Back atcha from Kalispell, Montana, gateway to Glacier National Park, which I plan to visit later this morning. (But then, I've always been under Kalispell, my Hindu goddess of choice).

Have travelled over 3,000 miles and entered another time zone (in more than one sense) since I left lovely Claremont, CA, exactly 3 weeks ago. Regrettably, I have neither the time nor skill to describe adequately the Wonders of Washington! My first time in the state, and I traversed its northern span from Seattle to Spokane (two more different cities can hardly be imagined) After leaving the lovely hospitality of Ro's home in Courtenay, BC, and disembarking from the good ship Chelan at Anacortes, I decided to head directly east and take the northern route, Rt. 2, across the Cascades and was glad I did. The scenery was incessantly impressive and beguiling, uniquely spectacular in many very different ways, and the contrasts were extreme. Do not miss taking this trip if you possible get a chance. If you can't see the USA in your Chevrolet, at least drive across Washington in your Prius. It's a pretty good microcosm of the whole. California is perhaps more diversely spectacular, but it has the kind of nervous energy of a child prodigy with ADD. Spectacular but exhausting. Washington is a calm old colossus by comparison.

My first impression of WA, when I entered it over a week ago, before the excellent diversion to BC, was of a tranquil giant, peaceful and confident in its endless and massive expansiveness. All vistas, whether of forests, mountains, plains, farmland, went as far as the eye can see; I know that's not particularly surprising, but the eye can see so much farther in Washington. Perhaps the major difference between the two Washingtons - the District of Columbia and the State of the Columbia - is exactly that: their respective spans of vision.

I knew the Cascades were mountains, but I did not realize that they rivaled the Alps!! They really do, and I only wish I had taken the time to stop a dozen times and try to photograph the incredible views. I did snap some shots through the windshield as I went, and they are impressive enough, but not a fraction of what I could have captured had I lingered a bit on the precipices overlooking miles and miles and miles of the most beautiful valleys, lakes, and snow-capped mountains imaginable, all at distances that would make a 747 envious. Not to mention the many roadside waterfalls that suddenly appear as one rounds a bend, much to suddenly to snap a picture, let alone stop to enjoy. So it was not surprising, after all, to learn that much of the area comprises a National Park (North Cascades N.P.). Of course, besides the beautifully designed and ample roadway, there's not a sign of human intrusion anywhere in sight for seamless hours of travelling. But then, like all good things, the lushly forested mountains end and give rise (the wrong metaphor) to the dry but irrigated plains of eastern Washington, with, first, its charmingly and scrupulously cared-for series of orchards (cherry, pear, apple), followed by the most beautifully endless expanses of flat to gently rolling farmland, cultivated in low growing crops of every shade of green, with not a farmhouse or sign of cultivation equipment in sight!! Not to mention the awesomely expansive (that's the word for Washington!) Columbia river, which at first seemed so wide and still, I thought must be a huge and peaceful lake. Finally, spent the night in Wenatchee, one of those sudden settlements that comes out of nowhere in the uninhabited desert/farmland wilderness; a town with some history, at the confluence of the Wenatchee and Columbia rivers. Next day was an excursion up to the Grand Coulee Dam, of fabled New Deal glory and Woody Guthrie anthem! The drive to the dam was unexpectedly awesome (a word I could have used before but somehow neglected): passing through and beside enormous rock formations that seemed from another planet, both along the banks of the Columbia and along the roadside. I wondered what kind of geological history they told. Later, I learned exactly that they are the remnants of an amazing ice-age flash flood, 12,000 years ago, that tore through the span of land from western Montana to eastern Washington when a colossal ice damn, miles high (!), burst and released its fury and in just 48 hours had scoured the countryside for hundreds of miles, leaving only the bedrock exposed, and depositing boulders the size of small mountains, strewn about – the other worldly landscape I'd just driven through. The canyons thus scoured between high outcropping of vertically crystalized granite cliffs, are called “coulies” and the Dam was built in the most expansive one of them all, the Grand Coulie! There's a reason for everything, including weird earth formations and weird place names.

Approaching the dam, I took a photo of the peaceful, hardly moving river from the side approaching the spillway, not suspecting in the slightest, what was just around the bend. When I saw that spillway, one of the true wonders of human engineering and construction, I was so flabbergasted I uttered a comment that cannot be rendered here out of respect for the genteel sensibilities of my readers. It's initials were HFS (first word was “Holy”). But there were no words, even profane ones, that could possibly describe this spectacle. Fortunately, my little camera did capture it in video and audio, so eventually I can share that moment with you. The visitor center provided some excellent, short movies that documented the history of the dam – an early project (beginning in 1933) of Roosevelt's intrepid recovery program (oh, that Mr. Obama would have the courage!!) that provided employment for thousands of brave and strong workers, electric power and irrigation for the huge region of the Columbia River valley I'd spent the day driving through. The largest human construction in the US, and at the time, in the world. And one of the movies featured Woody's songs (“Grand Coulee Dam” and “Roll on Columbia”) for much of the sound track. Ever the video opportunist, I actually filmed the films (!) and will post them on YouTube if they are not there already. They are must-sees for their educational content: geological and human history. “Roll on, Columbia” has been rolling on in my head ever since. What a great song! Happy hundredth birthday, Woody!!

Okay...on to see Glacier National Park, one of my “bucket list” destinations ever since my first cross-country trip in the early 60s when the route was a little to the south through Yellowstone and Grand Tetons, but missed Glacier.

I will wish you warm regards from the Glacier. (Just another of those magnificent contradictions that comprise life and living.)

Back to the trail.

Ben

It's Monday, July 2, 2012, 12:20 PM PDT, and I'm in between countries on the water between Sidney, BC and Anacortes, WA. Not Christlike, but high and dry and humming along on a big ferry named CHELAN, the same one that took me in the other direction, from Friday Harbor to Sidney, last Wednesday. So it's a fond reunion of sorts.

Spent a very rewarding 5 days at ex-sister-in-law (Gloria's sister) Ro's lovely digs in Courtenay, BC, located up the east coast of Vancouver Island, about 3 hours from Victoria, which is at the southern tip of the big island.  She provided first class accommodations, wonderful mattress, a whole room for a study, and some lovely field trips to a seaside forest park and a fabulous localvore gourmet restaurant! Plus hours of mind-expanding, neuron-exploding conversation. When it comes to vigorous and relentless exploration of Big Ideas, I've met my match, and then some. Plus lots of “family” talk, given our mutual connections (though it'd been 35+ years since last contact), and (surprisingly!), her vivid recollections of a visit with my parents, Larry and Ros, back in the 70s! And last but not least, making the acquaintance of two gorgeous felines: Nellie (aka Rorshak Inkblot), and Puffin (aka Tiggerkat). Besides being sleek and black, Nellie is quite securely comfortable with newcomers, and we got along beautifully. Puffin is a young, recovering feral pussy cat, and is painfully shy. Hid under bureaus and behind doors the whole time I was there until the last two days, and only this morning did he actually allow me to touch him (having an irresistible treat in my hand helped a lot).

While there I decided I really needed a functional lap top to replace the ancient ones I'd brought with me: one that can actually play the videos I've taken en route! So I drove down to the closest major Mac store in Nanaimo, a charming town about 90 miles down the Island, major port for ferries to Vancouver across the bay. Bought me a MacBook Air, and love it!! It's not much bigger than an iPad, but has nice keyboard and a solid state hard drive, so the battery lasts about 7 hours! Am writing on it right now, although will have to wait until I disembark and find the first McDonald's (and wi-fi) before I can upload it to my blog. But after bringing it back to Ro's, spent many hours getting caught up on my video production work for my Portland friend, Holly's, making DVDs of the 3 sessions on Emily Dickinson (“Centre and Circumference”) she gave in Claremont before I left. Most important, I got the R&R I needed to recover from the 2K mile trip up the west coast, and prepare for the 2K mile trip across the continent: Eastward Ho!

I've decided to abandon my Grand Plan to drive across Canada, as tempting as it was. The road trip through Jasper and Banff National Parks in Alberta looked too good to miss, having come this far. But it turns out that motel costs in Canada are consistently more than twice what they are in the US for similar accommodations (I routinely get nice rooms at Motel 6 for under $50; they are more like $120 in Canada), and gas is about 30% more expensive. But even more daunting for me was the prospect of trying to “enjoy” the most scenic drive in Western Canada on the day after Canada Day (their Fourth of July is on the First!), the first day of Canada's true summer vacation, when the kids have just finished their school year and I imagine half the population of BC, Alberta and Manitoba will have the same idea of a great road trip. So....I'll figure out another time to see that magnificence, and just aim eastward when I get off the boat. General plan is to drive through the Washington State Cascades this afternoon (weather is completely overcast and rainy right now!), and end up at the Motel 6 (for $42), in Wenatchee, WA, not far from Grand Coulee Dam (where I will listen for Woody's anthem to the Optimistic Grandeur of the New Deal/WPA Recovery Programs echoing across the valley.) We'll see how well that went with 80 years' hindsight.

After that, I'll drive due east to Spokane, pick up I-90, take it across Idaho and Montana, then at Billings pick up I-94, across the High Midwest, through Garrison Keillor Country, then head through northern Wisconsin to Michigan's Upper Peninsula, which I've always wanted to see. Then will cross the international border again, across the Sault Ste. Marie bridge, into Ontario, and make a beeline to Montreal, then only five more hours to home. A much more pleasant short cut than revisiting the “lower midwest” which has seen enough of me, and the feeling is mutual. Figure I should be home by about July 15 or before, but we'll see how that goes.

Wish I'd had the time and energy to blog about the incredible land-, sea-, and forest-scapes of Northern California. But after I get home, I'll put the photos and videos together and post some links to them.

Thanks again for staying in touch. And how are things going for YOU??

Note added after passing through US customs: the guy in the uniform and dark glasses looked at my passport and driver's license, asked if I was driving back to New Hampshire;  I said "yep," then he peered into the car (my conestoga hybrid, loaded to the gills) and asked "Did you leave anything home?"  I had to ask him go repeat the question before I realized he was really cracking a joke!  I didn't think levity was allowed by DHS.  At least he waved me on, figuring he had better ways to spend the afternoon than searching through my car for contraband Metamucil.

Well, back at last!  So sorry for being either too busy or too tired to post a blog since leaving California, but hope to backfill on the main events, and reflections, sometime before long.  Thanks so much for checking back, anyway.  This will have to be brief, as I am being picked up for a 3 hour tour of Seattle in a few minutes.  That's where I am now, at the cheap Motel 6 at the airport in the town wedged between Seattle and Tacoma, called - get this! - Seatac!

Arriving Sleepy in Seattle, I took yesterday off as respite from nonstop activity. Looking forward to another beautiful day (no, it hasn't rained here!!) and a pleasant escape across the border tomorrow afternoon:  ferry from Anacortes, 2 hours north, to Friday Harbor, a night on that island, and then a ferry on Wednesday to Sidney, near Victoria.  Plan is to spend a few hours in Victoria, then hightail it up to Courteney where my ex-sister-in-law and good friend, Roberta, is most graciously hosting me for a while.

Looking forward to finding some time to backfill this blog, as there is a lot to report and reflect upon.

Thanks for stopping by.

Surreal in Seattle

"Eureka!  You've found it!!" is what I expected to find posted on the welcoming sign as you enter that northern California town.  There was no welcoming sign at all, just a lot of motel signs lining the main drag as far as the eye could see.  I snagged a Motel 6 for $49.99 (my goal!), and it was nice enough, but the wifi didn't work.  So I'm in McD's for another free session.  But this will be painfully (for me, not for you) short, since it's almost noon already.  But I have to briefly cover two jam-packed days:

Main event on Monday was leaving the coastal highway and taking rte 128 into the wine and pot growing country (both legal!) to visit my old and dear friend who lives in one of the 4 little (and very special, I've learned) towns in the Anderson Valley.  Hers is Boonville! The road was the most incessantly and exhaustingly winding switchbacky road I've ever had to negotiate.  But it was a really special visit.  Life in that small, very rural and very communally oriented town, is soooo different from life on the fast lane in Claremont/LA, that's for sure.  It's a lot like a northern New England hill country life style, very rustic and backwoods looking, but the homes (she tells me) can cost in the millions, and the residents are fugitives from professional lives, many in their 80s and going strong.  She's found a very meaningful life of diverse community activities, and I was so impressed and happy for her. And a little envious.

The road from Boonville back to the coastal highway passed many little family vineyards and wineries, all with "Wine Tasting" signs.  Then it went through the first dense redwood forest I'd gotten to.  Wonderful.  Then, on the coast, I stopped at a lighthouse site, got a little exercise walking to it and back, and watched and video'd the sunset over the Pacific. (I'd estimate it splashes down around Hawaii, but that's just a guess.  Far enough away so you can hardly hear the sizzle, though.)  It was a sweetly uneventful sunset, almost no color at all!  But the cold wind was ferocious.  Felt like a good workout when I was done.  Motel 6 in Ft. Bragg.

Yesterday was all about Redwoods.  Rte 101 is called Redwood Highway (yes, I drove through the first drive-through tree, for $5), and there's a 32 mile diversion called Avenue of the Giants, where you see all the redwoods Gov. Reagan dismissed in his memorable comment. He only saw one.  I saw them all!   Driving through them, lining the road for miles at a time, was, indeed, an awesome experience, but stopping and walking the trail through Founders  Forest was really special.  The path was softly cushioned with the tree droppings, the smells were invigorating, and exploring the details of the trees, like the huge cavities in some of the bases, and the many fallen trees in various stages of decay, covered with the new life of vegetation they support, and the unbelievably massive roots.  It's quite a hike just walking from one end of a fallen redwood to the other.  They get to be well over 300 feet tall.

So it was a relatively relaxing day, but no less awe-inspiring.  One of the things this trip has already taught me is that it's truly amazing how many different kinds of Amazing there are.  And that's just in California!

Thanks for reading this.  I gather some people are actually doing that!!  I'll try to make it worth while. Do write back and let me know what you're up to as well.

As every total stranger in California says: "Have a good one, buddy!"

[From the Red Roof Inn near San Francisco Int'l Airport, where I used my Free Night Certificate!]

I think I will give this blog a title: "The Existential Tourist," because of how yesterday went.

 I had every intention and desire to visit the famous Monterey Bay Aquarium in the morning after my decision to stay in the Monterey area and not try to find a (nonexistent) place to stay near Santa Cruz.  Of course,  my plans to do anything in the morning are the kinds of thing God finds hilariously funny.  So when He was done laughing, I found myself near the Aquarium at noon, on a beautiful Sunday, which happened also to be Father's Day.  The crowds were all happy families with big smiles and filling the streets - did I mention "crowds"? - parking was $10, and I quickly decided, "not for me; not today," and decided to head up the Coastal Highway (Rte 1) to my San Francisco destination, only about 100 miles away, via a side trip to Santa Cruz to scope out the town and campus.

I very much enjoyed Santa Cruz: it's clearly a college town, iconically so, and the living is easy.  All the homes are modest, close together on the very lived-in streets, with bicycles and lawn sculptures strewn about; the residents obviously have better things to do with their time and imaginations than keep up their lawns or worry about appearances.  My kind o' town!  I really didn't see any of the campus buildings (not obvious how to find them!), but I soon found out that it was Commencement day, so I decided that it wasn't the best time to visit campus.  I did happen into a faculty housing cluster, which was right out of Disney Studios: the most perfect cluster of modest homes in a beautiful, communally designed setting, you could imagine.  Spoke to a perfect Mr. Chips walking his dog.  He'd been teaching there since the campus opened in 1965, and loved it, except that California's current financial disaster has hit the state campuses really hard, so these are very sad and difficult times for their faculty and students.

Mid-afternoon I continued my drive along the Coastal Highway, and it was another gorgeous treat: this time all about sand: beautiful, expansive public beaches in awesome coves ringed with huge sand dune cliffs, one huge State Beach every 5 miles or so!  (look at a CA map of Rte 1 from Santa Cruz up to Pacifica, and you'll see what I mean).  It was a little frustrating do drive it, though, since between the road and the beach was a continuous berm-like vegetated dune that blocked the view from the road.  The only way to really see the beaches or the spectacular views would be to pull into a parking area,  and get out of the car.  By this time, I was experiencing increasing Awesomeness Fatigue,  suffering from Post Awesome Stress Syndrome (PASS), and just wanted to haul my hybrid ass up to San Francisco!  So I floored that baby and passed all the scenic wonders unseen, except when the road curved on a high overlook and the sight was amazing, but I didn't even bother trying to snap a photo from the car!  I was that jaded.

Hence the title for this blog, The Existential Tourist:  With the right vehicle and maps, and a valid credit card, anyone can plan and execute a successful sightseeing trip.  But to spend 3 long days to get to a site, like Monterey Bay Aquarium, or the UCSC campus, or the Central Coast Beaches, and then not bother to see them takes a special kind of refinement that only comes from great experience and hard work, plus, if I do say so, a certain degree of natural talent  to be in the right place at the wrong time, which, according to my parents, showed itself precociously when I was quite young.

I won't even mention the fact that I ran into the biggest traffic bottleneck I've ever witnessed at the turnoff from Rte 1 to Rte 92 going to SF, where the entire populations of San Francisco and San Jose were returning from a wonderful Father's Day at the beach!  Luckily, I managed to avoid the deadly trap, veered off into the weird seedy/boutiquey town of Half Moon Bay, stopped for a wifi connection, then figured out a way to bypass the traffic jam:  just continued speedily up Rte 1 to Pacifica, and down I-280 to my motel, arriving comfortably at 7 and getting a first floor room!

Okay...heading out soon for the Mendocino area, via Rte 101 this time, to Booneville to visit an old friend, then on to Mendo and then Ft. Bragg where I've booked a Motel 6 room!  Been averaging around $55 a night so far.

That's it from the battle field this morning.

Writing on Sunday morning from an unexpectedly lovely Motel 6 in Salinas, CA, 20 mi. NE of Monterey, where there are affordable motel rooms!  Yesterday was another wonderful day: began by doing major reorganizing of the Prius (my hybrid conestoga), so things are more accessible when I need them.  This always happens a couple of days into the trip, after painful experiences looking for stuff.  It's a great spiritual relief to have that taken care of.  So didn't get going until noon, on another beautiful, cloudless day.

Headed back toward the 17 Mile drive, which goes around the periphery of the Monterey Penninsula
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/17-Mile_Drive   http://kestrin.com/wedding/images/pebble_beachhotels_map.jpg
and provides endless spectacles of "the restless sea" (quoting one of the site markers) splashing and foaming around the wildly rough-hewn, and promiscuously scattered, protruding granite rocks, with occasional seal sightings.  Not to mention the really wonderful Monterey cypress forests, which I first saw, strikingly, at Point Lobos on Friday on the way up here.  These trees, native only to this area, seem to me like practice versions of the giant redwoods I look forward to seeing tomorrow, north of San Francisco.  Nowhere near as big, but trying hard to be...and having a menacing tendency to lean over toward the road (and there is much evidence that they do, indeed, occasionally fall over.)  They also sometimes sport a beautiful drapery of "Spanish moss" like trees in the southeast!  One thing is certain, the central CA coast gets a lot more rain than the LA area where I just came from!  It's really green here - the trees, anyway.  The fields are all iconically California golden.

Then continuing up into Monterey itself, I was charmed!  The town reminds me of a New England seaside town, like Portsmouth, NH, for instance.  But the beaches are much more accessible: the road just runs next to the beaches, with parking areas every mile or so.  I'd say, if I could do it over, I'd try to find a job with one of the local colleges (Monterey Penninsula College, or CSU Monterey Bay), become a specialist in marine protists, and live happily in the sea air, sans snow!

Since "sanity" has been the byword lately, I decided not to rush up to Santa Cruz in the afternoon, where I couldn't book a room, anyway, but stay in Monterey.  So got this affordable room in Salinas, which has a lovely entry walk under trees and birds, between my car and the room.  And paid the $2.99 for internet access to save schlepping out to another McDonald's.

The ride into Salinas from Monterey takes one through miles and miles of the flattest terrain I've seen in a long time.  I mean, FLAT, as far as the eye can see...at least right up to the mountains in the distant mist on both horizons.  So flat that a topographical map of the area would just be a blank piece of paper. There is on topography.  And of course, it's all cultivated, with sprinkers going full blast (draining the Colorado River?) and only seedlings showing at this time.  I thought of Steinbeck, who hung out in Salinas, and the depression era "undocumented immigrants" he wrote about in "Grapes of Wrath," one of the few novels I actually finished!

Did a little shopping, mainly to get cash back with my debit card, and was again so inspired by the bilingual verve of the young women at the registers all over California!  Chattering away in high-speed Spanish with the customer in front of me, and then in flawless and always warm and friendly American English, taking care of me (somehow, I'm never mistaken for a Spanish speaker.  Uncanny!).  I thought, I have a Ph.D. but as a hopeless monoglot, would be vastly unqualified to run a cash register in California.  These young women could be simultaneous translators at the UN, but have to settle for minimum wage at Albertson's.

I was all set to heat up my gourmet leftovers packed from Claremont, using the hotplate and saucepan I brought, but decided I deserved a night out, so found a Thai restaurant open late on Main St. in Salinas.
The young Thai waitress also spoke flawless Californian (every other word was "awesome" - a word I noticed I'd never even used describing my Big Sur experience.  Let me correct that now:  it was AWESOME!)

So I returned to the coast for the sundown show, which was lovely even through some clouds on the horizon, and took photos and videos.  These and others will be posted sometime, but my computer is way to slow to handle much photo and video work now.

Well, dear blog reader, I'm sorry to have distracted you from an otherwise worth-while day, but I did want to keep up, if only to unload the brain for the next day's accumulations.

Speaking of which,  having been thinking and talking about Emily Dickinson a lot over the past months, I reflected that it was a good thing her experiences of nature and the world were limited to the relatively modest proportions and pretensions of New England.  I thought, if she witnessed what I had these past few days, her brain would have caught fire and she would have burnt to a crisp.  And that would have been a tragic loss for us all.

Off to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, and then on to San Francisco, where I might just leave my heart.
(Have already left my left hip in Riverside).  Catch you later.

Sitting in a noisy McDonald's in Salinas, CA, because my cheap motel charges 4 bucks for wi-fi!!
Anyway, I am a total failure as a blogger, largely because I have actually turned out to be a smashing success as a traveller!  Just can't do both!  Today was one of the most spectacular treats I've ever experienced (and I've even eaten Breyer's ice cream!). The 80 miles or so drive up CA Rte. 1 between San Simeon and Carmel, known as Big Sur, was unbelievable.  High cliffs meeting the ocean with huge rocks jutting up....you've seen the pictures, but this was really real.  Megacove after megacove...uncountable, one more magnificent than the other, each one almost a mile wide arc of cliffs  dropping down to the pounding ocean, studded with amazing rocky prominences.  Sheer beauty, I thought, and then realized the pun!  Almost as amazing as the natural land/seascape is the incredible engineering and labor that produced the highway that climbs and curves and switchbacks its way alongside those cliffs, so the awestruck traveller is at the right height to look down hundreds of feet to the ocean and up another hundreds to the tops of the steep mountainside which he is actually travelling upon!  Yet the road is usually very wide and smooth and feels remarkably safe. 
Anyway, I did take lots of photos and some videos, of course, and will post them when I can.  And yes, they include elephant seals frolicking in a most accommodating and picturesque tidal cove.  They seem to enjoy being in California, too.

And I even took a detour to avoid going all the way up the coast to Monterey, since I was suffering from sensory overload, and the sun was in my face when I looked at the ocean that late in the day.  I hung a right inland to Salinas, a working class burg where English is spoken as a second language and John Steinbeck has a National Center.

Tomorrow I go back and explore Monterey (the 17 mile drive, etc.) and then up to Santa Cruz.
Till then.....be well and keep in touch.

Hello again.  It's been forever!  Want to know how to post photos and maps on this blog so I can use it as a travel journal.  Don't see any obvious way yet...but I'll keep looking.