This summer's been incredible so far, and keeps getting better. The entirety of my stay in Okinawa was as much as I could ask for, then I got to explore two cities that breach my top 5 city listings. I'd put them in order starting with best as following: Barcelona, New Orleans, Portland, Sydney, then Rio. Seattle was great, but Portland was full of rock babes, hippies, degenerates and collegiates. (My kind of place!) Not that Seattle didn't have it's share of these fun-loving party people, it's just that Portland shows it's colors with fervor. Walking down the street in Portland to meet up with a couple friends provided the opportunity for some eco-loving GreenPeace dudes to blast me with information about global warming. I got to talk about alternative energies, watch a double decked bike fly down the road with a top-hatted teen atop it, and the tattoos and gauges alone were enough to gawk at. In the pub our bartender had 2 inch gauges, and the waitresses were all good-looking and trendy. After drinking some of the best beer I'd had in months, (Rope Walker ale methinks...) We departed.
The drive down was beautiful, but jet lag got the best of Matt and I.
We showed up at this gorgeous lake home in the woods later that day, it had to be one of the coolest houses I've ever seen. After a quick meet-and-greet, dad, Christy and I went hiking. We saw some hawks and deer along the trail, and were supposed to keep an eye out for bears. The trees here are huge, and I'm not even in the redwoods yet. I've gone ATV-ing, and myriad other cool outdoor activities in the last 2 days. Among them, light up bocce ball and Great Dane-frisbee tug-of-war were probably my favorite. There's six dogs here total, with three huge Great Danes, (Nalu, Carter, Harvey) a cute labradoodle, (Josie), the tiny bulldog (Harley) and the patriarch mutt that has cancer, (Bill). Carter's the biggest, and competes with Josie for most loving. Bill reminds me a lot of my dog, Oso. Smart, obedient, just all around an amazing mutt. If you know me, you know how much having dogs here means to me. Anyone that would say cats are better, or dogs aren't worth having, really hasn't hung out with a dog before. The whole family out here is amazing too, as they basically are the family I never had. There's a biologist working on genetics, Tyler makes mandolins, Addie Lou was a body builder, some of them made kayaks, some make cabinetry, a bunch actually used the barter system for a long time. It's just different; refreshing, too. Everyone's from the West Coast, Cali brahs and Patagonia/Columbia/North Face-wearing hippies. With kid-names like Piper and Varona, you know they hug trees. (Which I love.) Kenny is a 30-year old guitarist that blows most string-twangers out of the water, and Matt lives off of the money he makes from BAGPIPE. Comfortably. Ever heard of the Kildares? That's him. Addie Lou's friend does the logistics for the big beer festival in California every year, and has impeccable taste. We've been drinking everything from Pacifica and Hop Czar to Corona and local brews. Everyone's got some eccentric niche, it's awesome. Today we took a couple of the off-road ready trucks on some paths. The owner of the cabin has a beefed up Suburban from the eighties, a couple of ATVs, dirtbikes, and a '90 Jeep Cherokee. My daily driver and moshmobile in high school was an '88, and it was amazing off the asphault. His was better. I had a sweet setup, but his had all the amenities plus the things I'd always wanted on mine. Needless to say, the backdrop provided for some of the most fun offroading I've ever seen. Tonight we got more beer, and most likely will attempt to play mountain top beer pong. That is, of course, only after face-painting and more fire-side stories.
Lovin' life in the backcountry.
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