw some of the tallest redwoods in the world. Big deal. Later I skipped rocks all they way across a river. Impressed many onlooking children. Almost hit one. We went for a swim upriver of the poopy pants children wading across and later realized we were downriver. ?Como se dice Giardia?
In Coos Bay we found a local watering hole, the type where locals come in and get the same drink everyday and the bartender asks Kevin if he's not from around here. We met up with Uncle Nick and he took us around the area and eventually to Charleytown where his boathous on the water is. Nick is an all around great guy and if the sea wasnt so windy we would have taken his boat out and caught somethin delicous. At dinner that night the three of us salty seamen were having some beers when nick's ex wife, crazy aunt carol, showed up out of the blue. She started talking about family feud this, Mary Kay that, at which point Nick promptly fell asleep at the table leaving me and kevin to ignore this woman.
Anwyays we slept in a trailer, and woke up at 4 to go clamming like we ha planned the night before. All of us being a bit hungover, we decided clamming would have to wait. After a great breakfast with carol, we skadoodled.
On to Eugene.
Sunday, July 19, 2009
The beginning...
It all began when two of the biggest ladies men who ever came from davis purchases matching motorcycles. They were 14 and 19 year old german girls, we hit it off from square one and began planning the epic quest which only took 3 minutes.
First stop was Fort Bragg to see our high school metal shop teacher Dallas Denver Davis, 180 miles and 6 forties later we arrived and missed our teacher at his house by 5 minutes. We cruised the town sendin out good vibrations but no locals took to our swagger, it must have been something to do with the brown bags of Coors. Dallas was awsome and picked us up after he was done wine tasting and ended the first night with an outdoor shower and chattin around the living room. Woke up bright and early, ate some of Davis's home made sausage and got on the road for Arcata where Luke's brother lives.
We choose to take the scenic route and headed up through Ferndale but got a little lost at shelter cove and did a few miles of up and down gravel roads. Terrifying. Arrived safe and sound and now 360 miles into it still going strong.
Blog fail
not to be confused with log fail... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzrmntvwfBk
Does this work? I hope so.
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