The West

Well we just got to Boise, Idaho, after a long day of driving from Seattle. We are couch surfing from Seattle to Boulder, staying here in Boise, Salt Lake City and a couple couches in Boulder before finishing the road trip. Couch surfing (couchsurfing.org) is a website where you can search anywhere throughout the world and find people who offer their couches for a night or two.

The past week has been spent along the west coast from northern California, up through Oregon and eventually to Seattle. The drive along the coast was beautiful with several stops to check out the beaches.

It was tricky finding camping so close to the 4th of July. We were able to find some rustic camping in northern California where we drank some of the Champagne that Al's friend gave us and made a fire.

The next night we made it up to North Bend, Oregon, and camped out again before heading north to Portland. Oregon is a great state, people are nice. very scenic, and no sales tax! The first two nights we stayed with Rissa, a girl I met at CU Boulder's open house. We went hiking just outside of the city and found an awesome cave that we crawled into and some swimming holes to cool off in.

The next day I found out that Lovers (http://www.holdmyclothes.com) was playing a show at this tiny venue downtown.

After the show I dropped Dan off at Rissa's because he was getting tired. I went out to explore the city. It was 1:30am and there was a tattoo parlor open right next door to a bar. I decided to check it out as alcohol and tattoos can sometimes be an interesting combination. I met a guy named Cameron who was getting a tattoo with a girl that he met a year ago but hasn't seen in months until today. When they met up they decided to get matching tattoos of a tooth with a smiley face and lightning bolt cavity.

We started talking a bunch and the three of us hung out until 4:00 am before I decided to go back and get some sleep. The next day Dan and I explored Portland for a bit and tried thinking of places to stay for the night. We were trying to find some rustic camping out near Mt. Hood national forest but the ranger station was closed for the holiday. I gave Cameron a call and he told us that we can crash at his place.

While meeting up at his place we saw a couple people walking by who asked if we were going to the party. Apparently some guys got evicted from their house and they were holding a huge party for their last night there. We showed up to the eviction party and the front lawn was filled with about 100 kids. The Jizz Wizzards were setting up to play a show in the basement. It was a wild time.

Soon after someone spilled beer on the band's mac and the music ended. Cameron decided to take the party back to his place. We made a bonfire in the back yard and invited people on the street to come join. The next morning I sent Cameron a message thanking him for letting us crash at his place and showing us around Portland. He wrote back saying no problem, and mentioned that he got fired from his job for waking up too late.

We had decided to go up to Seattle the next day for the 4th of July and see my buddy Micah. Micah had some bikes for us and we headed down to Gas Works Park. We had heard that the fireworks show there is one of the best in the country. We met up with Micah's buddies, a bunch of engineers who graduated from RIT the year before and moved to Seattle to work at Boeing. We took a walk to Freemont which is famous for being the location of the center of the universe. That's right, the center of the universe is located within Seattle, now you know. We then headed back to the park for the fireworks, which were amazing.