San Diego: getting there....

Well after a full days worth of flying, and killing time in aiports we've successfully completed the first and in all likelihood the easiest leg of our journey.  As the previous post indicates,  the Washington-Dulles airport has some pretty pricey beers.  Good thing there aren't anymore airports in our forseeable future.

Our plane landed an hour early last night, so after collecting up our baggage and grabbing a post card or two we decided we may as well just get down to it and walk from the airport to our hostel.  A cool 3.5 miles, easy as pie.  We hiked around San Diego bay taking in the tall ships, submarines, and old steamers docked there.  We kept a vigilant eye out for marine wildlife, but save for a small crab skittering across the rocks we didn't see too much.  What the bay lacked in sea lions, and cool marine life it definitely made up for in homeless men sleeping along the shore. 

Lucky D's hostel is a pretty sweet spot, and the atmosphere is great.  It's quite sizeable and theres seems as though there are at least a couple dozen other residents right now.  Lucky us, we just happened to arrive on free dinner night, and with complimentary breakfast this morning we haven't had to shell out too much cash as of yet. 

Today we plan to tie up all loose ends, grabbing up the last couple bits of gear and supplies that we'll need before we hit the trail head tomorrow.  The weather's pretty gloomy right now and looks as though it may be a rainy one.  Unofrtunatelty the San Diego Zoo may have to be put aside for another, less rainy day.

The hostel's computers aren't seeming exactly compatible with my GoPro camera at this point, so pictures and videos are coming whenever we find ourselves a less ancient computer on which to upload them. Stay tuned, and since this is San Diego also "stay classy."

--Jesse

Let's get this stone rolling...

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived."

-Henry David Thoreau

Well, it has begun. I had meant to post something before we actually hit the road, but when I began to write at 530 this morning after not sleeping a wink, everything I wrote down ended up being total crap... So you're welcome. Hopefully anything I spew out now, sitting in the airport, after drinking some unreasonably expensive beer, sucks a little less.

The fact remains however, that this trip is officially underway. Although with everything happening over the past week or so, one could argue that I've been in the thick of it for days. This week has been interesting. Its been a week full of great times and hard times. I got to spend the week unemployed, waking up when I want, hanging out with awesome people all day, brewery tours, bowling, croquet socials, conversation over dinners and conversation over liquor. But they all ended in the inevitable goodbye.. some for months, others for years and some even forever. It's been difficult, but having to deal with these hard times has really left me humbled, put things into prospective for mecand left me driven, determined to get to BC and make everyone back home proud.

The only thing that stands in our way now is 1 flight and a couple buses (and a super fun day at the zoo to come tomorrow, which I'm stoked on) and then it'll finally be time spit in mother nature's smug face and show her that we call the shots. Stay tuned for more from me, but hopefully Jesse will have something for you soon too.

Happy trails!
(Side bar: I may start signing off with happy trails haha)

Mike

Hikin on the Bruce

Well guys, I know I haven't posted for a while, but I'm back! And with the trip less than a month away you can expect to see more in the coming days.

I loved the Bluffs

Jesse and I have both been doing what we can to tie up the loose ends that are left and really get ourselves into hike mode. So last weekend my girlfriend, Kim, and I, headed north to spend 3 days sauntering along the bluffs of Georgian Bay, hiking through Lion's Head Provincial Nature Reserve. It was a nice little taste of what's to come and basically just a wicked way to spend a weekend.

We were a little discouraged on the way up, because of the rainy forecast we thought was unavoidable. But lucked out when we didn't get a drop of rain our entire trip (even though I was really looking forward to taking my awesomely handsome rain skirt for a test drive). Even with no rain though, we learned that the forces of nature are nothing to take lightly. After a great day of hiking, taking time to gaze off the cliffs at the turquoise water below us, we finally settled for the night on a cobble stone beach, where the sounds of crashing waves and a chorus of frogs in a nearby pond lulled us to sleep... Until the piercing cold kicked in and made sure we didn't sleep a wink for the rest of the night. It was good though, we learned not to be cocky, layer up according to the conditions and chose our site carefully. I wouldn't change it for the world.

The View from Our Campsite

The next few days were also great, more great scenery, great terrain, napping in the sun, reading by the lake sitting by a roaring fire (which if anyone from the Bruce Trail Association asks, we didn't light). Not a bad time of life. One major highlight for me, was finding what I still firmly believe are the tracks of an Eastern Cougar, a very rare and newly reestablished species to the area. Now I say STILL believe, because Kim showed the pictures we took to an MNR biologist who dismissed them as black bear tracks. But I don't buy it. Black bears have 5 toes, these have 4, which I think rules out a bear outright. Plus I have a zoology degree.. So I'm totally right.

*Edit* :... I think it might be a black bear. Hey, nobody's perfect...

Two Happy Hikers

All in all, it was a great trip. Hopefully I'll be able to get outside for more little adventures before we ship out. So stay posted for more!

Also, I'd like to welcome those of you reading that got directed here from the pcta website. It's nice to get some traffic through here that aren't just friends and family, so please keep checking back!