Day 73

Paulo and I had begun discussing the possibility of going white water rafting while we are in Oregon. It is something that he has always wanted to do and I am interested in trying it as well. However, we missed our chance to go today because the stupid dog and bone hasn't had a signal since we reached Coos Bay last night.

Feeling a bit dejected, we drove into Roseberg and had breakie in the local cafe called Brix. The food and service were both very good. Since the dog wasn't working, I thought it might be useful to try to ring some motels about a room from a payphone so there wouldn't be any hassle later on. No joy. In the meantime, Paulo had gone looking for change and disappeared. It turned out that the woman in the shop he went in to was fascinated with the details about our trip. She wouldn't let him leave! She just kept asking him one question after another. She did tell him that a place called Crater Lake was quality and that we should check it out while we are here.

So, we got onto 138E and headed to Crater Lake for the day. The three cups of coffee I had for breakfast were starting to kick in and I was ready to take on the day.

Crater Lake is a national park that has been built around the deepest lake in the States. There are no rivers or streams to feed the lake - all of the water comes from rain and snow. But it is considered the cleanest large body of water in the entire world, which lends to it's intense, clear blue color.

The lake sits inside a caldera that formed after a volcano eruption almost 8,000 years ago. The park was established in 1902 and is approximately 183,000 acres in size. The lake is about six miles wide and nearly 600 meters in depth. It's volume is five trillion gallons of water! It is surrounded by a 33 mile road called Rim Drive that offers numerous vantage points and stops for viewing the lake.

We entered the park from the North Entrance Road and drove to the North Junction, which overlooks the lake from the north west corner. I was immediately stunned by how blue the water was.









Continuing along the western side of Rim Drive we went to Watchman Overlook. It is one of the highest viewpoints on the entire rim and has a trail that can be hiked in about one hour.



The crater (or caldera) was formed after Mt Mazma erupted. However, before the crater began filling with water and forming the lake, more eruptions occurred. The biggest led to the formation of Wizard Island, which is itself a volcano and visible from anywhere around the lake.



Over time all of the eruptions and pouring lava created massive rock formations and spires all along the walls of the caldera that still stand today and offer physical evidence about the age and structure of the former Mt Mazma.







Our next stop was the Rim Village for a bite to eat in the Rim Cafe. In typical fashion, the sambos were under prepared and overpriced. But tourism has a cost and you have to pay it.

We drove further south along Rim Drive and our next stop was Vidae Falls. The waterfall is the point where a spring-fed creek flows over a glacier-carved cliff and drops about 100 feet over a series of ledges.







Phantom Ship Overlook was our next stop. It lies against the eastern shore and is a bit off the beaten track. The island is named after it's resemblance to a small pirate ship. But in actual fact, the island is as big as a sixteen story building. The rock is over 400,000 years old making it the oldest in the caldera. We stopped there in the late afternoon and the lighting made for some interesting photographs.







We decided to turn around instead of following Rim Drive up the eastern side of the lake. Our last stop was Pinnacles Overlook located south of the Rim Drive in the south east corner. The pinnacles are colorful 100 foot tall spires that sit along the canyon wall. The spires were formed by gases from the volcanic eruptions combined with the extreme heat that cemented hot ash in to solid rock cones. Since their formation, streams have eroded the canyon and exposed the cones.









Leaving the lake, we drove down to Medford and decided to stay in a Motel 6. Big mistake. Shite TV - no channels, no breakfast in the morning and (unbelievably) no wifi. We were not impressed at all.

Dinner was Applebees (again!) due to the serious lack of other choices in Medford. After dins, we went back to the hotel to chill with a bit of tele before eventually hitting the scratcher.

Day 72

Today started with a 65 minute run around Eugene. I figured that since I was in Track Town USA or The Track Capital of the World, the least I could do is go for a decent run. I ran a lap around South Eugene High School and then went up Skinner's Butte (hee hee). It's apparently named for the first pioneer Eugene Skinner to settle in the town with his family. They had a cabin on the side of the butte. As funny as it sounds, it was a tough climb up to the top.

A quick shower and it was straight into town for breakfast / lunch. Eugene is a bit thin on good cafes so we had a Johnny in a local place called Hawthorne's and then went across the street to Starbucks for a coffee. I had a Rift Valley Brew and it was strooong - just the kick I needed after the run.

We drove out 126W to Florence to check out things. We went out to the beach there but it was pretty tough to get around - there were lots of tree stumps and rocks. There was one decent little patch of sand but it was cold - only about 60 degrees and the water was absolutely freezing.

Moving on, we continued to Coos Bay where we had lunch / dinner in Abbey's Legendary Pizza shop. I really enjoyed mine but Paulo was convinced that they were not worthy of legendary status and they had some cheek calling themselves legends. Tough crowd. Still, it does take bollocks to name your self as legendary.

Further south we discovered Charleston and then went out to the beach. We stopped at a Arago Bay near a lookout where there were loads of seals just off the shore. There are Northern Elephant and Harbor Seals along with Stellar and California Sea Lions. Some of them live here year round but most of them just come here during the summer months to mate. We had a hard time seeing them but there was not problem hearing them.









After our attempted seal watching, we drove back to Sunset Bay for a game of wiffle ball. The west coast seems to have invigorated Paulo as he beat me 10-6. He played great and I played terribly. The series is now 3-1 to me. I hope that I can get myself together before the next game...

We also played a bit of frisbee and then watched the sunset.









Then we drove to Roseberg along 42E and it was some drive. There are hardly any straight sections of road - it just twists and turns and twists and turns and... We listened to the Doors new CD release of their gig in Boston on April 10, 1970. Absolute quality driving music.

We checked in to the Travel Inn, caught Futurama and Family Guy on tele and then fell asleep. I snoozed like a log all night long.

This Post Has Been Intentionally Left Blank

The Power Of A Man's Mind Are Directly Proportional To The Quantity Of Coffee He Drinks

Day 70

I woke up refreshed and went for another epic run - this time about 55 minutes. I managed to run the whole way around Lake Union and felt really strong. After 2 1/2 months, the form is coming around and I am finally starting to see some results from all of my training.

We packed up and went to do some laundry. There was a place just across from Louisa's called Washing Town. We put the clothes on and walked over to Louisa's for a bite and a coffee.

When the laundry was finished, we drove north a couple of miles to Ballard and had a sniff around. We ate lunch in a place called Palermos and then we went across the street to a cafe called Verite to meet a friend of mine who is currently staying in Seattle. We chilled, had loads of chats and I downed my 5th shot of espresso for the day.

The afternoon was great but we had to pay the price when we left - rush hour traffic in Seattle. We crawled down 5S only covering about 12 or 15 miles in the first hour. The plan was to go to Portland but we decided to find somewhere before then to rest for the night.

We found an Econo Lodge in a place called Kelso, which is, well, it's a dump. It was founded in 1884 by some Scottish dude and named after Kelso, Scotland. It used to be called Little Chicago because of an unusually large amount of taverns and whorehouses. But over the years all the excitement seems to have diluted. In 1980, when Mount St Helen's erupted, Kelso had a perfect view. It seems that some of the local shops have been built on volcanic ash. Now the only thing I think it really has going for it is that it known as the smelt capital of the world. That's a pretty far cry from taverns and whorehouses.

We dropped the things off and then went to Applebees for a bite. It was in a shopping center that also had a bowling alley, so we went for a game just for the craic. The place (called Triangle Bowl) was everything you would expect from a bowling alley in the middle of nowhere in Washington - cheap games (only $3.40 each), lots of high school kids along with a few hardcore nerds (playing alone) and cheesy, hair-metal music playing from the stereo.

In a hard fought three game battle for a dollar, Paulo took the first game with ease. I was terrible and after only a few frames thought that I wouldn't be able to move my arm for a week. I also couldn't find a ball that I was happy with. But I came back in the second game and won it, bowling a strike and two spares on the way. The third game was really close until about the 6th frame when Paulo pulled away, sealed the victory and won the all coveted dollar.

During the showdown, we learned that Barry Bonds had hit his 756th home run and set the all time home run record. I think most of you know how I feel about this. I have already said that Hank Aaron is the one and only, true home run king. I won't accept that Bonds has surpassed him in a totally honest fashion and I won't ever refer to him as the 'home run king'. Unfortunately, I think the record will stand and Bonds will probably not be found guilty of any wrong doing or punished. I guess the conciliation is that Gay-Rod (the player that I want to hate but can't help respecting) should pass Bonds in a few more years.

We headed back to the room and eased in to some tele - our favourites: Seinfeld and Family Guy.

Giddy Up

Day 69

This morning I woke up paying for the excesses of the night before. I was incredibly tired and very hungry. Paulo was even worse. We meandered down a few blocks to Louisa's Cafe for a sambo. I couldn't even face a coffee because my stomach was so delicate.

After struggling through lunch, we went back to the Inn where I arranged to stay an additional night. Neither of us were going to be able to face packing, moving and trying to find another place to stay. Paulo caught a few more Zs while I got stuck into ripping my new bundle of CDs.

A few hours passed and we decided that it was time to venture out into the world and look for some more food. We drove into town (the long way) and down to Pike Street where I convinced Paulo (and his stomach) to let me take a few snaps.







Usually when I navigate and Paulo drives we do pretty well. Except for when the place we are trying to find doesn't exist. We drove up Pine Street looking for a Mexican place that I had read about called Bitchin' Burritos. Unfortunately, it had closed down since the guide was published and is now all boarded up. Plan B involved driving back in to the center of town and looking for something. Anything. We parked and found Fox Sports Grill which was grand because we both wanted to see the Sox - Angels game. But the Sox lost and the service in the place was brutal (kinda like Fox Network).

We had nachos to start that were great but I was disappointed with my salad. I also wasn't mad about my Alaskan brew. Still looking for that quality IPA over here...

The night called for some more chilling and tele. Predator was on but had way too many commercials to properly follow the film. A few channels later Eddie Murphy's Raw was on. Except that it had even more commercials and all of the f*cks were bleeped out. What is the f*cking point!? You can't watch that film censored. It's just not funny. And it doesn't make any sense because you can't hear 75% of what he is saying! Frustrated and tired we turned off the tele and fell asleep.