West Coast Road Trip

West coast road trip….

Some pics can be found on my new Flickr website: click here.


My life took a dramatic turn in early October. To make a long story very short I now find myself sitting in Santa Cruz.

Andrew and I are taking a road trip down the west coast from Vancouver to Santa Barbara. We brought it all from skis to bikes, running shoes to climbing gear. Our plans were slim.. I knew I wanted to catch up with some folks on my way down but other than that? I suppose the road was ours to explore.

Vancouver to Portland
The first morning we woke up before the sun and headed for the border in order to try and beat as much traffic as possible…with success we rolled into Vivace coffees by REI in Seattle by 9.15am and met my buddy Colin. We caught up, drank probably the most delicious coffee to date and went and checked out REI (it is huge).



We rocked it to Portland and had enough time to check out the Pearl District, go for a run in the Forest trails before meeting up with another good friend Kristi and her man Mike. They made us a delicious dinner, we chatted about fermentation, had some of their home brew (which was fantastic) and eventually made it to the futon….



Portland to Redwoods California
After a good morning faff sorting out some flights, Kristi showed us around her neighbourhood, we played in the park and then headed for the coast. The Oregon coast is beautiful…. I made Andrew stop a lot as I was getting excited at every turn….The Oregon coast is long… We managed to sneak in a long long walk on a secluded beach into the night….We almost got stranded but luckily somehow found the car again. We drove into California late into the evening and set up camp in Redwood National Park. We managed to illegally park as well as set up our tent on an archeological finds area…. We got off lucky!



Redwood National Park to San Francisco
We rose with the sun and started off on what became a somewhat epic journey to San Francisco. The highway 1 proved to be gorgeous but very very slow….there is one section that is mighty twisty and sketchy but Andrew’s mad driving skills got us through.



We managed to run on Blind Beach which is slated as one of the most deadly beaches in California….. it was beautiful in that mysteriously frightening way. We left right before a coastal storm hit us…The end of the drive proved to be quite interested with fierce winds, showers and darkness. We met Kyle (an old high school friend) in San Francisco around 6pm. We went out for some yummy food and then hit up a Tiki bar which was full on…It rained, it thundered, the dance floor was on a wooden boat and the live band was playing on a moving platform in a pool of water. We drank all sorts of fruity drinks.




San Francisco to Santa Cruz



We woke up early in San Francisco as we had big plans before heading down to Santa Cruz. We started off the morning with coffees at a famous little coffee place called Blue Bottle. It lived up to its name. We then put on our running shoes and set out for what turned out to be an epic run! We managed to run over the Golden Gate Bridge through Fisherman’s Wharf and the Market Road, Downtown etc. We were out on our feet for 6 hours…. FUN! We managed to take off before dark and drive the coast road to Santa Cruz while hitting up a beach for sunset. We finally made it to a friend Alex’s place and Daniel (team Yogaslackers) arrived shortly after. Alex and Daniel prepared an amazing Indian dish…chatters and eats we didn’t hit the hay until about 1am.



A day in Santa Cruz
After dealer with parking issues Daniel, Andrew and I headed for a really fun mountain bike ride. What was supposed to be an hour ride turned into 3 hours of fun! He showed a bunch of the trails around campus. We finished the ride close to dark but managed to squeeze in a fun atypical trail run with Alex before figuring out dinner. Alex and Daniel once again prepared two outstanding meals.. We ate like Kings and Queens and Katharyn (Daniels friend from SD came over for a visit).

We are now heading to Santa Barbara.

Live, Love, Laugh,…DREAM!
Lina