I obviously haven’t been keeping my blog up to date since some time in early February. Those who follow me on Facebook and Instagram are aware that this lack of blogging hasn’t been for lack of travels. Over the course of these last few months, I visited a few new sights in California and have made my way up to Oregon! Time to catch up!
For some reason, I’ve been dreading writing this post, and only more so the more that I put off doing it. So, I didn’t write about stopping into Las Vegas for usual business of the government saying I live there. That’s not a big deal. Maybe even skip my first couple of stops along the way. No big deal. But suddenly it is July and I haven’t actually written a damn thing since February, when I was still in Southern California, on the blog. Now I’m in Oregon! It’s time to get this out of the way so my next post makes a bit more sense (fun backpacking trip coming!).
So what did I accomplish through all of this time? I spent a random month in San Louis Obispo for absolutely no reason. Did a fun hike in Pinnacles National Park. Drove through Napa Valley to absolutely no gain whatsoever, but had fun in the Redwoods in Northern California. I went to my first Pride in Portland and explored the Oregon Coast. It’s been an adventure!
Did I just ruin the whole post? Yeah, basically. That’s been it!
After hiking the SDTCT and hanging out around San Diego for a while, I wasn’t really in the greatest mental state. A lot of that is… well, I get depressed any time I do a big backpacking trip. I anticipated it and dealt with it fine. At the same time, changes at work were going on that disrupted a lot of my usual day to day rhythm and things were just weird and not really great all at the same time. Shit happens. In the midst of that, I just kinda traveled around for a bit, once I decided to hit the road.
Aside from some time spent around Joshua Tree and Lake Mead, I finally headed off and started at Keyesville outside of Lake Isabella. I really just started there just to start somewhere, before heading off to some National Forest land outside of San Louis Obispo. The Central California Coast is a really amazing area, and I had fun exploring it before heading up near King City and Pinnacles National Park.
I had a cool experience while staying just south of the Bay Area. A reporter from France contacted me and I ended up spending an afternoon being filmed kind of simulating my life. This aired as part of an episode on a French TV show. My instagram, in particular, got flooded with French speakers, and it has been an interesting experience.
And then it was off towards Northern California. I spent a week and half of Memorial Day weekend at a reservoir in the middle of nowhere, hanging out with locals and enjoying the area before ultimately ending up in the Redwoods. I haven’t been to the Redwoods before, so that was actually really cool. Just expensive, because free camping is not easy. Nonetheless, those are some cool trees, and the drive along Bigfoot Highway afterwords was cool!
And then into Oregon. I basically end up centering my entire time in Oregon around Bend, and this time has been no exclusion. With a little more work, I could probably find some elsewhere, but it has worked out okay this time. I got a hotel room for the weekend of Pride in Portland anyway, and got to enjoy that. The following weekend, I just spent the weekend driving along the entire coast. I didn’t get out and do a lot of hiking, but I was enamored by just how rugged and beautiful the coast is. It’s a pretty great place!
Alas, I’m now camped up in the Cascades of Oregon, preparing for a great backpacking trip (that should be my next post!). It’s been a trip! And here’s the pictures…
