Thanksgiving

So, it's coming up on Thanksgiving. We are heading south for the holiday - to Winnsboro and Columbia. You know, this is the time of year when you take stock and give thanks for the many blessings and gifts given throughout the year. I have had many adventures this year: traveling the country,



living on a farm with goats,


and finally, moving to Brevard, NC.


Amanda and I saw the passing of the domestic partner bill in Oregon and taking full advantage of our state rights there before we moved.

This year on December 25th, our neice turns 1. It has been so wonderful to watch her grow into a little lady.


Most of all, I feel I have been blessed with a great family and wonderful friends who have seen me through thick and thin. Thank you. May everyone have a great Thanksgiving holiday.

It's Been a Long Time Coming

I've decided it's time to start blogging again.  

Day 13 Saturday (June 28, 2008)

We left Lonoke, AR around 8am after the power went off at the hotel. There was a terrible storm that stretched from most of Arkansas all the way to Memphis, TN. We drove through it and managed to stay ahead of the storm - which was also moving east. To say that we were ready to get home would be an understatement. The car seemed to be too small and a speed limit of 70 mph very slow. We did arrive in Marshall, NC at the Goldson's house around 7pm and have settled in nicely to the Western North Carolina lifestyle....enjoying the sound of rain on a tin roof, sipping beer on the porch, and playing with the goats.

Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas

Day 12 (Friday June 27, 2008)

Today we drove 614 miles and made it to Little Rock, AR. It's been a pretty good day; we covered a lot of ground and we're ready to get home. It looks like we'll be able to arrive in Asheville tomorrow. Yippee!

Grand Canyon, New Mexico, and Texas

Day 10 (Wednesday June 25, 2008)
We drove from Needles, CA (hell on earth - where the temperature at 7:30am was 98 degrees) through the desert to the Grand Canyon. We were able to drive around the South Rim at sunset and took many great pictures. The Grand Canyon is definitely a major tourist area and we hid out at our campsite for several hours during the heat of the day.

Day 11 (Thursday June 26, 2008)
After spending the worst night ever on a air mattress, with a slow leak and multiple animals outside of our tent, we decided to get an early start on the day. We woke up, packed up, took a couple of shots of Grand Canyon at sunrise and hit the road at 6:30am. We hit New Mexico and stopped in Albuquerque for lunch at a great mexican restaurant in Old Town. We finally stopped in Amarillo, Texas. We drove a total of 700 miles today. Pretty much exhausted now.

To the Desert

Day 9 (Tuesday June 24, 2008)

Today we drove through the middle of Yosemite and reached an altitude of 10,000 feet. In some places there was still snow on the ground and the lakes amidst the mountains were pristine and crystal clear. The Forest Ranger we spoke with when we first arrived in the park told us that the majority of visitors to Yosemite never make it out of Yosemite Valley. So, we felt like we were part of a elite crowd.

After we made it through Yosemite we started driving south on Highway 395. Today we drove the farthest we have so far. To think that this morning we saw snow on the ground and by the end of the day (at 6:30 pm) we were in 114 degree weather in the Mojave Desert. In fact, we learned that the desert is really hot. Who knew? We, currently, are in Needles, CA on the Arizona border. Tomorrow we head to the Grand Canyon.

Yosemite

Day 7 and 8 (Sunday and Monday June 22 and 23, 2008)
So, we opted out of going to church at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco and headed on to Yosemite. After only a couple of hours we arrived in the midst of so much beauty. Unfortunately, we also found hoards of people. We made the best of the situation and took in as much as we could. We saw the Yosemite Valley with clear views of the Half Dome and Bridalveil falls. It's really quite stunning and pictures really don't do it justice.

Monday we awoke to ash covering everything. There was a controlled fire in part of the park and made all of the views we saw the day before slightly hazy. We drove to the southern most tip of the park to view the Giant Sequoias. We took a hike amongst the trees, but at a high altitude and smoke filled air it was quite hard. We also took a little hike to the base of Yosemite Falls and felt the intense spray from the falls.
After a busy and tiring day, we made camp again in Yosemite.

More of California

Amanda's turn!

Day 6 (Saturday):
We took the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) into San Francisco. Once there, we went to Fisherman's Wharf, where there was a great view of Alcatraz, Angel Island, and the Bay in general.


We walked along the bay for awhile and then caught a cable car up a few humongous hills (including right next to Lombard Street's crooked block).

We ate Chinese in China Town. Sadly, our restaurant was chosen by the insistence of a crazy Chinese woman who practically dragged us into a hole-in-the-wall that wasn't too bad, but definitely inferior to Miyo's!


Finally, we went to City Lights bookstore, made famous by Allen Ginsberg's Howl.

Travels

I'm starting this blog to document our trip to the East coast as we relocate to Asheville, NC from Portland, OR. Hopefully, I'll keep this up after we complete this move.

So, we left Portland on Monday (June 16th, 2008) around 2pm. The day before, we spent a great last day in Portland with Michael and Dennis marching with St. Michael's in the Portland Pride Parade and then enjoying the afternoon relaxing at their condo. It was a wonderful way to enjoy the Rose City before we rode out of town.
Back to Monday - Because we didn't do much on Sunday, Monday was spent cleaning and doing the final packing. We made it to Cottage Grove, OR and set up camp at Schwarz camp ground. We camped right by a river and enjoyed a very restful night's sleep.
Day 2 - Tuesday June 20, 2008
On Tuesday, we made it to California and the Redwood Forest. We camped at Jedediah Smith Redwood State Park, and we really enjoyed seeing the tallest trees in the world. They were amazing.
Day 3 - Wednesday June 18, 2008
We spent the moving walking and driving through the Redwood Forest. We moved on further south on Hwy 101 and stayed on the Avenue of the Giants still in the Redwood Forest, but somewhere outside of Eureka, CA. We stayed in a campground where a church youth group was having a retreat. They, very loudly, learned Psalm 23 (KJV) and enjoyed taking mass trips to the bathrooms.

Day 4 - Thursday June 19, 2008
We made it to Hwy 1 and discovered that, while very scenic and beautiful, is a little hard to drive and that we're carrying an extremely heavy load. The "check engine" light decided to come on and worried us a little.
We ended up staying at a little campground off of the highway and right on the other side of a cliff from the ocean. The view was wonderful, but the people were a little sketchy. Some of the people looked as if they had been living there for several weeks. That night, Amanda needed to call her mom and cell service has been pretty shoddy. So, she took the car and drove until she could find some service. Luckily, she found a spot on a cliff overlooking the ocean. However, along the way, she also found an entire herd of cows hanging out in the middle of the road. Crazy.

Day 5 - Friday June 20, 2008
Since we were a little nervous about our sketchy neighbors at the campground, we skipped breakfast at the campground and headed out as quickly as we could. We headed further south on Hwy 1 and then met up with Hwy 101 near Petaluma. It, actually, was where we stopped for breakfast - 2 hours after we left the campground. We were hungry.

We traveled further south to San Francisco where we will be for the weekend. We've taken this day pretty slowly - laundry, figuring out the car, and checking email for the first time all week. It's very hot here. I think it wouldn't have been so bad had we had some work up to it. This morning, we were in 50 degree weather and wore sweatshirts to bed. Then, bam, the car is reading 107 as the outside temperature. What?