< back to other trips

Leaving the Atlantic for the Pacific
California and Oregon
August/September 2010

San Francisco, California

Walking the streets of the Mission neighborhood in San Francisco.

Lunch in the Mission neighborhood with my dear friend Eric Baliey, his fantastic wife Rhea and their adorable daughter Paloma.

Eric and I got hired as a graphic design team by Leo Burnett back in 1997. On the day we got the word that we got the job, we went to Taco Bell to celebrate. It was then that Eric (who had already been nudging me to go freelance) asked me if I really wanted to work for an agency, or if I would be happier working for myself - it was right there and then that I decided to turn down Leo Burnett and go it on my own. If it weren't for Eric, I might be another drone in a cubicle... I haven't seen him in almost 13 years! It was FANTASTIC to catch up and finally meet his lovely family. They met online the same year Aaron and I did (2004), and got married the same year we did (2006).

Long ago memories for Aaron

Aaron lived in this apartment building when he was 2! Only for a year, but it was cool to visit...

Muir Woods, California

Muir Woods - Aaron's 38th birthday - BREATHTAKING.

I cannot describe the size of these trees, some which are 800 years old. The strange thing is, we spent the entire trip surrounded by these oversize trees - they're everywhere. This was a magical birthday for Aaron!

Big tree. Small me.

If a tree falls in the forest...

Hmmmm.... what would it taste like?

I find climbing trees great fun.

After about 1/2 mile in, the tourists pooped out and we had the entire place to ourselves for the rest of the day.

Tangled Aaron.

Aaron in a trunk.

We spotted a mule deer on the trail, and I was able to snap this shot. But you can only see his butt (highlighted).

Northern California Coastline

Bodega Bay, California

This is the very first glimpse we had of the Pacific. Aaron was so excited, he practically jumped out of the car before I could stop. He ran right over to the edge, sat down and smiled.

Come join me buddy!

There are so many varieties of plants and flowers it's unbelievable. These have blossoms as big as your hand.

We stopped for lunch at a secluded cove just north of Salt Point State Park.

Someone had built a fort of driftwood on the sand. If you look close you can see "Trump Place" written on one of the pieces at the top.

It was huge and empty like most of the coastline beaches in Northern California.

We found a dead otter on the shore - you can see HUGE shark tooth puncture wounds on his back. Circle of life :(

MacKerricher State Park, California

MacKerricher State Park, California

Since it was off-season, we got a wonderfully secluded walk-in site right in the State Park. You park your car, load up a wheel barrow and wheel your gear into the forest (which is much better than lugging in what you can carry on your back. We're getting old.) There was only one other site taken, so we were happy and secluded. There's our trusty tent. We've been travelling with it since 2005 and it's just about as good as day one. It has seen Washington, Idaho, Montana, California, Oregon, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada and New York state! PLUS, our friend Marcus used it when he travelled through Africa!

Adorable little raccoon prints on our fire ring. Rascals.

Our trusty Zip Ztove. Many a meal has been cooked on this using nothing but broken twigs from the forest floor.

A happy Aaron in our tent. Ready for a night of book-readin'.

We were broken in to by some of locals. I woke up and looked outside the tent, and saw the momma and her 2 babies (you can see the shyer of the two pups in the bushes - the glowing eyes are a dead giveaway. Adorable.) I shouted, "GIT!" and they were not alarmed. I was so glad my camera was close.

The momma.

You can still see one glowing eye from the other baby in the bushes.

They had broken into the garbage bag, and the baby was trying to roll a bit of the tin-foil top of a bottle of wine in his cute little hands. I think he thought it was a shell of something tasty.

Morning. Ready for a good cup of coffee before our hike.

We were staying right in the State Park, and just a short walk away from a beach where cute seals spend the morning floating around and laying out on the rocks. Again, adorable. This entire coast is a great whale watching area, too, but we were there at the wrong time of year. :(

Cute little ground squirrel... They have gorgeous thick furry coats and teeny-tiny short legs (like Edith). This one is sunning himself.

We took a wonderful hike accompanied by a description of all the trees and flora at the trailhead. We learned so much! This part of the country is an absolute bread basket - fish, berries, grains, edible plants... A great place to survive off the land.

The trail went from the coast into a dark and ancient forest.

Mount Shasta, California

a.k.a. Where I want to spend my final days

Gumboot Lake Campground - Mount Shasta, California

This was our best campsite on the trip. And it was free! We were here for 3 days, and on the first we were the only people there. There's only 7 sites and ours was the only walk-in. It didn't have a wheel barrow (oh! My aching bones!) and was nestled in thick forest filled with every animal you can imagine. A very loud bald eagle woke us up in the mornings - we saw him soar over the lake - magical. Also, on our second night, a young mule deer was loudly courting a female (who passively grunted back) all night. I don't think he got lucky. When we were camping on Independence Pass in Colorado a few years ago, we heard elk doing the same thing and (since I had no idea what it was - it sounded like someone torturing an animal) I was so terrified that we grabbed the gear and sped away to a motel. Now that we learned what this VERY LOUD sound is, it was positively delightful to sit by the lake and listen all night. Funny how a little knowledge can turn a situation from absolute terror to absolute beauty. Truth and beauty. Ahhhhh.

Aaron taking a breather after we lugged all our gear in.

The lovely forest with no one for miles.

This is where I want to spend my last days. Seriously. I plan to retire in the Mount Shasta area - it has EVERYTHING. Just a long and windy drive (through Redwood trees) from the coast and a short drive from the desert. Perfect.

So this is what it feels like to be 38. Hmmmm.

I think Aaron has already lost weight and gained muscle since we started. Camping is hard.

Our fire. Would you believe I walked to the site with a bundle of camp wood on my shoulder?

At Gumboot Lake (which was actually more like a big pond) there was this piece of driftwood in the shallow end that we walked by all day. I call it the dick stick. You cannot un-see it. Heh heh.

Gumboot Lake. Precariously held in by this old stone wall. Our water source.

Trees on the hike - Pacific Crest Trail. Everything here is mossy and impossibly tall.

The first glimpse of Mount Shasta from the Pacific Crest Trail.

Lunch break on the trail. I'm so appreciative of the self-timer on my camera - thanks mom!

What a view for our lunch break! We dined on Cantaloupe and granola bars. Mmmmm. Cantaloupe is a great source of water when hiking - it was HOT here.

We bathed in the lake. What's better than that? Talk about solitude... Dragonflies EVERYWHERE - you can see one in the sky. HUGE!

Aaron tried to get one of the lillypad plants, but couldn't even cut through it - the stem was thicker than his arm! He brought me a lovely flower instead.

Aaron cutting a dead tree for fire - thanks dad! He's using the saw you gave him! While he was taking the bark off, he discovered a nest of termites - as soon as they were exposed, they began furiously carrying the larvae away to safety. Truth and beauty abounds in the forest.

Just another day walking the Pacific Crest trail. Oh, hello mule deer buddy! How are you today?

You can take the boy out of his library...

Lava Beds National Monument, California

Lava Beds National Monument, California

This place was amazing. Thick, sharp lava rocks EVERYWHERE. Imagine all those rocks covered with holes (like giant chunks of pumice stone). We were practically the only ones there - obviously this park isn't visited much. It was a warm and stormy day so we had the trail to ourselves.

Self-timer.

There were huge caves everywhere. Terrifying. Plus, lots and lots of bats live here. Shudder.

Our hike - the Whitney Butte trail - surrounded by cinder cones.

Our campsite, right in the National Park under a giant Juniper bush.

Our picnic table, made of logs and lava rocks.

Just what you want to see posted in the campground you're staying in. I don't know what I'd do if I saw one of these. But for some reason, I'm not as scared of them as I am of bears. A foolish cat person, me. I looked for them the whole time.

Our squirrel buddies hanging out at the top of the tree. All the animals here look fat and healthy. :D

Crater Lake, Oregon

Just a short drive from the Lava Beds, I've wanted to go here since I was young. But in true Oregon fashion, the entire place was covered in thick, thick fog. It was an absolutely terrifying drive - you literally couldn't see more than 10 feet. I was going 25 MPH in a 45 MPH zone PRAYING a deer wouldn't prance out in front of me. This was all we saw.

I CAN'T WAIT to come back here. They get 500 inches of snow in the winter! 500 inches!!!

As visible as it got. And it was freezing - and snowing.

There's a lake down there somewhere. Oh, well... we'll be back!

Florence (Coos Bay area), Oregon

Florence, Oregon

So now we enter the set for the Dark Crystal. The huge trees and ferns and moss-covered everything were literally dripping. This is a great campground (also almost completely empty) which was right on the trail to the only sliver of dunes that doesn't allow ATVs. We felt like we were in the rainforest (maybe this is rainforest?). It was as if the Amazon was running through this place, and I'm amazed there are no monkeys swinging from the trees.

Typical Oregon fog. I love it.

This is the most beautiful beach I've ever seen. Right in the Siuslaw National Forest, we spent all afternoon here.

You might not be able to tell, but these seagulls were gigantic. And hilarious.

Meh - it's no Atlantic, but what're you gonna do - fogettabouit. Heh heh. Brooklyn mooks.

Classic Aaron. I love him.

The beach was covered with barnicles, sea anemonies (as big as huge donuts! and when you touch then, they close up. So cool.) and thousands upon thousands of mussels. Better than you can get at most restaurants. As I said, these coasts are bread baskets.

A spectacular Dark Crystal cave. DRIPPING with wild flowers of every shade. The petals shed from above leaving a path of colored spots. Unbelievable.

The wonderful sand dunes. Aaron doing his best Sasquatch impression.

Mountains and forest to the left…

…Dunes and Pacific to the right.

Northern Oregon coast

Cape Mears, Oregon

This is our last hike, and the most spectacular. It starts at the top of a cliff and goes through the set of Dark Crystal, ending at the beach. As you can see, the trees are so huge, I cannot describe. And the ferns were bigger than me. EVERYTHING had little droplets of water hanging on the ends of their leaves as if it had just rained. Banana slugs and snails everywhere. There were hawk and eagle nests all over the trees - some eagle nests get as big a 15 feet in diameter! And you could hear the powerful ocean the whole time. Apart from screaming blue jays and chipmunks.

No color correction here. Just truth and beauty.

Just to give you an idea of how big these trees are.

I love trees. I kissed this one.

The beach at the end of the trail.

Our seagull pal who was with us the whole time we were there. Maybe a reincarnated Mary?

We love it here.

Starfish

And it wouldn't be complete without the garbage. Go humans, Go! No, really - leave the forest if you're too lazy to pick up after yourselves. But to be fair - California has an EXTREMELY well maintained park system. I was hardly able to find any garbage anywhere. Oregon on the other hand... I suppose when you don't have a sales tax, you gotta sacrifice something. Or at least the non-human animals gotta sacrifice something.

LIST OF ANIMALS WE SAW!

A lizard of some sort
Mule deer
Raccoons
Chipmunks
Squirrels
Seals
Bald Eagle
Hawks
Commorants
Seagulls
Jellyfish
Otter (deceased)
Gray Fox
Ravens
Crows
Some sort of rodent (kangaroo mouse?)
Blue Jays and Scrub Jays
Mountain lion (dead, on the side of the road. Go humans, go! There's only 6,000 left!)
Dragonfly
Banana Slugs
Snails
Egret
Heron
Coyote
Garter Snake
California Quail (as cute as you'd expect)
Flying Squirrel
Sea Anemone
Mussles
Hermit crabs
Black-tailed Jack Rabbit
Robins