Blogs from North America - page 7985

Last night I went Tango dancing at "Cell Space". An alternative Milonga here in San Francisco. Despite the sketchiness of the area (Think kind of like Skid Row but with more attractive graffiti), and despite I parked too far away and was concerned about the walk back at midnight AND wondered if my car would even be there when I returned (even if there is not a "no parking" sign in site I am still weary of the fate of an automobile here). Oh yes, despite all of that, the inside was spacious, the people welcoming. The only thing was that several of the men smelled. Two reeked of funk and I wanted to mention something deodorant. One smelled oddly of baby lotion mixed with baby powder....strange, but he danced well. Then there was the ... read more

"Go away rain! Come again another day, like tommorrow, after we're done with our tour!" I guess it was to be expected, we were very close to Seattle after all. After a late night at the gambling hall, The Tulalip Casino, waking up this morning was difficult. When we did, we headed straight for the motel's conference room. Our continental breakfast was waiting for us, good thing 'cuz we were hungry, as usual. We headed south afterwards hoping that we could find it in ourselves to pedal all the way to Portland. Ha! As if! :) Sleeping in, dinkin' around, and excessive breaks(after all, we are on vacation) prevented us from accomplishing such feat(250 miles in one day). Rene and I have done 200 miles in one day, but we raced the clock, without gear. ... read more

Well today was a pretty relaxing day all things considered. I was feeling pretty sore from the climbing yesterday so I decided to just let myself sleep in until my legs and arms were ready to face the world again. Heather had to work most of the day but she left me her bike so that I could get into town. Except it got left locked inside the garage :( So I just decided to walk into town and meet Heather on her lunch break. It took me less than an hour and it was a pretty easy 2.5 mile walk downhill. I took some nice pictures and got to see all the crazy critters that like to run across your path when you're walking!! At least they're cute! Heather took me for lunch at ... read more

First thing we appreciated about Oregon were the gas prices - first time below $3/gallon all trip! We’d be happy to pay these high prices if the money was going somewhere other than the oil companies pockets…but that’ll take a new administration and some cojones in the halls of Congress. I digress. We headed up the Oregon coast to Sunset Bay State Park. A nice marine mammal overlook with two species of sea lions, seals, and even a gray whale. A botanical garden with a huge variety of roses was another treat. Headed up the coast to South Beach State Park, near Newport. Got in a nice run along the beach, where the shorebirds were abundant. Talked to another stranger who was a bigwig at the Forest Service until his retirement, then volunteered abroad for ... read more

The views around here are fantastic, especially in good lighting conditions. Those Grand Tetons are awesome. The drive to Jackson is Classic Wyoming, just beautiful. Way back when we traversed Wyoming, from Evanston to Rawlings on Interstate 80, we had to agree with our Salt Lake City receptionist's questioning of why we should visit the state, and she was born in the state. It can be desolate and arid in that part of the state but we think she had explored much of her own state. Elsewhere, Wyoming is fabulous. It's so peaceful once you are out of Jackson and even the town is not noisy, well we never noticed excessive noise, apart from our terrible log cabins at the Wagon Wheel Village, the worst we''ve ever experienced in any hotel/motel, anywhere in the world! Don't ... read more