Trip Analysis

Hey all! Back from my travels out west and I'm going to declare that it was one of the best weeks of my life. I'm happy and sad to be home, but am thankful that I was able to take this kind of trip (especially during the school year). I'm not sure how much sleep I had throughout the trip, but I can tell you the first few nights we maybe had a couple hours at best. Vegas was the big culprit, as was our early flights to and from Portland. Drew and I estimated that we traveled over 6,000 miles (1,500 driving, the rest by plane or train) during our trip and we hit a total of 10 states (most of them ones I had never been to or through. All this in only 7 days - ahh the joys of being young.

I'm going to try and break this down by city and day and just write a summary about each.

Day One - Las Vegas
I flew into Los Angeles by myself and had the daunting task of picking up the car and driving like mad through the rush hour traffic in LA on a Saturday. I survived and picked up Drew's sister, Andrea at the other L.A. airport and then we made our way along highway 15 to Las Vegas. Our Ford Focus was amazing and we made pretty good time. I can't say enough about the weather and the view around us while we were out there - just awesome. We made it into Vegas while the sun set and found our hotel ok. We stayed at the Mirage which is right on the strip. I somehow got myself a penthouse suite and we supposedly stayed on the same floor as Jay Leno (he was preforming at our hotel that night). We never saw him though - too bad. Once Drew flew in, the three of us walked the strip and stopped at various places. We didn't gamble too much - I think I maybe spent 20 dollars total and of course, lost it all. We did get to see the fountain in front of the Bellagio, which was cool at night. We stayed up very late (2 am in Vegas - but 5 am to our bodies) and since we had been up since a little before 5 the morning before, I was exhausted by the end of the day. One thing about Vegas and this can be said about Portland as well - very clean. Everything was clean.

Day Two - Portland, Oregon
We flew up to Portland for leg two of our journey. We got in fairly early and got downtown via train (very cheap) by noon or a little after. Drew and I met up with our friend Rob (buddy from WMU) and his two friends and we spent the afternoon with them. We had lunch at Rock Bottom Brewery (some tasty beer by the way) and then made our way to a nickel arcade (in an old movie theatre) and some local stores. It was very different from our day in Vegas, but Portland altogether is a very different place. Very reserved, but very cool too. Kind of like a gentle giant. Just a beautiful city with lots of unique characteristics to it. It didn't remind me of any place I've ever been to. I can see why lots of people like to live in the area. The weather was crazy too - rained periodically three or four times with no clouds and sunshine in-between (I'm told this is the norm out there). Welcome to the Pacific Northwest. It was neat just walking around the city and not necessarily going a lot of places, but experiencing everything.

Day Three - Big Sur, California
Today was a big travel day and our last long car ride. We flew back to Las Vegas (past the mountains which was awesome) and picked up our Focus. From there - we traveled all the back across the desert and up the California coast - a grand total trip of about eight hours. The Focus drove excellent (really great on the gas too). I had fun again watching the scene around me change as we went from the city, to the desert, to the green mountains of California and finally to the Pacific (my first time seeing it). Our drive on highway one was very cool. We were driving along the highway while the sun set and it was a very cool to experience. We didn't reach Big Sur until after dark and our campground was closed. They left us the key however (so graciously) and we stayed in a little log cabin that night. Ate some food at the Big Sur Roadhouse - excellent place - and finished the night with a campfire (can't beat that). Driving on the rocky cliffs of that coast was unlike anything (there were a lot of firsts this trip) I've ever done. Drew referred it to like driving in a videogame. I quickly reminded him that if you fall of the edge though, you can't hit the reset button. Great weather while there. Just awesome.

Day Four - San Francisco, CA
We departed Big Sur the next morning having a better look at our surroundings now that it was daylight. Continued on highway one again (my turn this time) and made our way towards Frisco. Our GPS system (saved us countless times) guided us to our hotel in downtown San Fran and luckily we were able to park in a safe place for the day/night. We walked pretty much the rest of the day (if I would do it again - I might rethink this strategy) climbing and running down the hills of San Fran. We passed the famous zig-zag street called Lombard St. Pretty neat. We toured Alcatrez Island and took a tour of the island - pretty sweet. Very cool place with an almost eerie feeling (I would've hated to be there at night). Fisherman's Wharf was also cool. We ate some seafood and walked around, doing some shopping, etc. - just taking it all in once again. We also saw the protestors as the olympic torch was in the city the day we left for Santa Barbara (but we didn't see Richard Gere - darn!). Crazy that we were there at the same time. San Fran very different from the cities we had been to so far - lots of homeless and very dirty. Drew and I commented numerous times about these facts. All and all though, very neat city and we even caught a Giants-Padres game that night - not bad for a day.

Day Five - Santa Barbara, CA
We made our way back down the coast (but avoiding highway one this time) towards Santa Barbara. We originally were thinking San Diego, but by the time we would have got there, it would have been night and we would have missed out on everything and wasted a day on travel. We made it to S.B. in the afternoon, after of course my speeding ticket - ugh (didn't see a cop all day until the guy in my rear-view mirror). We acutally found a pretty good deal for the kind of city it is (very nice). The city is set on the coast with the mountains in the backdrop. There were tons of stores in the city itself, but no skyscrapers or anything. Just a very big Harbor Springs perhaps, but with more variety and more glitzy. We ate at the Santa Barbara Brewing Co. that night and walked around the town a lot (bought some wine!). The next morning before we left we even went to a winery to taste some wine (very good). Drew wouldn't let us leave California without going to at least one winery and I agreed. We went down by the harbor and the Wharf as well and went through some of the shops. Very good place to stay at - I'm glad we stopped there that night.

Day Six - Los Angeles, Union Station
After a lot of hassle between getting to the train station, dropping off the car, and getting to the train station we made it with an hour to spare before our train departed that afternoon/evening. We both checked one bag and had two bags with us on board - we had to each buy one bag to put the stuff we had collected/bought on the trip in it. We had coach seats (no sleeper car) next to each other and sat in the very last car of our amtrak train. The first night we made it as far as eastern California before the sun went down. We spent that night trying to find a good way to sleep in those uncomfortable seats. What a battle that was. Cool looking out the window and just taking it all in after having to do everything ourselves over the previous five days.

Day Seven - Cross-Country Travel
Today was our continued travel onboard the train. We passed through New Mexico and by nightfall, Colorado. We were going at a pretty slow pace through N.M. because of the turns and the mountains. We actually got some snow while on the train and for me, it was a sign that we were returning home and our trip was close to its end. Took a lot of neat pictures that day and saw a lot of cool things that people don't normally see driving through Michigan or other areas of the country. Just neat taking it all in. Drew and I watched DVD's on his laptop when we weren't stareing out the window and just having a good time relaxing. Let me tell you - there were some kind of different people in the seats all around us, so there was always someone watching our bags (we never both left the seats at the same time).

Day Eight - Chicago & Kalamazoo
Today we arrived in Chicago. Our friend Mel was there to meet us as we got to the train station. The train was actually on-time, almost exactly on-time (3:20 pm). We did some more Drew and Adam running around to get a rental car and made in back to Kalamazoo around 10 pm our time. Whew. What a trip.

I'm sure I made a bunch of typos in here, so please forgive me. But I got pretty much most of the trip on here, so be thankful for that. I'm just glad I didn't try and copy my trip log onto here - that would have taken hours. I'm going to try and put some pictures on here soon, but it's sometimes hard to get them on here. Hope everyone enjoyed the entry.