areca

greeeetings and loving embraces from quinault lake resort! first i would like to express my upmost gratitude to all of the kind folks who have offered me a place to camp and/or shelter and food on my trip thus far. deb and tom-met deb at matlock market and offered me an uh-mazing river side space to camp on their land. denise (sorry if i got that or spelled that wrong) and steve-accepted me as a complete stranger and opened their home to me and denise makes wonderful homemade cinnimon rolls a rival to my families fer sure. ; D jon hawkins of the lake quinault resort- a wonderful wellness peaceful space with beautiful lake veiws. right down the road from the anicent forest and across the road from the 2nd largest tree in the world. on ... read more

i am off! currently i am in olimpia after taking a couple days to bike here after attending a ten day vipassuna retreat in onalaska, washington. the retreat of wonderfully hard. the bike riding easy and beautiful and tiring and satisfying. which by the way to get here i did not take any high traffic roads. i ended up asking locals all the time what roads/old highways to take each pedal turn of the way. none of the roads i took were detailed on my map, and almost all (except old highway 99) were not even on my map. it was a refreshing experience and i got to speak with so many different folks, all characters of the pacific northwest. : i had too much weight and am getting rid of things now and riding ... read more

i am listening to a new friend playing piano. for the second time since i have stopped playing piano i want to get up and fiddle on it a bit. although the last time i wanted to, it was a woman with incredible musical talent (not that this guy doesn't, but she was amazing) and she made me want to become decent again so i could make up my own music and enjoy to sounds made by my fingers again. i had my energies balanced today for the first time. you know that pracitce where a healer takes you to a room that quiet with smooth music playing and maybe touches your forehead. then they put their hands over your body (they don't touch you, well maybe some do. but safe, friendly, not invasive touching) and ... read more

I made it back from my trip to eugene and aprovecho thursday afternoon. both rides i received were kind, one of which i had great conversation with. the other preached at me at how envirnmentalists beat their drum loud when they are not fully researched, and that global warming is a farce. he was frustrating to sit with, harmless, but annoying. and he smoked grape swisher sweets so i smelled pretty gross the rest of the day. my time in eugene was fantastic, i danced a lot. i worked really hard on both my leading and following. i feel like i improved greatly in both areas, especially leading which i haven't done as much of as following. i arrived saturday around noon to the saturday market and walked around that for hours. i danced at the ... read more

So i am still hanging at the gypsy cafe, and it has been amazing. this place and these people have been so good to me, and have taught me so much. i have changed a lot since i have been here and feel more connected with myself and mother earth. tomorrow though i will be the first of four wwoofers to journey off in 6 weeks. i am headed to eugene to meet up with a great person (named loren) and do some dancing. i will hitch there tomorrow morning, tonight they are holding a celebration and dinner in my honor (i feel so special!). i have been thinking about it though and i do believe i will come back to the gypsy cafe some time next week, as i will be going south any way ... read more

Ahhhhhhhhh! This is a very satisfying life I am experiencing now. Mother nature is all around me and I am working in it everyday now. I arrived here at gypsy cafe Thursday to beautiful scenery and incredible people. Two other wwoof-ers came on the same day I did, all traveling independently! Funny, and the night I stayed at a women's shelter on the way here, I rode a late bus to get there. It was already dark by the time we had gotten to first avenue (somewhere on this road the shelter was chillin) and i was going to get off when we reached it, but another lady asked me if i was going there and took me there with her. as it turns out, she was really late (you had to be there by 6:45pm ... read more

Danni left wednesday morning (begrudgingly left ; ) and since then I have been with out a good friend. It has not been bad at all thus far. I have talked and met a handful of great people and am now surfing a different couch. I am not lonely, I have always enjoyed time in my own mind, and being has already proven to make me more approachable by others. I must focus on gratitude and love and consequently I will be surrounded by it. All of these options and opportunities are staring me in the face and all I have to do is open up my mind and my arms to let them in. I am still fighting with my mind in these first stages of travel though trying to overcome the scared silly thoughts ... read more

Danni and I have made it to Portland, Oregon! We received a total of 8 rides, some long some short. I started out with 15 dollars in my back pack and we came out with 40 dollars given to us by two of our rides and we were fed 4 times. All of the rides we got we incredible, genuinely nice people just wanting to help out another human being in need. Only one trucker we got a ride from was crass but harmless. Many of the rides we got all we had to do was hang around a gas station with our packs and someone would offer a ride if we happened to be going in the same direction, which was often the case when they asked. odd how that when someone offered us a ... read more

I belong to the water. We drove all night last night and arrived in LA around 2 am, got to the beach around 3:30 am. It was almost our own private space at the time. hard to get in LA i do believe. and driving the streets at night felt wonderful, we filled the road. i loved the rainbow gathering, i have never been around so many accepting people at one time. the best time was starting @ 7:30 am july 4th everyone (i don't know how many were there any where from 10-25 thousand) everyone was completely silent. it was such an immense feeling to have so many people (who drum, dance, and sing long into the night every night and yell such things as 6-up and nick and nite at the top of their ... read more

about 2 days and i'm off. this feels big, and i believe it will be a big movement in my life. i am excited for change and the unknown (even though sometimes i let my mind convince me that the unknown is scary, not usually for too long though). i have felt my life is too stagnant for quite some time and am ready for that feeling to dissipate with visions of things i will be seeing for the first time. i am getting together a list of all i will be taking and will post it hopefully before i go to see how that list will change and how effective it will be for me. my friends, if you have any desire to travel yet are unsure how (or do not think you can afford ... read more