Thursday, October 28, 2010

Oregon Coast, Part one...

During my time on the Oregon Coast, I lucked out as far as weather.  Aside from a light mist/fog (that would routinely become heavy at night), it was great weather and very mild temperatures.  I made it to many (not all though, there's just so much to see!) of the places that were recommended to me by many of you.

Mario - Oswald and Ecola State Parks were both awesome.  Very scenic.  And the hike into Smuggler Cove was awesome too.

Cyndy - Drove by Cleawox Lake briefly!  Cool lake!  I contemplated renting a dune buggy to go drive around a lot of the dunes out there, but decided to keep moving.  Some day though!

Glen - Stayed in Brookings for a couple nights too...  I'll talk about that in a later post though.

Here are a few pics (click on them for bigger versions!) from the first part of the Oregon Coast drive!  Of course, more to come!

Stay shiny.

Seaside, Oregon




 

 Cannon Beach and Haystack Rock

Oswald State Park (hike into Smuggler Cove):








Experimenting with my camera's panorama mode



Further on down the coast:


Finally!

So I've finally been able to spend some time on this blog!  Let me bring you up to date on where I've been...  It's been two weeks since I left on the trip.  Made it to Twin Falls, ID after the first day of driving...  Would have made it further, but leaving at 1:30pm will set you back a little.  No matter though, as I made it up to Issaquah, WA the next day, where I stayed for a the first weekend with a friend of mine and her family (thanks Alycia and family!).  Left that Monday morning for Astoria, where I spent the next day.  On the way, I had a guy pull straight out in front my direction of traffic as I was approaching quickly (as he obviously had not seen myself or the motorcycle close behind me) and I ended up having to swerve aggressively to avoid him.  He might have been 650 years old.  Just a guess, I can't prove it...  Spent the next number of days making my way down the Oregon coast, stopping at random times for random things.  Discovered that I have a knack for somehow neglecting to stop for the obvious tourist attractions but then driving 3 more miles and stopping at the most ridiculous little "pull off" a civil engineer could have possibly thought up.  Sometimes it plays to my favor, other times, probably not, ha.  Oh well.

Moving on, I continued my journey into California.  Stopped by Trees of Mystery to ride the gondola and see some of the coastal Redwoods.  Nothing short of awesome (pics to come).  Continued to make my way further down the coast before venturing inland a bit into Sacramento, where I am currently staying with my cousin.  I will soon be leaving for San Francisco and beyond!  On Wed., Nov. 3rd, I will be getting to race a 911, a Cayman, a Boxster, the Lotus Elise S/C, the Elise Exige, and a V8 M3 at the famous Laguna Seca Racetrack in Monterey for the entire day.  Yes, Christmas is on Nov. 3rd this year...


More pics to come shortly!  (See below for some of the first ones)

Stay shiny.