Biggy's Adventures

Olympic National Park, WA

We took a break from exploring potential towns to live in, to explore the northwestern-most reaches of the Washington coast. Not only are there gorgeous, endless beaches (pictured here at sunset), but also North America's only rain forest: the Hoh, at the base of Mt. Olympus.

Portland, OR

7,000 miles along we hit Portland, the biggest city on our adventure with 500,000 people. There was a whole crew of people to show us the town - Charlie, Annie, Rhett, Meredith, and Melissa showed us the ins and outs. We checked out the colleges (L&C, Reed, PSU, and UP) and all the cool neigborhoods (including Multnomah Village, Hawthorne/Belmont, Hollywood District, Alberta, Mississippi, and Knob Hill/NW 23rd). This photo is taken from the top of the EcoTrust building overlooking the Pearl District.

Eugene, OR

"Track town USA" -- Eugene is where both Prefontaine & Nike have their roots. It's a city of about 140,000. With the help of Kate and Jerry, we explored the local scene, from U of O to the farmers market to the local breweries, we saw it all (we even did some wine tasting out in the surrounding vineyards and caught a minor league baseball game!). Good times.

Ashland, OR

Ashland, in southern-most Oregon, is the home of a huge Shakespear Festival each year. The plays are amazingly done on 3 big stages (main one for Shakespear, two smaller venues for other playwrights). We swung though town and saw the comedy "The Importance of Being Earnest" by Oscar Wilde. Hilarious.

Oregon Caves National Monument

Our first stop in OR was just across the border from Cali. We went 250+ feet underground at the Caves National Monument and explored the tunnels (with a guide) for over an hour. This picture is of Erin descending a spiral staircase down one of the big drops in the cave.

Redwoods National Park, CA

We camped in Redwoods for a day and walked around the forest - the trees there are HUGE. Amazing.

Arcata, CA

Our next potential place to live is on the northern-most coast of Cali (and over 6,000 miles into the road trip): Arcata, home of Humbolt State University. Jesse showed us around HSU, beaches, breweries, and the works. This photo was taken at Clam Beach, on the northern edge of the town. It's very progressive and very enviro-conscious. It reminded us a lot of good ol' Burlington... Except we'd have to take up surfing!

Mendocino, CA

We stopped at Mendocino for lunch on our way up the California 101 coastal highway. We just missed the music festival there, but got the chance to hike around the bluffs over the ocean.

San Francisco, CA

San Francisco was another drive-through for us; not a potential place to live after this trip, but so we could visit Deb & Dan and check it out for future options. This photo is from the Embarcadero market down on the waterfront. It's a beautiful city, though our memories of it were a bit clouded over by hangovers the next morning (thanks for the good time!).

UC Berkeley, CA

We stopped at UC Berkeley for lunch with Jeff. It's not on our route as a potential plave to live, but he showed us around for potential grad school options when that time comes. Great campus!