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Introspection and a state called Oregon

I am continuously amazed by the reality that you can accomplish whatever you put your mind to. I am also continuously amazed that I keep losing track of this reality, and being surprised all over again when I am reminded that I can, in fact, accomplish whatever I set out to do.

Five months ago, I decided that I wanted to explore the last major region of the country I hadn't seen yet: the Pacific Northwest. I didn't think I'd actually be able to see much of it, but nonetheless, I took the leap to move into an apartment in Spokane, WA, with some old friends and see what I could make happen. I saw some of Eastern Washington, Northern Idaho, Western Montana, and spent far too many hours squirreled away in a coffee shop called Atticus job-searching and soul-searching.

Then, of course, the road trip happened. I got to see so much more of the country and share it all with my boyfriend -- an entirely different experience from my past solo travels with strangers and varying levels of transient friends. It many ways, it was so much better, but in some ways I also knew I was willingly letting go of that inexplicable part of myself I always held so close when traveling alone.

Well, after another few weeks in Spokane and some futile job interviews, we decided to head down to Oregon to visit Peter's friends and family. Little did I realize, it was all finally coming together to the fruition of my dream to see the Pacific Northwest.

Our first week was spent in Portland, the eccentric, hipster-loving, newly-gentrified liberal white mecca of America. We stayed in a big house shared by a bunch of 20-somethings, with a yard of chickens, a vegetable garden, and a hobby workshop.

Our days were spent exploring the city, sampling food from a multitude of food trucks and eateries, wandering Powell's Books (the largest bookstore I will probably ever see in my life), blues dancing, and generally experiencing all Portland had to offer.

The old paper mill and waterfall

One of our days, we took a trip out to Oregon City, which boasts the country's only municipal elevator. It was literally an elevator built into the side of a cliff, which takes you from the bottom of the cliff to the top. At the top, there was a beautiful hiking trail with views of an abandoned paper mill built around a roaring, misty waterfall. 

Another day, we took a short ride on a public sky tram that went from the city level to the top of a mountain. It took all of 4 minutes to get from one end to the other, but offered beautiful views of the city at sunset. It should also be noted, that despite Portland's reputation for being cloudy and rainy all the time, it was nothing but warm and sunny the entire week we were there!

The sky tram

The last touristy thing we had to do was eat at Voodoo Donuts. No matter what time of day we drove by, there was always a line out the door of people waiting to order -- and I soon found out why. Voodoo Donuts, in fact, has the best donuts I have ever tasted in my life. Everything about the place is just weird and quirky, from the people who work there, to the donuts they serve, and the decor inside, which all makes the deliciousness of their world-class pastries seem all the better.

At the end of the week we departed the magical realm of Portlandia and drove about 3 hours inland to the high desert of central Oregon. It is here that we have spent the past few weeks in a tiny, adorable town surrounded by dry pine forests and a view distant snow-capped mountains. It's incredibly beautiful and peaceful, and there are tons of trails just behind the house that wind for miles through national forest land.

Two weeks ago (geez, has it already been that long?), I took the Subaru out for a day trip to Eugene to visit one of my good friends from college. Not only was it a gorgeous drive, but Eugene itself was in a rainforest-like area blooming with wild daffodils and dripping soft green moss from the trees.

Wild daffodils on Spencer's Butte

After a delicious lunch at a vegan diner, we spent the rest of the afternoon hiking up a small, but steep trail to Spencer's Butte. It felt good to be hiking in the mountains again, to be seeing new sights, and catching up with a great friend.

At the summit

View of the valley from the summit

Trail at the base

Ginormous banana slug

Back in town with Peter, we have spent our days enjoying family time, cooking, and exploring the locale with its various offerings of cutesy shops and parks.

An old fashioned clock shop

One of our more unique excursions was to a local cave about 25 miles outside of town. We went with Peter's brother and some of his acquaintances, but the rest of the group quickly chickened out leaving just the three of us to explore the cave ourselves (all the better in my opinion!)

GoPro shot inside the cave

There were a few other people inside the cave, but for the most part it felt like we were alone in the pitch blackness with nothing but the dim glow of our headlamps illuminating the brittle cavern walls. It was supposedly an old lava tube, and it appeared to have had recent cave-ins, which rather unsettled me. Nonetheless, I followed along behind Peter and his brother, a little too curious as to what might be around the next corner or through the next crawlspace.

cave crawlspace

Surprisingly, we made it to the end of the cave, a little over a mile in and who knows how far underground. The crawlspaces got smaller and smaller until we could no longer fit through and they didn't open up into any larger caverns, so we took a short break in the last big cavern (which had a disturbingly hollow-sounding floor) before heading back.

At the park

The local coffee shop

With just 3 weeks to go before I head back to Alaska, I've spent the rest of my time in Oregon helping Peter with his projects, hiking in the woods, and generally making the most of my time out here. I've concluded that I like Oregon very much, and would love to see the coast next time I'm here, but for now I'm decidedly ready to get back to the Last Frontier. 

I feel fulfilled in my mission to see the Pacific Northwest, and confident that I'll be back. Oregon, it's been real.

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On the road: the final leg

The final leg of our road trip turned out to be logistically way more complicated than I had anticipated. As it turns out, a) there are not many couch surfing hosts in the rural west, and b) there are just as few cheap hotels in the rural west.

By this point in our trip, I was also feeling ready to get back to Spokane, despite the tantalizing opportunity to visit Yellowstone in the dead of winter. With funds running low, snowstorms on the horizon, and both of us fighting off nasty colds, we decided to fast-track it to Washington and visit Yellowstone and Utah another time.

Beautiful Pike's Peak

The weather was perfect as we left Colorado, but the further north we drove, the worse it got.

 

Wyoming was a desolate tundra for hours, with icy wind buffeting the little Subaru and snow swirling across the slick highway. I drove the first 5 hours before we stopped for dinner in a tiny little town, and then Peter took the last couple hours until we got to the town of Sheridan to stay in a cheap motel for the night.

It was tempting to try to drive through the rest of the way to Spokane, but after another full day of driving, we decided it was best to call it a night in Missoula, MT, where we rented an Airbnb attic room from a local college student.

Our attic Airbnb

Despite being absolutely freezing, the attic room was a fun stay just for its uniqueness. Once I crawled into bed to warm up, I didn't get up again for nearly 11 hours, so exhausted from driving and sick from my cold.

The next day was beautiful and sunny, boasting jaw-dropping views of the mountain pass as we crossed over the northern Rockies into the Pacific Northwest.

It took just over 4 hours, but finally we made it to Spokane, WA, our temporary home for the next few months until our seasonal work begins.  

Finally in Spokane!

It felt surreal for the first few days to not be on the move. After almost 3 months of constant travel, of careful budgeting, of staying with strangers, of seeing new sights every day, of wondering where we might sleep some nights, the tiny Spokane apartment felt like luxury. And after all the trials of our travels, our relationship had changed in many ways as well, having achieved new levels of trust, communications, and understandings of one another.

As with all great journeys, there are more questions now than answers, not the least of which is, where shall we go from here? As that remains to be answered, all we can do now is keep living life to its fullest.

This journey across America has shown me the vast scope of our country, the incredible people who inhabit our land, the bountiful kindness that lives in all of us, and the endless diversity of life across the grand spectrum of the human experience. I am truly moved by the generosity of so many of the people we met and the stories they shared with us. Traveling the way we did, I feel I was able to see each part of the country through the eyes of those who lived there.

Rather than quenching my thirst for travel, I think more than anything it has only whetted my appetite.

And so the question remains, where shall we go from here?

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On the road: MO to KS to CO

The next two days of our trip were completely consumed with driving, about 10 hours a day through Missouri, Kansas, and Colorado. I expected to hate the drive through KS, but instead I found myself wishing we had more time there!

Our couch surfing host in Wichita was a lovely and very funny young woman of many talents who entertained us into the night sharing stories of growing up in Kansas over a delicious home-cooked pasta dinner. She left us a huge list of places to go and things to do in Wichita, but unfortunately we hadn't allocated enough time, so regretfully we had to leave in the morning to make it to Littleton, CO by night.

In Littleton, we spent 3 days with my good friend/old roommate Lea and her husband Steve. Lea was my first roommate in college, and the last few years our lives have kept us apart in different regions of the country, so it was great to catch up again. During our visit, we took a trip together to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, which held an impressive display of all things, well, nature and science.

After visiting Lea and Steve, we headed just a short distance south to stay a couple days with Peter's friend Shirley, in Colorado Springs. Shirley was an amazing woman -- one of those people you just want to grow up to be like. It seemed as if she'd done everything there is to do in life, from growing up on a farm, to working on archaeological sites in Montana, to studying the effects of video games on the brain, to fostering children, to teaching English to immigrants, to negotiating with foreign diplomats in Europe, and so much more. I have never felt more fulfilled with ideas and inspiration!

Big horn sheep herd on a mountainside

During our visit with Shirley, she took us to Garden of the Gods, a park renowned for its dramatic red rock formations. That same day was the beginning of some of the first snow storms we got, so the geology looked even more shocking in the low visibility.

Peter showing off his moves again ;)

Chilled from our drive around Garden of the Gods, next we drove to the sleepy winter wonderland of a town known as Manitou Springs. I would have liked to spend more time here, but there was so much to see and it was freezing cold.

We spent some time at the musty old arcade, playing skeeball and 25-cent target shooting games that looked like they'd been sitting in there since the 1950s.

As if we hadn't seen enough amazing sites that day, Shirley then took us to a little museum nearby called Magic Town, created by a local sculptor named Michael Garman. I wasn't sure what to expect, but my mind was blown.

Inside the dimly-lit museum was a miniature world of model buildings and people, each with their own personality and features, every detail of every scene scaled down to perfection.

Even more incredible was the arrangement of hidden mirrors throughout the displays, which made it look as if the alleyways between buildings went on forever, or rooms inside buildings extended further than reality. Only if you looked closely enough, could you catch your own reflection somewhere, giving away the secret behind Magic Town's magic.

The main room in Magic Town

Mirrors make the alleyway look longer than it really is

Projects created moving images in the displays

I never would have thought to go visit Magic Town on my own -- it looked like it could be kitschy from the outside, and the name of it sounds even more cheesy, but thanks to having Shirley as our guide, I was thoroughly enchanted.

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On the road: TN to MO

In 1804, my great-great(-great-great-great-great... etc) uncle Meriwether Lewis passed through St. Louis, MO with his good friend William Clark at the beginning of what became the renowned Lewis and Clark Expedition. While their goal was to explore and map out America's newly acquired western territory, Peter and I were hoping to just make it through the Gateway to the West without getting lost.

The drive took over 5 hours, most of which was through the rolling hills of rural Kentucky and Illinois. We listened to audiobooks and music, talked, and I tried to get some sleep when I wasn't driving.

Geese migrating over rural Illinois

At one point about halfway through the drive, Peter poked me awake and I felt the car rumbling over bumpy terrain as I struggled to pull myself out of my slumber. "Look! Look!" He urged as the car rolled to a stop on the shoulder of the highway.

Lo and behold, outside the passenger window there was a massive, dark, amorphous cloud flowing and ebbing across a brown field. Migrating geese!!! I had always heard about these epic mass migrations, but to see it in real life was phenomenal.

Unfortunately my camera was somewhere buried in the back under the rest of our gear, but I managed to capture a short video on my phone.

I was excited that we made it to St. Louis, MO by mid-afternoon while the sun was still shining, so we decided to try and go visit the iconic Gateway Arch before heading to our couch surfing home. Unfortunately, it turned out there was a ton of construction surrounding the arch, and we ended up driving in circles and back and forth across the river for nearly an hour just trying to find somewhere to get to it.

 

Finally, we admitted defeat, and I decided just to be happy with the photos I got from the road. 

Our couch surfing host was an older-middle-aged man who lived right near downtown in a big multistory flat. He had two big friendly dogs, and he showed us some of the work he does for a living, painting and refurbishing interior wood.


We enjoyed some nice conversation with him, cooked a big dinner in his kitchen to share, and then afterwards we joined him and some of his friends down the road for an open mic night at a local tavern. The open mic night was fairly bad, but entertaining, and afterwards we left early to get back and get some sleep before a long drive into Kansas the next day.

It would have been nice to spend more time in St. Louis, but the wild west was calling us, and we were both getting pretty anxious to hit the road again. We knew the next few days were about to challenge our driving endurance.

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On the road: TN and KY

Welcome to Tennessee!

Saturday morning we enjoyed one last home cooked breakfast with our wonderful Atlanta couch surfing hosts before the 4 hour and a half drive on I-24 W to Nashville. The landscape changed from the grunge of northern Georgia to the rolling hills and winding rivers of the Tennessee wilds.

Just north of Nashville, we rented an Airbnb located on a farm off the highway. There were several farmhouses, one of which had all the rooms rented out for travelers like us (and a traveling band staying downstairs in the basement), and another had someone living in it, with chickens running around outside. Every morning, fresh eggs were left for us in the communal kitchen. After the hustle and bustle of Atlanta, the rural Tennessee farmhouse was a welcome relief.

 

After a good night's sleep, we drove an hour and a half north into Kentucky to spend the day at Mammoth Cave National Park. It was warm, but snowy out, and I was excited to experience a national park as a visitor this time, instead of a park ranger.

Inside the visitor center, one of the rangers gave us an overview of the tours and the cave, and we decided on the Historic Tour, a 2 hour walk through the historic areas of the cave, covering 2 miles and 440 steps.

It turned out to be a great choice as we descended into the damp darkness of the meandering caverns with a handful of other tourists. I would have liked a smaller group better, but overall it was enjoyable. Most of the walk was pretty easy through dimly-lit winding pathways, but my favorite part was an obstacle called "Fat Man's Misery." At this point, the path narrowed to the point where even I had to squeeze a little through a hip-high maze of rocks and duck under low ceilings. A few bats flitted about here and there as well.

When we finally exited the cave, the air felt warm and dry again, the drip-dripping of melting snow pattering down to the rocks under the gaping cave mouth. We all had to walk through a weird soapy mat to clean our feet afterward to help prevent the spread of White-nose Syndrome that has been increasingly killing off bat populations.

I was surprised to see the disease had spread as far west as KY. Three years ago when I was doing bat counts in PA, the disease had just been discovered on the east coast and was wiping out populations along the eastern states. But now it has been found as far west as OK, killing off almost 6 million bats nationwide, sometimes 90-100% of localized hibernating groups.

Once we were out of the cave tour we split off from the crowd and hiked some of the trails above ground. It was getting towards mid-afternoon and we were hungry for lunch, so we drove on through the park, looking for a spot to picnic.

One of the coolest spots we stopped was near the river ferry, but instead of heading towards the main waterway, we followed a side creek into the woods. Here we found all kinds of cool lichens and fungi, which Peter quite enjoyed, since he has studied bryophites before. Unfortunately, I don't remember what kinds of fungus he said these were. :)

 

In addition to the beautiful plant life, several deer plodded about in the woods across the creek, perhaps aware of us or perhaps not. Unfortunately I couldn't get any good pictures, as I only had my camera phone on me... Alas.

Wanting to make the most of our day, we decided to hit up downtown Nashville in the evening before heading home. Although it was incredibly touristy, we had a good time wandering the shops until dark. It seemed that as soon as the sun went down, the street came alive, despite being a Sunday night. Live music floated through the air from the dozens of bars, street musicians played, and groups of people dressed up in cowboy boots and Stetson hats hopped from one pub to the next.

Peter and I joined in the fun at a couple places with live music, putting our swing dancing skills to use (his more than mine!). At several places, we received compliments all through the crowd on our way out, and a homeless guy came up to us on the street to say he saw us dancing through the window and thought we were amazing (then asked us for a dollar).

What a day in Kentucky and what a night in Nashville! The next day we would be on the road again, driving towards the Gateway to the West: St. Louis, MO.

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On the road: Atlanta, GA

Couch surfing in Atlanta reminded me once again what travel is all about. Our couch surfing hosts for the first night were a young Portuguese couple who lived in a cute apartment near downtown. As soon as we arrived, Isabel made us a huge dinner, and we talked about cultures, work, and life. It turned out she also worked at a bakery and she invited us to come by in the morning for their world-famous croissants. In the morning, we did just that on our way to the Georgia Aquarium, and they were, indeed, amazing croissants!

Some kids enjoying the dive show

The aquarium was outrageously expensive, but fortunately Peter found a crazy discount online that got us in for about half the price of a normal ticket, and we ended up with more bonuses on top of that. After watching a dive show in the first exhibit we entered, I got to talking with one of the staff members and she took a liking to me and Peter. 

"You know," she whispered sneakily, "I bet I can get you in for free on my behind-the-scenes tour."

Peter and I looked at each other and shrugged, "SURE!"

After she radioed in to check with her superiors, she got the okay and took us on a 30-minute private tour of some of the back areas of the aquarium.

 

Behind-the-scenes view of the whale shark

This was where I saw my first ever whale shark. She took us in to the top part of the football field-sized tank where we could look down on the 4 whale sharks circling the glassy water. I was so excited I could hardly listen to what she was saying!

In addition to the whale shark tank, we also were taken into the back penguin husbandry area, where mating pairs of penguins and chicks were being cared for by lab technicians in white coats. Our lovely tour guide probably would have kept taking us around had it not been time for a scheduled dolphin show, so she took it upon herself to personally usher us into the dolphin exhibit before we said our goodbyes. 

The dolphin show was pretty spectacular, but entirely over the top and I almost felt uncomfortable watching it. It was more like a Disney musical than an animal exhibit, but nonetheless the dolphins seemed quite happy to do their tricks for handfuls of fish thrown in by the dozens of trainers coordinating the production.

Mesmerized by whale sharks

Penguins being inappropriate in the penguin tunnel :P

It took us almost the entire day to visit every exhibit in the Georgia Aquarium, but I was pretty impressed with the whole thing. In the evening, we tried out Atlanta's iconic diner, The Varsity, before heading to our next couch surfing location. 

I wasn't sure what to think at first -- the place was in an "intentional community" and our hosts, Daniel and Megan, greeted us with big hugs instead of handshakes. Their apartment was every bit the hippy abode but we quickly found out that we all got along swimmingly. We ended up spending the evening playing a strategy board game with them and their other roommate, Kevin, and had such a good time we decided to stay an extra day in Atlanta. 

The next day we spent hanging out downtown and getting some work and trip planning done for our next few destinations. That evening we played more board games with our hosts, and the next day we hit the road again, headed to Nashville, TN, the heart of American music.

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