OR to PA (Day 3)

4:45pm (Central Time) We welcomed Nebraska with a hearty “thank you” yesterday afternoon- leaving behind Wyoming, and hopefully, the worst of the weather related traveling delays.

For those of you who have not experienced Nebraska, you may be thankful. It is straight, flat and ultimately- purposeless in the life of the traveler. I know something about growing crops and stuff… things like that. For that, it may be “essential”, but for this purpose, worthless. For the traveler, it is empty space between you and your destination. There is very little you may actually care to see in Nebraska- perhaps the “Pony Express Station” that is off one of the exits. Or maybe one of the dozens of small towns just off the highway that probably only have any sort of business because of the highway. There are those unfortunate enough to have Nebraska as their destination- and that is a sad place to be.

Nebraska, for driving, however, was a breeze. Despite a few showers here and there along the road, we found it to be uneventful, non-picture worthy and ultimately, a 75-80mph blip on the trip-o-meter.

Now, before we left at 7am (45 minutes before crossing into Central Time), we watched the weather channel and saw some precipitation in Iowa- and the potential for some heay stuff. As we crossed over into Iowa, the clouds betrayed that prediction. They were light and speckled through the sky- leaving us in mostly sunshine weather. This could be nice, right?

Wrong. Oh so wrong! The clouds eventually darkened, and off in the distance to the north, east and south, we could see heavy rain. And eventually, we hit that. There were some areas of heavy, major rain! Lightning striking in the distance, as well. Having lived in Oregon for a year, I almost forgot that lightning storms exist! Most of the kids in our youth group had only ever seen lightning if it was really hot in the summer, and only up in the mountains. A “thunderstorm” would completely blow their minds!

I also had almost forgotten how much I love thunderstorms. They truly are an amazing display of God’s power and I revel in my Creator at the beauty of His Creation. However, I remembered how much I hate driving through heavy rain and such, too. Rachel took on the lion’s share of driving today- whereas I had driven the past 2 days straight and she would have ripped her hair out to just sit in the passenger’s seat one more day. So, at one point, she felt it necessary to stop at a rest area because she could not see the vehicles in front of her.

All of Iowa’s rest areas on I-80 are wireless hotspots. So, seeing as we could not connect to the internet last night (thank you very much Motel 6), I pulled out the laptop to check mail and look at the weather. So, getting on weather.com, I pull up the map of Iowa. There is a red outline around most of the state, signifying a “tornado watch” and I see a line of very severe storms (red, orange, yellow color on the Doppler) moving through the state. Approximately at our very location on the highway- about 50 miles outside of Des Moines. So much for leaving weather disturbances in Wyoming. At least rain, even heavy rain, doesn’t close the highway. Although the accidents that created a small traffic jam just after we returned to driving, did cause us to get off the exit and get back on the highway at that on-ramp. At least it happened between the off-ramp and on-ramp, thus allowing us to just cross the road and get back on the highway.

As I type this, the rain is bearing down on us. Not as heavy as it has been- maybe we’ve passed through the heaviest stuff. Maybe not. Maybe we’re traveling right along with it. But I do know this- each time the lightning strikes, my heart leaps. In a positive way. In the most positive way.

I realize today that I have missed REAL weather in the worst way. Living in Medford, we experienced basically two seasons, summer and winter. It drizzles and rains and is cloudy in the winter (with maybe a snowfall or two) and it is sunny and hot in the summer. There’s a little bit of in between in May and October, but it’s hardly anything to speak of. I have missed heavy downpours, spring mud, fall colors, snow- but surprisingly, not humidity! ;-)

9pm (Central Time)- we’ve stopped in Peru, IL for the night. In case Luke is reading, yes, that is the same town we stopped in on the way to Oregon. The heavy rains continued and actually got worse through a good portion of the afternoon- made it tough driving some of the way. When we got almost to the border of Iowa/Illinois, it was raining heavy. We found a weather forecast on the radio and found that we were right in the middle of some majorly heavy rain showers and tornado warnings! The clouds were wicked dark and it was just crazy. But we kept going. And eventually found our way out of the dark clouds into Illinois, where it was not raining hard.

When we arrived in Peru for the night, the guy at the counter of our hotel told us the storm we were going through was headed our way. And, sure enough- and hour after we got here, it began pouring and was totally windy. Crazy stuff…

So, we settle down for the night…

from OR to PA (day 2)

posted a day late due to not being able to get to the interenet last night... posted while we are stopped at an Iowa rest area due to heavy rain.

We shall never speak of this day again. It shall be removed from the records of history and cease to exist!!

We woke up a little before 7 in Park City today and checked the road report. Large portions of I-80 through Wyoming were closed. Updated just after 7, there were a few more. So Rachel rolled over and decided we’d check again around 9 or so to see if it’s just because it’s early morning. So, me, unable to sleep- did some internet. And around 8, I found out that all of I-80 was open and that there wasn’t supposed to be any inclement weather. I let Rachel sleep till the alarm and we got on the road around 9:45am.

That’s a pretty late start time, however, we did about 150 miles extra on Thursday, so we can wait a little. However, getting into Wyoming turned out to be the worst thing one could imagine!! The weather was a little shaky as we crossed from Utah into Wyoming and through nothing collected on the road, it slowed traffic. We got past that finally, but not before we hit 2 traffic jams, one which seemed to have no purpose and one that was because of an accident. But, we’re in the middle of nowhere- the “no reason” jam was so infuriating!! At one point, we’d done like… 200 miles in 5 hours!! Crazy!!

By the end of the state, we had hit 6 jams- with only 2 accidents and 4 seemingly reasonless. But what was bothersome on top of that were the tractor trailers. I felt almost run off the road a few times, have never used the horn more in one day before in my life and found them to be passing other tractor trailers by barely crawling by them. It happened so much and I was getting really frustrated! At one point, I even annoyed Rachel because of my muttering about the other drivers around me. We had already started late, lost a lot of time in jams and then they weren’t even allowing me to go the speed limit!!

It was so much that I almost missed a lot of the beauty of the state. I realized, however, that I had glorified Wyoming the last time I drove through. It has a lot of mountains and a LOT of beautiful stuff, but it’s still pretty bare- and 400 mile state to drive through!! And, due to the storm, everything was totally covered in snow. It was really quite beautiful.

As the day drew on, we moved our destination from North Platte, NE to just getting into Nebraska!! But, the skies cleared, the traffic thinned (thanks to no accidents or jams) and we began to make some better time. We came down out of the Rockies into Cheyenne, Wyoming’s capital. And we kept going and hit Nebraska. We thought we’d shoot for Sidney, where we stopped in Nebraska on our way West, but we passed it, still feeling in good shape and the sun not quite down yet.

We decided to shoot for Big Springs, NE- another 50 miles or so. When we got here, we found only a Motel 6 (and as I tried to connect, I found that they open their access to all the truckers who stop too, and so I, who am paying for a room, lose out because someone else who isn’t paying connected first. Actually, apparently a LOT of truckers and other connected before me- so I can’t get internet. A rough end to a VERY rough day.

Final statistics for the day:
miles, 550
time- 9 hours
Times I wanted to scream- more than a dozen!
Times Rachel and I just laughed- a couple dozen

OR to PA- the reverse! (Day 1)

Note: Luke has already archived our pictures traveling out to Oregon from Pennsylvania. We are not taking as many pictures on the trip back, although they’ll be posted shortly after arriving in PA. We are taking video, however- and will likely make something out of that, as well.

4:30am- wake up. Roll over, roll my eyes, etc. Not the most comfortable night sleep I’ve had, but… oh well. It’s on to driving now.

5:00am- we’ve gotten the bags and stuff out and are out of Dave & Kassie’s driveway on our way.

5:10am- stop at Dutch Bros drive through coffee stand for our last drive through coffee for a while. I’m not usually big on coffee, but with a long day ahead planned, I’ll take it.

5:20am- on the 5 heading south. Up over Siskiyou Summit and beyond. It’s too early, still- very dark and not even expecting to see the sun for another few hours. Rachel has brought up the SNL: commercials that I downloaded for our iPod for the trip. That will be a useful device, I’m sure.

9:10am- stop in Susanville, CA for breakfast. 230 miles gone, through the mountains of northern California. Susanville is as the base of the mountains. Last time, we saw the sun going down as we traveled on these. Today, the sun was rising up over the frost covered everything. If it was possible to be more beautiful than last time, this was the way. Absolutely amazing. Stunning.

12pm(ish)- though still having a quarter tank of gas, we decide to stop and fill up. Because it’s Nevada- and who knows when the next gas station will be! Signs literally saying “no services for 60 miles” are up everywhere.

7:45pm(Mountain Time)- we stop at Park City, Utah for the evening. The sun is just about to go down and the low gas light has been on for a few miles. So it’s time to stop. We saw a sign that I-80 is closed at Evanston- on the UT/WY border. So, I checked it out on the internet- there’s this storm going across the country that’s in Wyoming. Tomorrow, it looks as though it may be ok, but… we don’t really know. Instead of staying an extra day in Chicago, we may stay an extra day in/around Salt Lake City (and Park City).

A little more recap of the day. Nevada is just as I remembered it. These beautiful mountains that we get close to and go around, but so much flat desert. It’s a high desert running over 4,000 feet. There’s a LOT more snow on most of the mountains this time than last, but none on the ground. Which is totally cool. So, for Luke- I know why when we drove into Nevada it seemed as though we were going up and up and up forever. There are 2 summits between the UT/NV border and Wells, where we stayed the night. One of them is 5900 feet and the other is 6900. Holy Crap!

We saw, but didn’t visit, our favorite tiny town- Mill Creek, NV. Population of 29. and all of them work in the gas station/convenience store/subway/mini-casino/hotel. And the house in the middle of nowhere about a quarter mile off the highway. We saw that, too.

This time, we got to see the salt flats in Utah. They’re pretty neat to see coming down out of Nevada, but… they’re nothing too special. Also, we didn’t realize last time, but we were weaving around mountains for about 60 miles outside of Salt Lake City until getting to the flats. We also saw the Great Salt Lake- a pretty spectacular sight to see.

Well… keep checking back- I intend to keep this running daily at the end of each day. As long as the weather cooperates tomorrow, we’re going to finish Utah, get through Wyoming and hopefully into Nebraska.

i hate packing

i'm not sure that there's much more to say than that. i've been packing stuff for the past 3 weeks or so- while rachel was at work for a lot of it, but then a LOT more as the time for our travelling drew closer. i think we've got everything packed- the truck is ready to go and the car is full (it will not stay full, but i had to make sure everything we were taking in the car would fit...

now it's a matter of throwing a lot of things in the garbage, and giving a bunch of things away to goodwill or salvation army. but... grrr. i'm not liking it- i feel so exhausted. i'm glad we're taking wednesday to clean/hang out/relax. because i need to rest a little before the extra long trek ahead of us

well, suppose that's all for now- we leave thursday. be looking for the cross-country journal (and pictures- maybe even videos) of the upcoming trip.

the next step

Ok, so one more life & stories category blog for now. Wanted to let everyone know who reads this and may not already know- Rachel and I are going to be moving back to the East Coast. Pennsylvania, to be exact. At least, for the time being. We don't have too much lined up for there, but...

there is a poor job market here in Medford, and if we wait, we will not have the money necessary to move. While we've connected with some people out here, generally, we don't have too much in the line of friends and family. those who have been so for us- thanks so much! But we have a need to be back near family at this point in time.

We also need to be in a place where we can heal and hear from God, and unfortunately, here is not a place for us at this point. we don't have a church, and only have a few close friends.

beyond that, being on the East Coast will allow for better job searching in churches and such.

There are a number of reasons that have led us to this decision, some of which i've noted, some of which i haven't. but after some consideration and prayer, we believe this is the direction we're feeling led now.

thanks to all for your prayers, love and support! We're going to be moving at the end of this month- probably around March 28th.

feel free to ask any questions or anything. and... yeah.

San Francisco Weekend- the pictures

enjoy!


Rachel and I on the boat to Alcatraz.


island of Alcatraz


Dave & Kassie on Alcatraz


cool tree on the walkway up to the prison


cell block


City of SF from Alcatraz


Hard Rock Cafe for dinner


BB King- excellent


Beatles, anyone?


Rachel and Sonia


Driving down Lombard


Golden Gate Bridge

you can click here for the full photoset. Also, stay tuned on my youtube for a video from the weekend.

San Francisco Weekend- Day 3

The end of the Road, and the “must-see” of Frisco.
First off, early in the morning I awoke. We didn’t have early tickets to anything on Sunday morning, but I just couldn’t sleep. It could have everything to do with the fact that our rooms were not very large and not well ventilated. AKA- the ceiling fan that’s supposed to cool the room down- doesn’t actually work. I mean, at least it gets a breeze going, but it’s still really warm in there. Don’t get me wrong, though- we paid $65/night for this hotel that is right in downtown San Francisco. And on the weekend of the Chinese New Year parade.

I took an absolutely frigid shower at the hotel. The hot water was somehow off for our floor when we got to showering. It reminded me very much of my Ukraine experiences when there was no hot water and I showered for weeks in cold water. Ice cold water. Apparently, I was the only one brave enough to actually step into a cold stream of water. Everyone else did “bucket” style showers.

We left the hotel at a good time, giving us time to do a couple things without needing to feel rushed. Those couple things may be obvious now, as you’re asking yourself where was our Golden Gate Bridge trip. And on the way out there, we decided it was time to DRIVE down Lombard St. It was a fun experience, and not as hard as one might think. It’s fun to drive down, but Rachel hopped out to take pictures of us going down.

We next followed our noses out to the Golden Gate Bridge. It’s really cool- and fun to drive across. But, to be honest, the Bay Bridge is much longer, though certainly not as cool. Because it’s a suspension bridge, and due to the need to withstand heavy winds off the ocean, it has the ability to horizontally shift up to 27 feet to keep it from collapsing. That’s totally cool. And the huge wires that hold up the supports and all- 36 ½ inches around, I think. Majorly huge.

So, after going across, and going back across for the fun of it, we decided that it was time for us to head home. So we head back into San Fran, only following our logical sense thoughts to get back to I-80 to head toward Sacramento. Reminder here- we haven’t had breakfast yet, or coffee, or anything. So, as we get out of San Fran and pass Oakland, we stopped in Berkley to go to Denny’s.

Continuing on after breakfast, it’s a rather uneventful drive back. We saw the Del Taco/KFC again. And one of the coolest things was seeing this sign that we were not able to get a picture of. It is a miles-to sign- telling us that Ocean City, MD is 3073 miles away. Ocean City is where Rachel and I have gone to the beach before when we lived in PA. Check our pictures here and here.

Our conversation on the drive back ranged from so many different topics. At one point, it was discussed that urine can smell like coffee if nothing else is in the bladder. Funny part- hours later, Rachel is sharing about a social worker friend of hers who has one client family that doesn’t brush their teeth because they believe it to be a conspiracy. When asked about it, Rachel said, “oh, well, this is also the family that drinks their own pee.” And me, the comedian I am, answer the obvious question of “why” with, “because it smells like coffee!”

Overall, the weekend was excellent! We had a wonderful time, and got to spend some really good time with friends that we will be all too soon leaving. Anyone with the chance, find your way to Frisco. It’s a great place, with lots of fun things to see- and of course, way too much to do in just one weekend.

And as I close out this series of blogs, I really want to do this: here’s a list of what I can think of in television shows and movies that take place in San Francisco. I would love to entertain comments of other things missing from the list, or corrections on things, too.

- Big Trouble in Little China- great Kurt Russell movie. And, as I watched it again for the first time since I was young, I discovered that this movie had “Matrix” style moves way before “The Matrix” ever came out. I guess one less thing they’re original on…

- Full House- “what ever happened to predictability? The milk man, the paper-boy, and evening TV…”

- The Rock- of course. Connery, Cage- what more do you need to make a movie work?

- (Rachel, Dave and Kassie all seem to agree that this one is in SF) Who Framed Roger Rabbit- I remember something about the RedCar (trolley) being dismantled…

- So I Married an Axe Murder- “woman, wo- man. Wooooah- MAN”

- Mrs. Doubtfire- “see that Nattie- that’s called liposuction.” The classic “Dad dressed like a woman just to be a part of his kid’s lives but then his older kids find out and can’t tell the younger one and it all blows up in a restaurant when he’s supposed to be himself and the woman at the same time, but gets a little drunk and forgets himself and ultimately ends up all coming back in his face type” of story

- The Parent Trap- is primarily based in the California Wine Country- which is the Frisco area.

- Just Like Heaven- one of Rachel’s new favorite movies.

I’m sure there are more. Help me out, people!!! Also, bonus points for anyone going back to see how many different terms I use to refer to San Francisco. And super-bonus points if anyone knows of any variations that I have NOT used.

Thanks for reading my running commentary. I’ll get back to some of my ranting and hopefully get some thoughts relating to spirituality or something out soon.

San Francisco Weekend- Day 2 (part 2)

End of the day:

Midnight+: This is the 3^rd blog. So apparently, this will be a 4 blog set. It’s another late night now. We’ve been out late doing what we do best- hanging out with people and just loving on them and being real. But I’ll get to that soon.

This morning, as Rachel and I ate breakfast, we saw these couple people go by- in wheelchairs. They were talking on cell phones and, funnily enough- using their legs and feet to move themselves up and down the street. Later, as we went out to shop before dinner, we saw the one guy sitting there begging for money.

Other random thought- Rachel and Kassie found themselves resisting the biggest temptation a girl will ever face- looking down the loaded barrel of a Louis Vuiton Store and not spending any money (or even asking to).

So, we left the hotel to go shopping before dinner, except we really didn’t plan on spending money. Just going into stores we didn’t have in Medford and enjoying being in a city. But after a little while of that, we decided to try and catch a cab to the Wharf where we intended to eat dinner. Honestly, the gene that allows people to catch a cab- it’s not in either Rachel or me. She may love cities, but we can never live in or near one because we can’t catch a cab to save our lives. We spent a half hour in NYC on our honeymoon trying to catch one. We spent a good half hour walking around- heading toward Fisherman’s Wharf in order to be closer when we caught one. But, man, it was so hard to get one. The whole “Chinese New Year” parade. Which, by the way, I did find out the Chinese New Year wasn’t this weekend- they just had the parade today.

Decided to do dinner at the Hard Rock Café. Good decision- I’ve never been to one before. Despite having been in a number of cities in my life, I’ve never been to one of these before. A few funny anecdotes from all this- we sat in a table underneath a hat that had belonged to Michael Jackson. Very funny for us for a number of inside joke type reasons. Near us was a jacket once worn by Sting. Eddie Van Halen had signed a guitar for this Hard Rock. They had a guitar signed by Journey, which was amusing because I’ve had the song “Don’t Stop Believing” in my head most of this weekend- and singing it out doesn’t actually relieve me of having it in my head. Sometimes, it intensifies it. Finally, a guitar signed by George Harrison. Good stuff, good stuff.

Dave and Kassie headed off to spend some time together and Rachel and I headed down the street to meet and old friend of Rachel’s from YWAM- Cheesecake. Explanation- this girl’s name is Sonia. Middle name Lee. Sonia Lee. Very similar to Sarah Lee- aka- Sarah Lee cheesecake. So she gets called “Cheesecake”. This is very similar to the girl who decided I get to be named “Grape juice” because my last name is Walsh- similar to Welch. And Welch’s makes grape juice.

So we just walked around for a while, sat down outside for a while talking. But we decided it was getting kinda chilly, so we walked around a little more trying to find a nice little café type place to sit down. We found one, after putting out names in at the Rain Forest Café’s waiting list. And apparently, while Rachel and Sonia were standing in line waiting to get coffee and I was resting my legs and feet, Rachel mentioned something about Family Guy and the Simpsons. And for some reason, that made a huge difference in the direction of the conversation, and, ultimately, the night.

See, apparently, she had not been saying much and watching what she said because she didn’t want to offend a “pastor”. And those of you who know me know I’m not the type of guy to get really offended at stuff and I realize that if people are going to offend me, I’ll have to deal with it if I care about that person at all. So, anyway, finding out from her that hearing I’m a real person who’s not an uber-conservative went a long way toward us just being able to have real conversation among the three of us and not just have trivial small-talk that so often pervades conversations of people who get together to “catch-up.”

She becomes the second person in a short span of time to tell me if I were the pastor of a church, they’d be there in a heartbeat. It’s good to hear things like this sometimes, especially after having received really “beat-me-up” comments from someone recently that have gone the contrary to that. It doesn’t matter who says it, hurtful things that are said still hurt people- surprise. So hearing things like this from the people who I would want to reach with the Gospel or have as a core of people means a lot.

However, not to be the only one receiving encouragement, after having talked to Sonia, she shares with us what an encouragement it is to have spent time with us because we’re not very conservative, and neither is she, but she lives with 3 roommates who are super-conservatives and so she has a hard time being herself around them without feeling judged. So we feel as though we’ve had a really good night, and though it’s really late arrival again, it’s been a good day. Long day- and very eventful, but very good.

San Francisco Weekend- Day 2 (part 1)

3:00pm- “Gentlemen, welcome to The Rock!” Woke up at 7am so that we could head out at 8:30 to reach our destination of the early-bird Alcatraz tour (9:30). We found that our hotel has short shower heads, a small shower and a very small continental breakfast. Muffins and bread for toast, juice and coffee were the options. So Rachel and I went next door to the coffee shop and enjoyed breakfast sandwiches.

We took a quick walk down the street to one of the trolley-car depots in town that would take us down to Fisherman’s Wharf. As we turned on Powell St, we saw bleachers set up and signs for the Chinese New Year parade. I thought that usually happened in February, but apparently the first weekend of March is it this year. We discover that the trolley just down the street from the hotel is shutting down at from 3-9:30pm. So apparently we don’t take that trolley back to the hotel if we need to get back between then.

The trolley ride is, of course, one of the things everyone must do when in San Fran. It’s one of those things that are famous. And this trolley ride took us right beside the famous Lombard Street. Presque Isle, Maine has its own Lombard Street. It’s a steep street on the northeast side of town. But it’s not curvy. And not THAT steep. Until I was in high school, I didn’t realize that street got its name from the famous one in SF. And, I think my earliest recollection of Lombard here is seeing it in the original Tony Hawk’s pro skater- and if you can get going fast enough, you can get a sweet combo for just jumping all the way down Lombard.

Back to Lombard in real life, it’s early in the morning, so nobody’s trying their luck getting down the street. If anyone wants to, this is likely the only chance you’ll get to try the street without a dozen cars in front of and behind you, thus keeping you from moving down the street very well.

I thought the trolley would let us off a little closer to Fisherman’s Wharf as it had that name right on the trolley. But it was a little hike for us to get to pier 43. But we were looking for Pier 33. It’s already 9:10 and we’ve got another good hike to the pier. I was walking fast- a good dozen strides ahead of the rest of them. I was reminded of being in Boy Scouts and how my step-father and one of the other scout leaders were fast hikers and walkers. It’s not that we couldn’t keep up with them, we just didn’t because we weren’t fast walkers as they are.

5 minutes before we needed to be there, Rachel asked what time it was and the answer made us hurry up. Reaching into her purse for our pre-paid, pre-printed tickets, we almost ran in order to get to the Alcatraz ferry. It’s 9:29- an easy 30 seconds to spare. No worries! Feeling fortunate to have even pre-printed the tickets so we didn’t have to stop at the window, we moved to the lower level, front of the boat and enjoyed the cool breezes coming off the bay.

Alcatraz is one of the coolest things you could possibly do in San Francisco. There are lots of “tours” that will take you by the island and let you see it, but only one ferry that will take you to the island (which is a national park) and let you walk around. It’s a lot of sloped roadways and stuff to get up to the prison and to different areas of the island (surprise, surprise- sloped roads in San Francisco). They have a decent video that has been produced by Discovery Channel for people to view.

No, they don’t actually show “The Rock”, but they do let you go into and through the prison block. It’s not like in “So I Married an Axe Murderer” where the Rangers escort all the tours (and certainly not having Phil Hartman referring to “Machine Gun” Kelly)- they now have audio tours (reminiscent of the audio tours at the famous castles I saw in Scotland) that will take you through the prison. It was very thorough and really cool. The Rangers do offer alternative types of… well, for lack of a better term, classes. More specialized types of tours of Alcatraz- stuff like “escape from Alcatraz” and things like that.

Anyway, after having had our fill of the whole island, prison and more, we got on the 12:15 ferry back to the “mainland”. As we got back to pier, we headed back to Pier 39, one of the more loaded piers with stuff at Fisherman’s Wharf, for a quick bite. We decided it that we would walk around and enjoy some of this stuff there while we were there. Just as we got back, Rachel had called her friend who lives in SF and made plans to meet her at Pier 39 this evening. And we’re planning on going there for dinner, as well.

There were lots of fun stores to look in and see cool stuff. I was totally taken by this one store Rachel and I went into- Field of Dreams. It’s got some amazing sports memorabilia- signed photos, framed photos, signed baseballs, and lots of other fun stuff. On the way in the door, I notice this large picture of the World Series Champion 2004 Boston Red Sox- signed. I figure, it’s gotta be just a copy or something, because, after all, the price tag only says $51.99. We look around- they’ve got signed Ted Williams stuff, non-signed less expensive stuff, but finally, at the prodding of the salesman, I’ve gotten the ok and decide to spend $52 bucks on something for my office wall. Well, just as we’re getting it to the check-out, Rachel notices that there’s no decimal in the price we had seen. That’s right, $5200. Oops- that’s just a small error on our part- sorry, we can’t afford that.

Feeling like a complete stooge and idiot, I decide it’s time to leave so that my embarrassment can subside some. As we leave, we met back up with Dave & Kassie and decide it’s time to head back to hotel for a little afternoon down time. Rachel’s feet are sore and we’ve still got a little hike back to the trolley. But as we get back to the trolley station, there’s a HUGE line. I mean, probably a half dozen trolley cars packed full worth of people ahead of us. After standing for about 15 minutes, we decide that it doesn’t matter if we got the all day trolley pass; we’re going to get a taxi. Because it’s not worth waiting in line, and in a half hour, they’re shutting down that line of the trolley.

By now, we’re all quite warm. Sitting in the sun, no breeze cuz the harbor is a few blocks away. I’ve donned my Red Sox cap since before the pier experience. And we’re all hot, a little sweaty and feeling kinda gross now. So, we leave the trolley station in search of an empty taxi. Finally finding one, we get a nice, albeit terrifying (going up and down the steep streets in a cab) drive back to the hotel.

Rachel is almost dehydrated, having eaten very little and had even less to drink. Dave is also quite tired- ready for a break. So, we grab some of our grub and eat, and drink and try to recoup a little before dinner and then hanging out with Rachel’s YWAM friend tonight.

San Francisco trip

stay tuned in for the next couple days for the comprehensive "San Francisco weekend" blog. I've pretty much typed it all out, but want to go back over and make sure it's all good. I had intended to blog daily over the weekend, but couldn't find a wireless to connect to- despite the fact that the hotel should have had one for us.

anyway, here we go...

San Francisco Trip Blog:
Day 1- leaving & arriving

As I’m a terrible blogger, I felt this would be nice- to do a 3 blog series on our weekend trip to San Francisco with some friends of ours. So here we go.

We left Medford after Rachel and Kassie got off work to go get some quick food at the grocery store. After all that stuff, we got on I-5 around 5:30 or 5:45. Of course, we were looking forward to going over Siskiyou Summit. It’s the highest mountain pass on the entire I-5- which spans from San Diego up through Seattle and beyond to Canada. A full north/south highway on the West Coast. I’ve only been all the way up and over the pass once- and that was driving out here. 4310 ft above sea level. It had been raining and even snowing in the valley off and on all week (which snow is uncommon in the valley- a sign that even MORE snow lay ahead in the mountains). And there was a LOT of snow packed beside the road. Despite the potential of driving through the snow, there were only clouds around the mountains- no snow on the road.

As we began our descent into California, I was reminded of the only other time I’d been on I-5 this far south. It was the trip out here to Oregon, and as we drove forth, the idea that the Northwest is a bunch of pot-smoking hippies was reinforced as we drove through the town of Weed. Luke said it best in his blog of the drive out- they must have all gotten together and came up with their favorite name for their favorite plant and named a city that- Weed.

It was a rather uneventful drive, however. And it got dark shortly after we crossed into California, so we weren’t able to see much, anyway. We drove through the town of Redding after a couple hours- Rachel had taken the girls in the youth group to a water park there last summer. It was apparently not all that great of a place, but better than nothing and nothing is what Medford has. Just another reminder that while we may live in a town of decent size, and Redding is a little bigger than that, there’s still NOTHING around for miles and miles.

Our conversations were pretty varied, but so many things ended up falling into one of two categories. Either we were quoting "Family Guy" and reliving favorite episodes or moments, or we were talking about things that made me think of "Oops, I crapped my pants". Different stories relating to control issues leading around different ways our bodies releases its non-used materials. Absolutely hilarious, but, for you, my readers, you only get the ambiguous retelling.

Driving through the Sacramento Valley, we saw that our clouds had left us and we continued driving in the moon-lit glow of the full-moon. Turned on to I-80 in Sacramento. Both Rachel and Kassie were quick to remark how much of a real city it was. It’s got almost a half-million population, but that’s more than enough when you’ve been living in Medford. As we continued, we passed Ikea- right off the highway. In all it’s splendor. I found myself as the voice of reason saying to Rachel that we don’t need any more stuff as we’re already trying to get rid of stuff as we plan to move. And telling Dave they don’t need any more stuff, either, as they’ve just gotten a new sofa. Way to be the buzz-kill.

In one of the funnier moments, we saw a KFC/Del Taco sign. I have many times before seen a KFC/Taco Bell sign. But never with Del Taco. We began making fun of it immediately. “uh, yeah, I’d like to have a chicken leg in my taco, please!” or “ummm- can I get a mashed potatoes and gravy burrito?” well, at least we thought it was funny…

So here’s where it got tricky- the directions we had said it was 47 miles to a merging of highways, then another 6 to our exit. We misjudged that so many times that it lost all meaning to say “I think this may be where they merge!” until it was so obvious, we’d have had to be blind not to see it. But being blind, we’d have larger problems as we were driving… when we finally figured the merge out, we began looking for the exit. But the directions provided by hotels.com didn’t give us the right name for the exit and so we blew on past, just looking for Harrison St. Exit. And not finding it. It was almost midnight by now and we’re just ready to find our hotel. So, after doing a little turn around and deciding to just pick an exit where we thought it was- we knew the hotel is only a mile or two from Fisherman’s Wharf- we found the street we were looking for without even trying. What joy. Note to self for future- don’t use hotels.com directions again. I lay that blame on Rachel- I would have mapquested the directions, but she just printed out the directions from hotels.com an called it good. Not to pick on her or anything, though…

And from there, it was relatively easy- follow the directions again till we find our street. And as we traveled, we passed clubs and shops- and Kassie, who apparently has Rachel’s love for “real” cities, but only having lived in Salt Lake City, found herself loving this city. So, as we pulled up to the hotel- which was so amazingly well displayed that we missed it the first time- I found myself thinking- “I know who’ll leave her heart in San Francisco."

stay tuned for days 2, 3 and the picture recap!