Recording the adventures of Robert and Jenn since 2010.
Sunday, October 31, 2010
10-31-10: Second Chances
After we secured a room for the night, we ventured out for food. We were famished, having had only coffee and a meat stick since our last meal over 12 hours ago. Genius planners we are, I know. We found a place to eat next door and quickly ordered two beers, green curry and jungle curry, a non-coconut milk curry. We scarfed our food down, my jungle curry being nearly Thai spicy. We left quickly to escape the chain smoking Germans sitting nearby. Next we went scouting the other nearby guesthouses and to our dismay found a wonderfully clean room, right off the beach, for the same price as ours! (Melameen guesthouses) curse.
Now back to the main road, away from the beach, for more exploring. I don't have the desire to right another crazy long post, so I will try to abridge this without losing the point - second chances. We walked up the road quite a ways, taking it all in. Dirty street, jammed with vendors and touts offering everything from Thai massage, food, tailored Armani suits, skin shows, gasoline in plastic water bottles or old liquor bottles, and much more. As you walked, sellers would greet you with their robotic, memorized phrases: hello, welcome my friend, Thai massage, come look. It was hard not to look when you heard the English words, but that only encouraged them to sell harder. We were not impressed to say the least.
We went back to the beach to walk in the opposite direction to see if it was nicer down there. No dice. The beach was a thin strip of debris-strewn sand accompanied by lots of hotels and eateries right next to the water. The establishments were a mix of upscale and skeezy, none being charming or inviting. We went back to our lunch place, Rock Sand, because it had Internet, beer and a place to sit. This is where the tide turned.
After a beer, things didn't seem so bad. The place emptied out. The teenage workers struck up a game of ping pong. We devised a way to practice our numbers - go fish in Thai, basically, ("do you have a nueng? No, go fish.") and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. We left only because we were hungry again and wanted to try a new place. We had seen some cheap authentic thai food amongst the brash western-catering joints on the strip, so we headed there. We skipped the place with a motion sensor on their sidewalk menu, which chimed, "hello! Welcome!" repeatedly until i cut the switch, turning it back on after we surveyed and rejected their menu. We found a better place and had papaya salad (not as spicy as we had hoped), green curry and noodles - aroi! (delicious)
We wandered the strip again for a while, but under cover of darkness, with most of the people ferreted away, who knows where, it was actually quite nice. We stopped for an excellent coffee before wandering back to the beach, where we were planning on retiring despite it being only about 6:30pm. We opted to turn away from our guesthouse and see the beach at night. Surprisingly, the tide had receded, revealing a wide, white sand beach (hence it's name - white sand beach/ hat sai khao). The eateries had strung up lights in the trees and we found a place to have a beer to try to keep us up until a normal bedtime. Failure. Alcohol is a depressant, did you know that? Quickly I wanted to head home and pass out, especially because the bar was playing horrible, ancient pop music ("hit me baby, one more time" among others).
Home we went, scaled the mountainside, strung up our mosquito net, shook the leaves off the sheets, slid into our silk travel sheets and fell asleep - determined to move on tomorrow to Lonely Beach, but not as grumpy at making a stop here, at White Sand, than we had been earlier in the day.
Now back to the main road, away from the beach, for more exploring. I don't have the desire to right another crazy long post, so I will try to abridge this without losing the point - second chances. We walked up the road quite a ways, taking it all in. Dirty street, jammed with vendors and touts offering everything from Thai massage, food, tailored Armani suits, skin shows, gasoline in plastic water bottles or old liquor bottles, and much more. As you walked, sellers would greet you with their robotic, memorized phrases: hello, welcome my friend, Thai massage, come look. It was hard not to look when you heard the English words, but that only encouraged them to sell harder. We were not impressed to say the least.
We went back to the beach to walk in the opposite direction to see if it was nicer down there. No dice. The beach was a thin strip of debris-strewn sand accompanied by lots of hotels and eateries right next to the water. The establishments were a mix of upscale and skeezy, none being charming or inviting. We went back to our lunch place, Rock Sand, because it had Internet, beer and a place to sit. This is where the tide turned.
After a beer, things didn't seem so bad. The place emptied out. The teenage workers struck up a game of ping pong. We devised a way to practice our numbers - go fish in Thai, basically, ("do you have a nueng? No, go fish.") and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. We left only because we were hungry again and wanted to try a new place. We had seen some cheap authentic thai food amongst the brash western-catering joints on the strip, so we headed there. We skipped the place with a motion sensor on their sidewalk menu, which chimed, "hello! Welcome!" repeatedly until i cut the switch, turning it back on after we surveyed and rejected their menu. We found a better place and had papaya salad (not as spicy as we had hoped), green curry and noodles - aroi! (delicious)
We wandered the strip again for a while, but under cover of darkness, with most of the people ferreted away, who knows where, it was actually quite nice. We stopped for an excellent coffee before wandering back to the beach, where we were planning on retiring despite it being only about 6:30pm. We opted to turn away from our guesthouse and see the beach at night. Surprisingly, the tide had receded, revealing a wide, white sand beach (hence it's name - white sand beach/ hat sai khao). The eateries had strung up lights in the trees and we found a place to have a beer to try to keep us up until a normal bedtime. Failure. Alcohol is a depressant, did you know that? Quickly I wanted to head home and pass out, especially because the bar was playing horrible, ancient pop music ("hit me baby, one more time" among others).
Home we went, scaled the mountainside, strung up our mosquito net, shook the leaves off the sheets, slid into our silk travel sheets and fell asleep - determined to move on tomorrow to Lonely Beach, but not as grumpy at making a stop here, at White Sand, than we had been earlier in the day.
10-31-10: Getting to Koh Chang, Thailand
We woke up early this morning, curse jet lag. Our bodies are still
confused about when we should be asleep. We packed up and left Ban
Jaidee Guesthouse and Trat, not realizing how good we had it there. We
found coffee for breakfast at a small, foul-smelling shop that catered
to Westerners, but the coffee was amazing. I'm talking Vivace-good,
for those of you in the know. We are starting to try out simple Thai
phrases like thank you and how much, which is fun and amusingly
embarrassing. Next we were approached by a sangthaew (truck taxi)
driver, offering us a ride to Koh Chang for 50 baht. This was the
standard price, so we agreed and jumped onto the back benches. We felt
clever finding our own way instead of waiting two hours for the
arranged shuttle we heard about through another guesthouse. The taxi
driver got us to and on the Centerpoint Ferry over to the island of
Koh Chang and off we went.
confused about when we should be asleep. We packed up and left Ban
Jaidee Guesthouse and Trat, not realizing how good we had it there. We
found coffee for breakfast at a small, foul-smelling shop that catered
to Westerners, but the coffee was amazing. I'm talking Vivace-good,
for those of you in the know. We are starting to try out simple Thai
phrases like thank you and how much, which is fun and amusingly
embarrassing. Next we were approached by a sangthaew (truck taxi)
driver, offering us a ride to Koh Chang for 50 baht. This was the
standard price, so we agreed and jumped onto the back benches. We felt
clever finding our own way instead of waiting two hours for the
arranged shuttle we heard about through another guesthouse. The taxi
driver got us to and on the Centerpoint Ferry over to the island of
Koh Chang and off we went.
Changing locations, although scary at first because we weren't sure
where or how to go, was shaping up to be pretty simple thanks to the
well-worn track from Trat to Koh Chang. When the ferry let us off, we
expected a taxi to be waiting for us, but no one seemed to notice our
arrival. We walked around the little shops there, got a meat stick,
which was cold, but we were so hungry we ate it anyways. Now what? We
eventually cornered a taxi driver, but he told us to wait for more
people so the price would be less. So we waited. We watched people
amass to take the ferry back to Trat and kids playing a game with
little rocks (like marbles, it seemed). Robert payed 5 baht to use the
bathroom, then we noticed the free, public bathroom, in front of which
we were sitting. Gotta love paying to use a free service.
We spoke to a German taxi driver going the other way and he told us a
few amusing things in his very broken english. First, he called this a
journey as in, "is this your first journey?" i thought this was an apt
descriptor of what we are doing, especially better than vacation or
holiday, which isnt really what we are here for. Also, he told us
about his previous four journeys: first-intro to thailand, second -
fell in love in thailand, third - visited his girl in thailand, fourth
and current trip - girl broke his heart. Poor guy, he was not a happy
camper. Finally, he explained the thai structure of importance:
buddha, king, thai people, ladybugs and then falangs (foreigners).
Again, i think he was pretty fed up with thailand at this point, but
an interesting point of view. The only westerners we have seen running
businesses here have been French men with Thai wives, who increase
their legitimacy. Off he went on the ferry leaving us to keep waiting.
Anyways, we got frustrated with waiting and went to flag down a taxi
on the road. The first guy we found told us to go back to the pier,
apparently there was a system for getting a taxi and we were not
allowed to flag down our own cab. Annoyed, we walked back to the pier
- oh, no! He wasn't jerking with us, the taxi at the pier was finally
loading and a million falangs had just gotten off the ferry and were
getting on to the taxi we just spent hours waiting for!!! Trick was,
they didn't really know what was going on. I walked right up through
their confused faces, asked how much (1/12th of the price I was quoted
as a single rider earlier) and jumped on. Done. We crammed 12 people
into that tiny truck and off we went. Our companions were: Germans,
Aussies, and Brits, no other Americans. We are odd-ducks it seems.
The road led straight up the mountain at a remarkable slope and then
straight down the other side. This truly isn't a place to learn how to
drive a motorbike as we were repeatedly told. We got dropped off and
spent some time wandering past and ignoring touts of all stripes. We
needed help, but universally refusing help from a tout, someone who
comes up to you with an offer, is the first rule of savvy traveling.
Finally, I broke down and asked another westerner for directions. He
was quite helpful and gave us a map - you know, the map that many of
the touts were offering! Oh well, we got ours eventually and were able
to find the few backpacker guesthouses we had heard about.
Story-worthy: Independent Bo Guesthouse
This was the first place we found in Koh Chang and for that reason
alone we shouldn't have agreed to stay, but we did. The place is known
for it's crazy decor, mountainside location and bohemian "vibe," which
apparently is a selling point for some. All three descriptions were
spot on. We were shown to the two free rooms at the top of the hill -
up twisted concrete staircases, with equally twisted hand rails. I'll
post a picture, the walk up is insane.
Then we got to the available rooms. The lower room was a wooden shack
with a technicolor paint-job complete with a room-sized bed, one
window and a shelf. I'm not sure the last time someone stayed here
because there were leaves and tree bits - on the bed! The wooden plank
floor was covered with blue stick-on laminate (think college-dorm
drawer lining). A bare, fluorescent bulb hung from the ceiling and a
picture of bob marley was pasted to the wall. There was a porch, with
an ocean view (obstructed by jungle, but there was water through the
trees too), one chair and an external padlock. Home, sweet home.
The bathroom was...well, you can decide on an appropriate descriptor.
Imagine. You scale a five-step wooden ladder to get to a landing where
you push open a white pasteboard door to find: a western style toilet,
minus the flush handle, a giant, blue plastic fifty gallon water drum,
a hand scooper sitting on top of the drum, a water hose on the floor
and a hand-held shower head attached to the wall. Oh - and a present
was left in the toilet, just for us, rotting away ever since the room
was last let - before the tree bits accumulated on the bed.
After this glowing introduction and the 300 baht price tag, we were
sold! Mostly we were ready to be done moving and figured this would do
for the night. Surprisingly, it did.
Pictures will follow.
Saturday, October 30, 2010
10-30-10: Learning How To Eat
Today when we left the guest house, we had one mission: to eat.
Yesterday we failed at this, so today it was fairly important. Many
places were closed and after some wandering, we ended up at the day
market. It was just opening, but at least we had a few options. We
wandered around more, making loop after loop of the same food stalls,
looking for tasty bits. Eventually we got frustrated with our indecisiveness and ordered some barbecued meat bits. They at least looked familiar. Language was definitely a challenge, but pointing works great when buying something. The only problem is: everything you buy has to be "no questions asked!"
We were definitely still hungry so we wandered some more. We found some places selling soup, but these places had a menu and you can't point unless you truly want to blindly pick your food. So I went with a different tactic - I walked up to a clean looking stall and pointed to some people eating their food already and ordered the people. "I want...(point, point)." They unfortunately had ordered their food from the dirty looking stall around the corner. Thankfully, the clean stall owner was willing to present a lot of different options and eventually we succeeded in ordering soup. We were getting the hang of this eating thing!
Next, I wanted some fruit to round out our fairly strange meal. I had my eye on these small, green, spherical fruits that I had seen cut open to show an orange-like inside. I bought several and was proud of my purchase until I smelled them. I bought four very tasty looking LIMES. Yum! Without a knife limes are hard to eat, but I peeled one in spite - couldn't make myself eat it though. Maybe we weren't going to be able to feed ourselves after all.
We got a hand-drawn map from our guest house and spent most of the day wandering and looking for places on the map, with mixed success.
Notable successes included many other guest houses (ours was still the
best, I think), a touristy coffee place where Robert got his espresso
fix - twice today, a supermarket where we got antibacterial soap, an
internet cafe where I was able to use my thumb drive to upload and
complete my UMich grad school application, a bookstore that had a
depressingly non-existent selection of english-thai phrases and a
restaurant where we realized we didn't have to eat at the market.
Shops keep strange hours here it seems and when they are closed, they
pull down garage doors that turn them into walls instead of shops, so
we hadn't seem many restaurants in our previous wanderings. I was
quite glad that we wouldn't have to feed ourselves on market food
alone.
Sidebar: Robert wants me to mention that we saw a GIANT snake today
too. He said it was a king cobra, but I'm pretty sure he doesn't have a clue what they actually look like. Regardless, it was pretty long and
scary looking. It was crossing the street in a jungly section of town
and slithered off into the bushes before we could get a better look at
it. We did amuse a passing motorbiker, who grinned when she saw us
jump at the snake. We make quite a scene here, getting stares from
everyone, but the motor bikers are most amusing, I'm surprised they
don't crash because of all their gawking!
We recruited help on feeding ourselves for dinner. We asked Frenchman
at the bookstore/hubby of our guesthouse owner where to go. He
suggested a Mongolian BBQ place nearby. He mentioned you have to cook
your own food, but I was up for the adventure. He said it was cheap
for a lot of food. Robert didn't understand him through his thick
French accent and was thoroughly surprised that we had to work for our
own dinner. It seemed like a cool place though - open air teak
structure, jammed with locals. We helped ourselves to a cross-legged
floor table and eventually the waitress found us. Her accent was crazy
thick, but eventually we conveyed - we want Korean food (not Thai,
which was apparently an option) - big, seafood, water to drink-big.
She took the menus, so we were done ordering. As they brought more
things to our table it became clear that we were in over our heads,
neither of us had done this before and we wouldn't be getting detailed
instructions from our waitress! I stared down a few nearby tables and
we guessed and eventually we had made ourselves dinner. The best part
was the spicy sauce. The biggest problem with dinner was the
mosquitos. Open air restaurant + by the river = too many skeeters. I
slapped and wiggled my way through dinner, imagining each bite as a
malaria sentence (we decided against the malaria pills for now). We
tried to order our check, but when she ignored us for 15 min
afterwards, opting instead to serve ice cream, we couldn't tell if she
was busy or had no idea what we wanted. Check was 170 baht, or less
than seven dollars for both of us.
Walked home and procured more water to stave off the swollen ankles,
which we are assuming are from dehydration or too much seated travel.
Fun times!
Attached are two pics. Me in the day market standing next to the pigheads (and TAILS) on sale and Robert cooking our dinner at the Korean
BBQ place.
Friday, October 29, 2010
10-30-10: Trat, Thailand
effortlessly slept for twelve hours.
A plane took us to the Bangkok airport, a shuttle took us to the bus
terminal, a bus took us to the Trat bus station, a truck taxi took us
to BanJaiDee Guest House. It was a little more difficult to find our
way than when we were just following airport signs, but we made it.
The guesthouse is perfectly adequate, small room with just a bed, two
shared bathroom/showers down the hall. Hot water is a wonderful thing.
After getting a room, we ventured out into the city to look around. We
picked up a map on our way out, but translating what we saw on the map
to what we saw in real life proved more than challenging. We found our
way to a series of markets selling anything and everything. My
favorite were the underwear stalls with whole tables full of bras. The
food was overwhelming though so we just wandered until we couldn't
think straight anymore. Mind you we still hadn't slept horizontally at
this point. So home we went, hungry but ready to shower and sleep.
Robert rigged our mosquito net, even though we have yet to see a bug.
We turned on our rotating fan and slid into our silk travel sheets on
the most wonderfully firm mattress you can imagine. We are gearing up
to go out now for food and more exploring.
Maybe I will have something story-worthy for you tonight.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
10-28-10: Marathon Travel
Right now, Robert and I are sitting in the airport in Singapore waiting for our connecting flight to Bangkok, which leaves in four hours. It has been a marathon day of traveling. We have survived three legs of travel so far: IAH to Atlanta - two hrs, Atlanta to Tokyo - 14 hrs, and Tokyo to Singapore - 7 hrs. The flight to Bangkok should thankfully be only 3 hrs. We are unsure about what to expect once in Bangkok because there is some flooding in the area. We shall see.
Amusing tid-bits from the day:
Written on our Singapore Disembarkation Form: "WARNING DEATH FOR DRUG TRAFFICKERS UNDER SINGAPORE LAW." I'm glad that I bothered getting my name corrected on my sleeping pills prescription lest they think I was trafficking them!
Robert got stopped at a security check point in Tokyo and the woman searched him and his bag. Before searching his bag, though, she asked, "is this your name?" (pointing at the name tag on his bag, which read "Over") Not sure if she was joking or not.
Amusing tid-bits from the day:
Written on our Singapore Disembarkation Form: "WARNING DEATH FOR DRUG TRAFFICKERS UNDER SINGAPORE LAW." I'm glad that I bothered getting my name corrected on my sleeping pills prescription lest they think I was trafficking them!
Robert got stopped at a security check point in Tokyo and the woman searched him and his bag. Before searching his bag, though, she asked, "is this your name?" (pointing at the name tag on his bag, which read "Over") Not sure if she was joking or not.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
10-27-10: Hello world!
Here we go again. Robert and I are sent to have another crazy adventure. If you followed my last blog, welcome back! If I did a really terrible job alerting you to the fact that I was 1) going on the first crazy adventure or 2) keeping a blog, welcome!!
Tomorrow morning Robert and I get on a plane to Singapore, where we will catch another flight to Bangkok, Thailand, where our adventure begins. We plan to spend about four months in Southeast Asia, some as-yet-to-be-determined combination of Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia and Indonesia.
I will try to blog as regularly as possible; this time with pictures! If you have never listened to The Moth Podcast, google it and start listening immediately.(" The Moth features true stories, told live, without notes.") I mention it because at the close of each podcast, the host says, "I hope you have a story-worthy week." I like the phrase, so I am going to steal it to denote the best story that Robert or I acquired since my last post. For example:
Today's Story-Worthy Story:
Today was a challenging day of last minute errands and final preparations for our trip. It was a mix of wins and losses, with their attendant highs and lows. It seemed like just as we managed to cross one item off the To-Do List, we remembered two more to add. One errand that we unequivocally count in the win category was our passport photos. Many travel sites recommend that you take 10-12 passport photos with you so you always have them on hand to get visas or other ID cards made. We went to Walgreens and asked them to take passport photos for us. When the guy revealed they would charge $4/photo, we were taken aback. $40 bucks is a lot to spend on measly photos.
We left, determined to do it ourselves. Robert, genius that he is, googled it and found us a very helpful website that coached us through taking our own photos, cropped them for us and created a neat 4x6 of 5 photos for us. We printed 3 copies each through Walgreens' online photo printing service, waited an hour before picking them up and only spent $1.23!!!! Ha-HA, Walgreens. Take that. I attached our mug shots, enjoy!
Monday, October 18, 2010
Final American Adventure Post
After the Selway, we drove through Washington to Seattle, camping one
night in a mosquito infested Swamp Restoration area. In Seattle, we
hung out with my brother a lot and did the following things:
Seattle:
Tuesday aft:
Got to town in the afternoon
Pho with ben
Duck dodge, sixth place, raft up
Road up cap hill
Fell down stairs
Wed:
Bk at the greek isles special food week
Pikes place mtk, ate our way around the shops: beechers Mac and
cheese, heirloom toms, donuts, two books, feta cheese pocket
Rode bikes all the way to uw, to center for urban horticulture
Made dinner at keishas, Tom kha and green curry
Thursday:
Espresso and cap at vivace
Conservatory and seattle Asian art museum, bahn mi from seattle deli
to eat at Seattle art museum downtown
Molly and plum for dinner
Stumbling monk for a beer with ben and keisha
Friday:
Am i forgetting something we did? It seems like it.
Took robert to the Locks
Bahn mi and pho in ballard
Cleaned the car
Drove to leavenworth, slept on Side of the road
Sat:
Hiked the enchantments, steep side first
Rescue operation on the way up aasgard pass
Made it to the top of the pass for lunch
Long descent
Lots of lakes
Started misting
Hiked in in the rain and dark with head lamps
13 hr 14 min hike all told
Slept on Side of the road again
Sun:
Ben woke us early
Ate at 59er diner on the way home, got a shake
Hung out at marcs for a while
Went with ben to get groceries to make enchiladas
Cooked at marcs, but Marc sick so he went to bed
Monday:
Stumptown
Burke on campus
Bahn mi on campus
Gas works to watch planes and yogis
Fremont troll
Road around lake union
Met ben and keisha at college inn for cheap nachos and good beer
Road bikes back to marcs
Went over to bens to hang
Tuesday:
Vivace
Bahn mi
Drove away
Provisioned along the way
Camped at cape perpetua in the amphitheater site 40 (29, 40, 30)
rainforest terrain, across 101 from the beach
Wed:
Visitor center at cape perpetua for info
Found a site at tillicum state park
Made tabouli, brought it to the beach for lunch
Robert tried to make a sand ladder to climb the sand wall
Spouting horn for high tide
Drove to get crab pots
Investigated Newport public dock, heard sea lions across the bay
Went to seal rock to look at tide pools and gather mussels
Cooked mussels and pad kee mow for dinner
Thursday:
Drove to historic Newport to find sea lions, found them!
Lincoln city to crab
No action at all, just lots of tourists
Lost pot, had to fish it back, but successful
Drove back to newport historic to crab off that dock
Lots of crabs, threw back two red rock keepers, oops
Alternated checking pot and getting beer at rogue
Ate clams at rogue too, good, mussels better
Met dock family and chatted them up
Left pot overnight with three red rock to collect in the morning
Collected mussels at seal rock, bc I wanted too.
Took forever to clean and cook them, got so many we were done eating
them before we had eaten them all, worked on de bearding technique,
and slurping to not eat the left over beard
Happy to sleep
Fri:
Early morning to go check pot, two big keepers
More sea lion watching
Espresso and then dock sitting hoping for more action, nothing.
Headed back to camp to cook the catch.
Robert really enjoyed eating how fresh and home caught crabs
Rest of the trip:
Drove into California and then headed east barely through nevada,
slept at some point in meadow full of deer marauding as BEARs. Escaped
with my life just barely. Kept driving towards durango, slept in Utah
one night with good star watching and free peaceful camp place just
for us on public land. Made it to durango, hung out for a day, met
Davids new roomie, thankfully he let us sleep on his floor and off we
went. It was a marathon drive back to the woodlands. Got in at...2 or
three in the morning. Tired but safe.
Gone for 70 nights. Slept inside for 12 nights, 2 in a hotel.
What a trip!!
night in a mosquito infested Swamp Restoration area. In Seattle, we
hung out with my brother a lot and did the following things:
Seattle:
Tuesday aft:
Got to town in the afternoon
Pho with ben
Duck dodge, sixth place, raft up
Road up cap hill
Fell down stairs
Wed:
Bk at the greek isles special food week
Pikes place mtk, ate our way around the shops: beechers Mac and
cheese, heirloom toms, donuts, two books, feta cheese pocket
Rode bikes all the way to uw, to center for urban horticulture
Made dinner at keishas, Tom kha and green curry
Thursday:
Espresso and cap at vivace
Conservatory and seattle Asian art museum, bahn mi from seattle deli
to eat at Seattle art museum downtown
Molly and plum for dinner
Stumbling monk for a beer with ben and keisha
Friday:
Am i forgetting something we did? It seems like it.
Took robert to the Locks
Bahn mi and pho in ballard
Cleaned the car
Drove to leavenworth, slept on Side of the road
Sat:
Hiked the enchantments, steep side first
Rescue operation on the way up aasgard pass
Made it to the top of the pass for lunch
Long descent
Lots of lakes
Started misting
Hiked in in the rain and dark with head lamps
13 hr 14 min hike all told
Slept on Side of the road again
Sun:
Ben woke us early
Ate at 59er diner on the way home, got a shake
Hung out at marcs for a while
Went with ben to get groceries to make enchiladas
Cooked at marcs, but Marc sick so he went to bed
Monday:
Stumptown
Burke on campus
Bahn mi on campus
Gas works to watch planes and yogis
Fremont troll
Road around lake union
Met ben and keisha at college inn for cheap nachos and good beer
Road bikes back to marcs
Went over to bens to hang
Tuesday:
Vivace
Bahn mi
Drove away
Provisioned along the way
Camped at cape perpetua in the amphitheater site 40 (29, 40, 30)
rainforest terrain, across 101 from the beach
Wed:
Visitor center at cape perpetua for info
Found a site at tillicum state park
Made tabouli, brought it to the beach for lunch
Robert tried to make a sand ladder to climb the sand wall
Spouting horn for high tide
Drove to get crab pots
Investigated Newport public dock, heard sea lions across the bay
Went to seal rock to look at tide pools and gather mussels
Cooked mussels and pad kee mow for dinner
Thursday:
Drove to historic Newport to find sea lions, found them!
Lincoln city to crab
No action at all, just lots of tourists
Lost pot, had to fish it back, but successful
Drove back to newport historic to crab off that dock
Lots of crabs, threw back two red rock keepers, oops
Alternated checking pot and getting beer at rogue
Ate clams at rogue too, good, mussels better
Met dock family and chatted them up
Left pot overnight with three red rock to collect in the morning
Collected mussels at seal rock, bc I wanted too.
Took forever to clean and cook them, got so many we were done eating
them before we had eaten them all, worked on de bearding technique,
and slurping to not eat the left over beard
Happy to sleep
Fri:
Early morning to go check pot, two big keepers
More sea lion watching
Espresso and then dock sitting hoping for more action, nothing.
Headed back to camp to cook the catch.
Robert really enjoyed eating how fresh and home caught crabs
Rest of the trip:
Drove into California and then headed east barely through nevada,
slept at some point in meadow full of deer marauding as BEARs. Escaped
with my life just barely. Kept driving towards durango, slept in Utah
one night with good star watching and free peaceful camp place just
for us on public land. Made it to durango, hung out for a day, met
Davids new roomie, thankfully he let us sleep on his floor and off we
went. It was a marathon drive back to the woodlands. Got in at...2 or
three in the morning. Tired but safe.
Gone for 70 nights. Slept inside for 12 nights, 2 in a hotel.
What a trip!!
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