Ren's Footprints

Hello everyone. My friend Ryan and I were chosen to receive a road trip grant from www.roadtripnation.com and took off for Canada last week. We had tons of fun, but there were many setbacks. Check out my blog and pictures!

Here are the pictures. Feel free to comment on the ones you like or have questions about! http://www.picturetrail.com/gallery/view?p=999&gid=16096786&uid=8139566

Saturday 4/7:
We left San Francisco at around 5:30 PM via the 101 over the Golden Gate Bridge. We then took the 37 east to I-80 east to I-505 north and finally the I-5 north which would eventually bring us to Canada. We ate dinner in Williams, California where we sampled olives and bought some groceries. We planned on camping that night so we were becoming disappointed as the rain started to fall as we approached our campsite. Alas, the rain stopped and we were able to have a nice, peaceful, dry camp-out at Castle Crags State Park in Castella, California.

Sunday 4/8:
I made some scrumptious breakfast potatoes with sausage in the morning with my camp stove. Then we went on a bike ride to a vista point where we could see Mt. Shasta. Finally, we decided to hit the road because we planned on arriving in Seattle tonight.
The drive was absolutely gorgeous. The I-5 from Mt Shasta to Seattle has so many beautiful sights to see. We went over many different mountain passes which was pretty cool. Our only big stop was in Medford to get lunch and buy some film.
We arrived in Seattle around 11:00 PM and stayed with Ryan's friend Mike. I was impressed that he could live in the middle of Seattle but still live on a dirt road in a house surrounded by trees.
We inflated our air mattress and went to sleep.

Monday 4/9:
Ryan and I met one of our friends for breakfast that goes to the University of Washington. Her name is Hiroka and we met her on the beach in San Francisco. She brought along her friend Akiko and they both hang out with us through the morning.
We then went to the Sculpture park and saw some cool art and great views of the beauty which surrounds Seattle.
Later that day we went on a bike ride with Mike, and a friend of ours who also goes to San Francisco state who happened to be in Seattle at the same time. The ride was really beautiful and we were able to take lots of pictures of downtown from a beautiful, unique location.
That night we were able to have dinner downtown with all of our friends in Seattle, then we went to a beautiful lookout point where we got some pictures of Seattle at night.

Tuesday 4/10:
Today we woke up at 6:30 AM, picked up Hiroka and Akiko, and set off for some hot springs way out in the wilderness east of Seattle. We first took I-90 for around 30 miles then took a dirt road for around 30 more miles. Ryan was behind the wheel the whole time and was having fun being able to drive on the rural, bumpy, dirt-road. A couple times while on the road we hit some nasty bumps but his 2001 Ford Escape seemed to be handling it well.
We had a rough time following the directions to the place but finally we got to the place where the directions said we would have to cross a river by foot. At this point it was snowing and we were cold. We trekked to the shore and instantly realized that the river was way too strong and cold for us to cross so we just had to turn back.
Knowing that we had hit some violent bumps on the way here, I decided to look under the car to see if there was any damage. I couldn't see much, but I realized that we were leaking fluid. I told Ryan about it and so on our way home we stopped at a gas station to try and have a closer look. The attendants there suggested we go to Big-O, so off we went, and that's when the bad news started to pile up. It turns out that the transmission case was punctured and oil reservoir was also damaged. Luckily where was a transmission shop a few units down so the Escape was pushed there.
After getting an Enterpise rental car, we went to the transmission shop and talked a bit with the owner. We even agreed to participate in one of our Roadtripnation.com interviews so we got him on film and learned about his background and how he got to where he is today. He talked about how there are so many "garbage" jobs out there so you should really strive your passion. He has always been into cars and so he studied automotives. He began by being a scrub at an auto shop, and ended up owning his own business. He was a very personable guy and it was a pleasure to meet him.
We finally got back to Seattle that night being disappointed we couldn't go to the hot spring, nor could we even drive Ryan's car anymore. We were showered with delicious fortune soon after though when our friends made us a huge, ethnic dinner with various courses from all over the world. We also had a cake to celebrate Ryan's upcoming birthday.

Wednesday 4/11:
This morning we said goodbye to our friends in Seattle and made our way to Canada. The I-5 was a bit busy in northern Seattle for a while, but it eventually cleared up and it was smooth sailing the rest of the way. As we looked north we could see some of the beautiful Canadian mountains. It was quite a sight to see and added to the excitement of going there.
We approached the Canadian border patrol and watched as one-by-one cars would be waved along into Canada. When it was our turn, though, we were pulled aside and were told to go into the immigrations office to have our records checked. Finally, after around a 20 minute wait, the bad news came. After 1000 miles of driving we were being denied entry into Canada due to one of our personal histories. This was very crushing news, and we had no choice but to return to Seattle.

Thursday 4/12:
Today we spent hours dealing with talking to insurance and rental car companies on the phone. Ryan and I spent our free time at Green Lake where we went for a stroll.
We interviewed Mike of Cascadian Edible Landscapes and really like what he had to say. He stressed that the enjoyment of life hours is so much more important than focusing on just becoming rich in the future. We agreed with him that if you aren't happy with your career that you probably won't be happy in life.

Friday 4/13:
Today we met up with our new friend in Seattle, Carol, somewhere downtown. It turned out that we wanted to do different things so we didn't hang out with her the rest of the day. We ended up cruising around the public market, and taking a ferry to Bainbridge. The ferry ride was beautiful and was a nice, slow change of pace.

Saturday 4/14:
We found out that the Enterprise rental car wasn't going to be able to be returned to San Francisco like we had hoped so Saturday morning we were forced to return that, get another car from Budget, and then end our trip by hitting the road down the I-5 south. I took the wheel from Seattle all the way to College City, California. Ryan took over at that point and took us the last couple hours home. That was the most driving I had ever done in a single day. It was exhausting, but I really enjoyed it.