22/09/2010 Day 22 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: Nickel Creek CG to Elk Prairie CG 55km

Money Spent: $5 for Campground and $0.50 for a shower

Time cycling: 3 Hours

Total Distance Traveled: 1345km

I joined Robbie and Megan for breakfast, they cooked up an omelet dish offering me some and I topped off my stomach with more cookies, I finished the 1kg pack I bought yesterday and too be fair I really wasn’t feeling any better for it but im not surprised.

I spent the morning making another Beer can stove as the one I had was breaking, I put this one together in a few minutes making it taller and more efficient using the instructions the Canadian couple I met a week or so ago.

I left the campground around midday and set off back to Highway 101 where I had to climb a steep hill through the redwood forests; these trees are enormous but on this part of the highway it was hard to enjoy the view as there wasn’t much of a shoulder on the road and traffic was pretty dense.

I managed to rig up my tripod on my front pannier to film a timelapse video of the downhill section from one part of the redwood forest to the coast, it was a 2 mile 6 degree downhill stretch where I flew down the hillside around 45 km/h. Fun Stuff!

At this coastal beach where I had lunch I met a very lovely Chinese woman named Annie who got chatting to me for a good while, she was a incredibly cool grandma and although she was turning 60 this year she gave herself 3 tasks to do, one of which was cycle 100 Miles on a bike which she did in 8 hours, that’s pretty good going for a woman her age.. She was babysitting a granddaughter and grandson and I had a great time on the beach with them.

I took a scenic route through the redwood forest where the traffic was pretty much non-existent but although I had to tackle a very steep uphill section the downhill cruise through these absolutely gigantic trees in this forest dwarfed me and my bike was just incredible. I spent a lot of the time looking up, not paying any attention to the road let alone the oncoming traffic in the other lane. Really, WOW!

After miles of being gob smacked through the forest I reached the campground that Megan and Robbie suggested I go to, it was $5 entry which is the first time in 22 days I’ve paid for accommodation but at some point I needed to pay and besides I needed a shower and I could have snuck in too, damn next time.

I caught up with the American couple and also ran into the Aussie cyclist Jeff again, Jeff offered to make laksa and I added some veg and tuna to the mix, it was a damn good meal and there was even some wine to go about too.

Another American showed up on his bike, Jay, he was cool and we all chatted till it got dark and we got some shut eye.

There is a 19 mile trail through this section of the Redwood forest which I might consider doing if Jeff wanted to join me tomorrow… we will see.

Waking in the morning finishing the 1kg of cookies I bought

made it to the Redwood forests

Cycling through the redwoods

Back at the Pacific

Annie Wong and her great niece and nephew

The mirror Megan gave me (thats pretty well useless)

the next Redwood forest just before the amazing part

Me at a Redwood Tree

21/09/2010 Day 21 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: Cape Sebastian State Park to Nickel Creek CG in California! 100km

Money Spent: $6 for Groceries and $2 at McDonalds

Time cycling: 4 Hours 15 minutes

Total Distance Traveled: 1290km

It was a frosty and misty morning, I got up early so I didn’t have to deal with any park ranger and so I packed up all my gear and got on the road by 8.

My blood didn’t get a chance to heat up when I hit the steep hill down towards Brookings, my hands were frozen and I even had ice frost on my sunglasses.

When I made it to Brookings I headed into Fred Meyer which is a huge shopping supermarket where you can get anything from fruit to hifi equipment and even guns.

I picked up some groceries including some cream filled cookies for $2 for almost a kilogram, they tasted pretty good but I don’t think eating handfuls of them like I was is very good for you.

I also stopped by McDonalds to use the free internet to find out whether I have a place to stay in San Fran early next week, unfortunately not yet but I wont be arriving there till early next week so I have plenty of time.

Today I also crossed into the next state of Cali-for-i-a, my first impressions with the locals were surprising as one lady told me to be very careful as “Hispanics” will attack and rob you any chance they get, I took this with a pinch of salt and joking asked whether I should get a gun and she replied “absolutely”, later finding out in the 5 minute conversation I had with her that she had at least 2 guns, one of which was in her car. I really don’t think getting a gun is necessary for this bike ride.

Another guy told me that there are also some rough areas around and that I should be careful as Natives will hassle me.

See, all this actually got me a little scared like it shows on American television; striking fear into viewers but I think it’s all a little exaggerated.

Anyways I cycled into the first major town on the coast of California named Crescent City using a bicycle route that took me down some side streets beside the highway bypassing a prison (which isn’t helping my new found fear of the states).

I found the information center where I picked up a map of California and a cycle route guide for the state and I also asked about camping grounds nearby, of which one was free. I got a tag of my tent and set off to the campsite about 5 miles out of town.

The road to get to the campsite was fine but I did not know there would be a ½ mile walk to the site down a crappy gravel path, see, my bike is a road bike and dosent handle gravel roads too well, it was a bit sketchy but I got there.

I set up my tent and went for a walk along the beach, which was apparently one of the top 10 best secluded beaches in the USA. I met some old random people that I walked and chatted to for a while whilst picking some mussels from some rocks for dinner.

The mussels (all 3 of them) I cooked in a milk/cheese/oriental stock based sauce with 2 minute noodles and veg that actually turned out pretty good for an improvised job for dinner although the mussels were a little gritty.

Later some other cyclists showed up (Robbie and Megan) an American couple who were a good laugh and we spent the evening chatting and eating my cheap cookies before crashing out.

Guns at Fred Meyer (Supermarket)

Entering California

goodbye Oregon, next time make the weather better!

Camp at Nickel Creek CG

One of the Top 10 Secluded beaches in the US or California.. not sure

Rock Pools

HDR Rock Pool, Pacific Ocean

Mussels for dindins

20/09/2010 Day 20 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: Humbug Mountain Campground to Cape Sebastian State Park 50km

Money Spent: $5.50 for laundry and $8.00 for some groceries in the supermarket

Time cycling: 2 Hours 45 minutes

Total Distance Traveled: 1190km

My tent and tarp were not up to the job last night as again it was cold wet and windy. I tried keeping myself as dry as possible by surrounding myself with leftover plastic bags from touching the walls of my tent and even putting on my poncho; it worked for a while until a pool of water had gathered under my sleeping mat. But surprisingly, I slept quite well.

I woke to the sound of the construction workers digging a hole for a new building for the campground and I packed up my things and left by 8 saying goodbye to Jim. Hoping the weather would clear up today as I was told by a local, I cycled 20 miles into Gold beach where I saw Stan’s bike outside a cafe and joined him for a glass of water, he again bought me breakfast; a country style eggs Benedict with sausage cream sauce which was amazingly tasty and he shot off as he needed to be in San Francisco by Sunday.

I went to the Laundromat in town and washed and dried all I could, including throwing my tent and shoes in the dryer…. It worked well… at first anyway, my tent was fine but my shoes soles had expanded slightly making them a little bit uncomfortable.

Another cyclist came inside the Laundromat to meet me, an Aussie (Jeff), I’m surprised I haven’t bumped into him sooner as he was pretty much on the same route as I am.

As I was leaving the Landromat I ran into Jim again, we grabbed some food from the supermarket and had lunch in the parking lot, chatting for an hour or so.

He left and I headed to the Library where I spent a bit of time doing this blog when Chang, the Taiwanese guy I met a week or so ago shows up.

At around 6 I headed out of town having to tackle the steep part of a mountain to get to a lookout point as suggested by the cashier in the supermarket who had unbelievably florescent green eyes; the lookout point was Cape Sebastian, it was a tough cycle to get there but certainly worth it as the weather had FINALLY cleared up.

It was a great view from the top but some people there recommended taking the 20 hike down to the water for the sunset, it was about 2km down and I got some great shots with my piece of crap camera.

Hiking back up it was getting eerily dark as the mists were coming inland and I found a place to pitch my tent just off to the side of a trail next to a parking lot. I think the fine for camping in a state park is about $100 so let’s hope I don’t get caught.

View from Gold beach

Yay, the Sun was finally out! just after taking this pic I crashed into the side railing, Go me!

HDR of Sunset from Cape Sebastian

Cape Sebastian North View

HDR Pano of Sunset from Cape Sebastian

HDR of Cape Sebastian down by the Sea

HDR Cape Sebastian looking South

Me! First time seeing the sunset over the Pacific

Thumbs up to the Sun!

As the sun went away

19/09/2010 Day 19 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: Somewhere on Seven Devils Rd to Humbug Mountain Campground 80km

Money Spent: $2 as a tip at breakfast and $2 for a muffin and some Oreo cookies

Time cycling: 4 hours 15 Minutes

Total Distance Traveled: 1140 km

I was getting comfortable in my tent but pretty much everything I owned was damp at best. If the weather was going to go on as it was yesterday I would have stayed another night but there was a break in the rain and I packed up my things and cycled off into the fog. It really sucked having wet shoes, it really make’s things miserable from the moment you put them on, but it had to be done as there wasn’t a choice in the matter.

Seven Devils road was great as I had cycled the worst of the uphill part and had mostly downhill gradients to tackle.

Just before passing the small town of Bandon I met a weirdly cool old American guy named Stan, he invited me for coffee and we managed to get undercover just before it started raining; we stumbled across a stereotypical diner offering cheap food and drinks. Stan was kind enough to pay for my breakfast even after giving me a cream cheese bagel shortly beforehand.

We cycled on together for most of the day until we hit the road leading to Cape Bianco, I was debating whether or not to stay at the most western part of America (excluding Alaska). It was windy, cold and miserable and whilst saying goodbye to Stan another cyclist comes by (Jim), this American was cycling around the country from somewhere near Portland to Pennsylvania on the east coast. I decided not to go to Cape Bianco and cruised on with Jim to Port Orford where I picked up some munchies at a seven 11 and continued without him till Humbug Mountain Camping grounds.

For some reason, today I saw more road kill than on any other day cycling put together, there was everything from birds, deer, skunks and raccoons and also an unusual number of snakes and frogs. Most of these animals were hit recently and I suppose I could have carried them off the road but they have people who are paid to do it.

One of the raccoons I saw seemed like it was smashed in the back of the head as its eyes were hanging out of their sockets, but thats enough of the details.

The cycle from Port Orford to Humbug Mountain was crazy windy to a point where I should have been rolling downhill but instead was getting blown backward, that’s more of an exaggeration but trust me when I say it was bad.

When I finally made it to Humbug Mountain Camping grounds there was a sign saying closed for construction and renovation, I was kind of agitating as the next campsite was another 13 Miles away and I didn’t want to cycle any further so I went around the gate and made my way into the campground. Some other cyclist also had the idea to camp there too, his name was Ric; another older American who was a little shy as after talking to him for 5 minutes he shot off to bed before it was even 6pm.

I struggled to get my tent and tarp up before it started pissing it down again but it didn’t really matter because all my gear was wet anyway.

I scoffed down some bread rolls and honey for dinner and called it a night.

Just outside Bandon town... dunno what im doing?

1

18/09/2010 Day 18 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: 0km Ventured only 20 meters from my tent to take a shit on 2 occasions

Money Spent: $0

Time cycling: 0 hours

Total Distance Traveled: 1060 km

The weather was just terrible today so decided to stay in my tent where I did nothing more than read my book and eat most of my food. I did gather rain water dribbling from my tarp that I used for cooking after boiling it up (it was a distinct yellow colour from the moss), but hey, I didn’t get sick.

My camping site for 2 days

17/09/2010 Day 17 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: North Bend to somewhere on Seven Devils Rd 30km

Money Spent: $14 at Walmart for some more fuel and groceries and $5 as a donation at a free food place.

Time cycling: 2 hours

Total Distance Traveled: 1060 km

Money withdrawn: $200

Looking at the forecast for the day it looked like it was going to piss down hard all day, I was going to stay with Dane and Ben for another night but the weather wasn’t that bad and I decided to push on as next week Saturday will be my 5^th year anniversary of travelling and I would love to celebrate it in a big city, the closest big being San Francisco 800km away, I will have to push myself and do at least 100km a day, easily possible but depending on weather and sights I might want to see and along the way..

We will see if I make it or not.

I left at 11 after Ben offered me some cookies and energy bars and I made my way to Walmart to pick up some food and more stove fuel, I got chatting to a very friendly woman with a beard for some time, she was kind but she really could have something about the hair growth on her chin.

Well, after seeing this I really wasn’t hungry but I passed by a sign offering free lunch between 11 and 12.30, it was mainly for homeless people but I guess I’m in that category and I thought ‘hey, why not’, I got some weird looks when I entered but one guy who worked there (Angel) got me a plate of food, I helped myself to some fruit, a pepsi and some cake for desert and it was all very tasty and free. As it was a charitable organization I donated $5 for all the food and even was given some extra cake and pepsi to take on the road.

Later I passed by a house with junk scattered everywhere on the front lawn with a sign saying ‘free’… I thought today was my lucky day! I tried to improvise a rearview mirror to attach to my handlebar but all I could find that was reflective was a CD, it didn’t work too well so I scrapped it. I must have outstayed my welcome at this junkyard because as I was sifting through the piles of junk upturning boxes apparently I was breaking some stuff and I was asked to leave by a enormously fat topless biker looking guy, I couldn’t quite understand as it was a pig sty anyway but I wasn’t looking for an argument with a guy that probably could suffocate me in his rolls of fat or kill me by simply sitting on me

As I left it again started pissing down, and I only got 20 Miles down the road before the rain was too much and I set up camp for the night under a tree in another forest plantation. I went to bed very early this night.

16/09/2010 Day 16 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: Yachats to North Bend 120km

Money Spent: $1.25 for a loaf of bread

Time cycling: 6 hours 15 minutes

Total Distance Traveled: 1030 km (About a 1/3 of the way!)

I left Ed’s place at 8 am hoping to cover the 75 Miles to North Bend where I had a place to stay using couch surfing, the weather at the beginning of the day was terrible, it wasn’t heavy rain but drizzled relentlessly, also I had quite a head wind to deal with too, which really did suck.

Today I had some crazy woman yell at me as they passed by in their Hummer towing an oversized Caravan, I couldn’t make out what she was yelling due to the clapping of my garbage bag poncho I was wearing in the wind but I can only assume that she was pissed because I was just there on the road, I was in the bicycle lane and don’t think I was doing anything wrong; anyways, I suppose ill never know what she was yelling about.

The weather cleared up but still heavily overcast around midday but I still had to deal with the annoying head wind that at this time of year should be blowing south, helping me get down to Mexico.

My feet were drenched for most of the day which could explain my short temper with some Americans that I dealt with; on one occasion in a supermarket when asking for the discounted bin/section or the marked down area, ‘I couldn’t have put it in any simpler terms’ she replied clueless and said “everything has a price tag on it”…meh, I just walked away, perhaps its just me… I dunno. There was another woman in a shop where I wanted to try an oyster but apparently they were sold out but she was just a grumpy bitch so I won’t go into the details.

Anyways the 75 Miles (120km) I had to cover today wasn’t easy, being wet, miserable and windy I thought it couldn’t get worse, I had to cross a 2 lane bridge just before arriving in North Bend where there was no shoulder, semis would pass me only inches from clipping my handle bars, see this is terrifying as when they pass me I get sucked into the rear tires of the semi because of the suction between the walls of the bridge and the passing truck, you have to compensate your steering to avoid a terrible accident, I stopped at one point on the bridge and waited for the cars and trucks to pass, what I thought to be the responsible thing to do, although I did have a police officer pass by whilst I had stopped and point at me as if to say I’m in the wrong… f#ck you pig! I didn’t want to die.

After all these ordeals I finally made it to Danes place, he and his housemate Ben were cool guys and spent the night chatting to them and playing video games (Halo 3). I also made some Spag Bol with garlic bread for dinner and played with Danes electric drum set to a Metallica song whilst he was on his keyboard and by the way was very talented, all of which was really good fun.

15/09/2010 Day 15 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: 2 miles outside Newport to Yachats 40km

Money Spent: $3 for a bag of pears from a market

Time cycling: 5 hours 15 minutes

Total Distance Traveled: 910 km

After packing up my things, fixing my tent (again) and saying farewell to the other cyclists in the camp I set off travelling further south, it was suppose to rain in the morning but thankfully it was all good.

I rode to a park with beach access to put my hand in the Pacific Ocean just for bragging rights and continued on to Seal rock, again unfortunately there were no animals at seal rock but it did have a nice view from one of the lookout points.

I stopped by a Wednesday market at Waldport getting some cheap ripe pears for cheap.

At this point the clouds were rolling in and the weather turned from very overcast to pissing it down, thankfully I found refuge at a library in Yachats before it got stuck in the worst of it.

After using the internet for a very long time hoping the weather would clear but unfortunately it did not and according to the hourly weather forecast it wasn’t going to ,I asked the librarian (Gretchen) if there was a place near town I could camp under a tree and she was kind enough to suggest a friend who helped out some other cyclists a while ago, so I left the library in the rain and cycled to Ed’s place, he was a big kind hearted man and willing to let a complete stranger crash on his floor. He was recently converted to the religion of Jehovah’s Witness after a lifetime of drug and alcohol abuse and we talked about the religion and my travels for some time, he even offered me a Bible (Jehovah’s Witness Edition) to take to read but I thankfully declined the offer. He offered me dinner too; a bean, rice dish he had made earlier that was very spicy and needed to be.

Also at the library I found out the weather for Friday was going to be terrible, I contacted a person (Dean Martin) on couch surfing about 100km from here in a town called North Bend to host me for 2 days until the weather cleared and I got a response accepting me right away.

Ed says the bible has helped him on his journey too be clean and he insists that God has helped him fight his addictions; me on the other hand have not had something so bad happen to me for me to turn to God; until (hoping not) this happens I don’t think I need to devote my life to a fictitious character and a book.

Just before going to bed Ed handed me a smaller JW Bible (travel edition) insisting it is even just a good book to read and to take with me on my trip, it was a little bit forward but he wasn’t pushing hard for me to be part of the religion, who knows I might flick through a few pages and perhaps I might get something out of it. So, thank you Ed.

Hands in the Sands of the Pacific

Seal Rock looking North

Seal Rock looking South

Me and all my rain gear...that doesnt keep me dry!

14/09/2010 Day 14 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: Sheridan to 2 miles outside Newport 115 km

Money Spent: $1 for a pack of cheeseburger flavoured Doritos (that actually tasted like cheeseburgers), $2 for a corndog and $3.50 for some vegetables and cheese.

Time cycling: 5 hours 15 minutes (now that I have a cyclo-computer I can add this statistic for my journey)

Total Distance Traveled: 870 km

This morning waking up at Stuart Grenfell Park where I made a great breakfast, two packs of 2 minute oats with a tin of canned fruit and the leftovers of blackberries I picked yesterday. I use my portable soldering iron to heat up the fuel for my stove to make the fumes to cook my food but it wasn’t working so well so I ripped the thing apart to fix it and now it works better and hotter than when I first got it.

I’m running low on stove fuel so ill need to buy/get some soon.

The weather was very nice for all the morning until I hit the coast, apparently when Portland and the inland has nice weather the weather along the coast is generally shit, and it was in Lincoln City as it was foggy and cold.

Before hitting the coast I stopped for lunch trying a corndog from a place that sells them as the best in the state, I had never had one before and was curious to what it was, its just a hotdog sausage battered and deep fried, personally I thought it was shit, but filling enough for $2. Luckily as I got the corndog some guy was going to throw out his fries he couldn’t finish but before he threw them in the bin I took it out of his hands… it wouldn’t of stopped me pulling them out of the dingy bin anyway even if he did throw them out.

I finally got to see to the Pacific Ocean from the states…well not much of it as the fog was very heavy and also reached highway 101 which is what ill be taking most of the way down the coast.

I met a Taiwanese guy named Chang on the route and chatted to him for a little while, he had cycled from Alaska and was making his way to Mexico too, I would have liked to cycle with him for a while but he cycles very slowly.

There was a nice little bicycle route that I took me along the coast, it was hilly but away from all the traffic also the views were great. This route took me to Cape Foulweather (appropriately named for today) and Otter Rock where there were no otters at all. Cape Foulweather was situated 500 feet high on the edge of a cliff, it really was quite cool.

I cycled on to just past Newport crossing a very eerie bridge as the fog obstructed any view past 20 meters where I went to a hiker/biker RV camping ground in a state park, its suppose to be $4 or cheaper but its now $6, I was debating whether to stay there or just on the side of the highway to save that little bit of money, although I needed a shower. There was a queue of RVs waiting to register at the single registration booth when I arrived and as one RV was entering the grounds I snuck in behind it and entered the park without paying, hehe.

I met a bunch of others that were cycling the coast too including a Canadian couple (Jason and Julie) then spent the evening chatting to them and a bunch of others.

Made it to the coast where the weather turned to shit

Today I joined the Highway that ill be spending most of my journey on

General Ridgway isnt too happy about the weather, he's pissed!

Some viewpoint along the coast

Chang, the Taiwanese guy cycling from Alaska.

Im hitting up the Oregon bike route.

Cape Foulweather located 500 feet from sea-level on the edge of a cliff HDR

Looking South from Cape Foulweather

Looking North form Cape Foulweather HDR

I found this memorial to the Vietnam war and thought it was a good idea to photoshop (rough) the bike i used to cycle the length of Vietnam next to the bike Im cycling the west coast of the USA.

13/09/2010 Day 13 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: Hillsboro to Sheridan 75 km

Money Spent: $2.75 for the light rail ticket, $6 for some groceries and $15 for a cyclo-computer from Walmart.

It was very trusting of Amanda and Michael to let me stay sleeping in whilst they went to work, they only really got to know me for a few hours over some drinks last night. They left me a note in the morning telling me to help myself their food so I made some toast and had a small bowl of granola for breakfast. I packed up all my things, had a shower and set off at 11.

One thing I hate about the roads in North America apart from them driving on the wrong side of the road ;) and that’s 4 way stop signs; where at an intersection all cars have to stop, first one there gets to go first. It doesn’t work so well for cyclists as motorists will sometimes give way to cyclists even if you were not the first one there, this confuses things a hell of a lot and now when I come across them I say fuck it and just cycle steadily through.

I made it to the Visitor information center where I got all the maps I needed for the coast of Oregon, the guy behind the counter suggested a route to the coast that he cycled a few weeks ago, I would have taken the route but it was heading more-so North which is in the wrong direction. Instead I hopped on the light rail to Hillsboro, this way I avoided all the boring suburbs around Portland found Hwy 47 south and then Hwy 99W that joins Hwy 18.

I stopped by the dollar store to stock up on some food for the next couple of days and also popped by Walmart to pick up a cycle computer that gives me a bunch of useful info whilst I’m cycling. So far I’m averaging 15 Mph and my top speed is 27.8 Mph.

The farmland I passed today was nice and the views kept me entertained as it was a gorgeous day, well, until the sun started setting whilst I was on highway 18 west, not only was I getting blinded but at the same time I got pushed back by a bad headwind dropping my average speed to 10 Mph.

Anyways, I still pushed on till I got to Sheriden where I filled up my water jugs and asked a local where a good place to camp was, he suggested a park next to the highway beside a river where there would be plenty of blackberry bushes, I said great, good enough for me and I set off there.

The park was nice and I spent a while picking blackberries before setting up my tent under a tree.

For dinner I cooked up some noodles with tuna, chili sauce and bread, and for dessert I made banana pudding (just add cold milk…I used powdered milk) with blackberries. Not a bad meal, aye.

Cool looking Grain Factory I passed by

12/09/2010 Day 12 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: roughly 25 km around Portland

Money Spent: $5 for breakfast.

Both Shannon and I woke up with hangovers this morning, I had to be up early to cook off the Jerky that had been marinating in the fridge for the past couple of days before I left. We went for breakfast down the road which was good, cheap and the weather was just gorgeous. It wasn’t until 2 till I had to pack up my things and start heading out of the city via the Visitor information center to get a detailed bicycle map of the pacific coast and another map to get out of town.

I was going to take highway 99W to highway 18 but apparently its busy and hasn’t got much of a shoulder. Shannon suggested I should take the light rail out of town and then highway 47, I thought id just ask the information center. Unfortunately for me the info center closed at 2 and I really wanted the maps from there so I headed to the hostel again and got in contact with Amanda through couch surfing who said she could put me up for the night for me to head off in the morning.

I cycled back across the bridge from downtown about 6km to where she lived, she lived with her boyfriend (Michael) in a small but cool place, they were very friendly and offered me beer as soon as I entered their house, I was their first couch surfer that had stayed with them and they were more than hospitable. After chatting for a while they took me to a bar where I met some of their friends, had a few to drink and then had some tata tots, basically deep fried potato chunks served with salsa, guacamole and sour cream, and for $3 it was great value for money. The beer was cheap too but almost seemed watered down, but what to expect at $2 a pint.

View of Portland from the North East side of the River

11/09/2010 Day 11 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: 0km

Money Spent: $2 for come cookies at a gas station.

After helping out with some cleaning around Shannon’s house we went on a hike around Mt. Saint Helens, we had to drive an hour and a half north where I recognized a lot of places I cycled past. The hike was good fun; we hiked about 8 miles and managed to get a very nice panoramic view of the Volcano from a viewpoint.

We got back in the late afternoon where we sunk down a few beers and went to Shannon’s friends BBQ. There were only a few people there but the food that I could help myself to was superb, mussels, chicken, stuffed onions and mozzarella salad, I really wouldn’t have called it a BBQ, it was more like a dinner party. We sat around for the evening continuing to sink down beers and chat.

All in all it was a good night although a sketchy drunken cycle home.

Panoramic View of Mount St. Helens with Shannon

Shannon and the volcano that blew up 30 years ago

10/09/2010 Day 10 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: Portland 0km

Money Spent: $20 for groceries and beer

Today after not getting much sleep last night I chilled out / lazed around the house and didn’t really do much. I would have liked to do some sight seeing but the weather wasn’t great and either was I. I did some cooking in the evening making some rice crispy treats and started marinating some beef for the jerky I’m making. As for dinner I cooked up some Asian stir-fry’s for the two of us and chilled on the couch for the night.

09/09/2010 Day 9 Vancouver to Mexico

Distance Travelled: St. Helens to Portland, 50km + 15km to Shannons and another 10km whilst intoxicated

Money Spent: $2 for McDonalds and $20 for Our drinks at the bar

Marywether woke me up in the morning offering both Fred and I a cooked breakfast, she had to go to work so we packed our things and we left at 9am. Fred and I just cruised to Portland not even breaking a sweat; it was pleasant as we where chatting all the way.

We arrived at the downtown area of Portland where we entered McDonalds to use the internet for a few hours waiting for the rain to stop outside.

We crawled around the downtown area (Fred likes to take pictures of random buildings…very often) looking for a hostel for which Fred to stay at but unfortunately they had been all booked up for the weekend.

He decided to leave the city and continue cycling meanwhile I stayed at the hostel waiting to contact Shannon.

I sat around for a few hours and finally got in touch with her, I had to meet her at her place in the North part of the city about 15km from the hostel. On the way I got a little lost, Portland is a network of one way streets and without a decent map, very hard to navigate but perhaps that’s just me.

Whilst trying to figure out where I was a guy helped me out by taking me to his place around the corner and gave me his map of the city, not only did he do this but he then gave me a loaf of bread for some reason… random.

I finally managed to get to Shannon’s place where she lived with her dog ‘Leon’ in a 2 bedroom house. We took her dog for a walk towards the river and when we got back we then munched down some dinner: burgers with homemade BBQ sauce (even better than mine) and red cabbage coleslaw. We had a few beers and then was invited by one of Shannon’s friends to go for few drinks down at a bar, we cycled there and they had a lot of beers on offer, there are plenty of micro breweries in the area and I just got the bartenders recommendation beer that smelt like wine and super alcoholic.

We cycled back to Shannon’s just a little bit intoxicated well, actually I was pretty wasted, had a few more beers at hers and went to bed, I went back to my bed the next morning ;)

Lunch Break on the side of the Hwy towards Portland

Sunset of Williamette River, Portland

Leon - Shannon's Dog that half Labrador and half Rottweiler and cute as hell